’s former producer has offered his theory on why 1988 album infamously has no audible bass. Fleming Rasmussen, who also produced the venerated (1984) and (1986) albums, has said that the heavy metal titans turned the low end down to haze then-new bassist . “I think – but this is purely speculation – I think that they did it to get some kind of reaction from Jason.
Because what they hated the most about Jason was that he was a fan,” Rasmussen explained to interviewer Daniel Sarkissian (per ). “He was never disagreeing or anything, or stating his own opinion. I think they were waiting for him to kind of state his place in the band.
.. I think they probably did it to get a reaction, and when it didn’t come, that was the way the album turned out.
” Newsted joined Metallica in late 1986, shortly after the death of his predecessor aged 24, and was famously hazed by his new bandmates. “For him [Newsted] and for us, it was difficult,” singer/guitarist James Hetfield said in a 2018 interview. “Psychology 101 will tell you that all our grief and sadness got directed at him, and quite a bit of it was that he was an easy target.
[...
] He was goofy enough to take it, which was a positive for him, and he was such a fan, and we hated that. We wanted to ‘unfan’ him.” Sign up below to get the latest from Metal Hammer, plus exclusive special offers, direct to your inbox! Newsted quit Metallica in 2001 and was replaced by current bassist Robert Trujillo in 2003.
He’d.
