James Hetfield speaks to Metal Hammer about his earliest musical experience. For the full feature, get yourself a copy of this month’s action-packed Metal Hammer!

Metal Hammer caught up with James Hetfield for a very special My Life Story. To catch the whole interview (including what James thought Cliff Burton would have made of the 90’s), get your hands on a copy of the latest issue of Metal Hammer – on sale now!

Metal Hammer: You First studied piano at the age of nine, then later got interested in your brother’s drums. Were the piano lessons in classical music?

James Hetfield: “Yeah. My mom had seen me over at a friend’s house just kind of start bashing on the piano, and she thought, oh, he’s gonna be a musician, OK, we’ll sign him up for piano. I did that for a couple of years and it was really a bit of a turn-off because it was learning classical pieces, stuff that I wasn’t listening to on the radio, you know?”

“I remember it was an older woman’s house and the cookies at the end was the big deal. But I am so glad it was somewhat forced upon me, because the act of left and right hand doing different things, and also singing at the same time, it gave me some inkling of what I do now. Singing and playing are somewhat easier than it probably could have been if I hadn’t have had piano.”

Get the full James Hetfield My Life Story in this month’s Metal Hammer!