Metallica frontman James Hetfield has responded to fans’ concerns about his voice.
In the latest ‘The Metallica Report’ episode, the lead singer talked about his health and his love for smoking cigars. It’s become his habit to puff on a cigar just before hitting the stage for a live show. This sparked some worry among fans about whether it might affect Hetfield’s voice. During the show, the rocker said:
“There’s a lot of people around me that are concerned about that and the health and what not.”
He then shared how he feels about it:
“I feel that I am kind of singing the best that I have in a long time and I am doing my best, and I get to enjoy that as well, so we’ll see.”
Hetfield Collaborated With A Cigar Company
Hetfield and Blackened American Whiskey teamed up with Drew Estate to create a new cigar inspired by Metallica. The collaboration resulted in Blackened Cigars ‘M81’ by Drew Estate. The project was driven by three experts: Drew Estate founder Jonathan Drew, Hetfield, the Master Distiller and Blender of Blackened American Whiskey.
They sent samples from Drew Estate’s collection to Hetfield and Dietrich to review and critique each cigar. After two years of trying different cigars, the team settled on a specific flavor profile.
It didn’t stop with just one collaboration. The company once more collaborated with the singer for a second project.
Voice Problems Affected The Shows
Though it’s unclear if it’s from all the cigars he has smoked, Hetfield’s vocal problems started affecting the band’s live shows.
According to Ed Masley from the Arizona Republic, Metallica’s gig at State Farm Stadium on September last year had a 14-song lineup, a couple of tracks shorter than their usual opening nights since the ‘M72’ tour in the US. Normally, they would end with ‘Master Of Puppets’ after ‘Seek & Destroy.’ They started playing the intro to ‘The Day That Never Comes’ but switched to ‘Hardwired’ as the twelfth song.
Setlist.fm also mentioned that Metallica dropped ‘The Day That Never Comes’ and ‘Master Of Puppets’ from the set because of issues with James’s vocals.
We can say the reason will be clearer as time passes by.