During an interview with Loudersound, bassist Jason Newsted opened up about the time he was in Metallica, being ”disrespected” by his former bandmates.
Regarding this, the bassist said:
“I’m going to go back to ”Sad But True”, because that’s my highlight of the whole project, because of the weight. I struggled with ”Nothing Else Matters”; I knew it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, it was undeniable, but I was kinda scared of it, to be honest, because I still wanted ”CRUNCH!” ”Sandman” I thought was kinda corny, honestly. […]
“After the ”Black Album” tour we had some money, but it was a totally different direction for me. I liked playing the songs and I could raise myself up for the people to play the songs for them. But ”Enter Sandman” for the 1,000th time… it kinda wears on you.
“I wanted to be that person who I knew myself to be on and offstage with Metallica. When they saw me, they knew they were getting everything, every f**king ounce of sweat left on that stage. The reason they were getting that, and the way I was able to do that, was because of the wacky music that I was playing offstage with my friends.”
He added:
“I wish I could have taken [Echobrain] further, but it was not the catalyst that sent me away from Metallica. The thing that set me away from Metallica is what I call ‘the perpetual dis’. No matter how hard I worked, there was still disrespect. Not the hazing that I got from the first six months of my career, but the general disrespect that I got, dismissiveness. The dis and dis, I call it.
“It stemmed from, as a collective and as individuals, [the fact] they had never managed to deal with their grief from Cliff [Burton] when he died. This kind of s*it, it manifests itself in young men’s minds, and young millionaires’ minds. Spoilt, spoilt, spoilt millionaires’ minds and I include myself in that… it would be hard to get your head around that.
“So it was much more a personal thing. I needed to rest; they refused to give me the time to rest; I had to leave to get that rest.”