In a chat on The Surfer’s Journal’s ‘Soundings’ podcast, Robert Trujillo talked about his place in Metallica and how he got the gig.
Trujillo was in Ozzy Osbourne’s band when he got the Metallica offer. He mentioned that there were ‘two auditions’ for the band and that the drummer Lars Ulrich convinced him to join the band.
“And so, basically, now I’m thinking about Ozzy, and I told ’em — and I don’t even know why I said this, but I was always trying to be loyal to Ozzy and Sharon; they did so much for me,” he recalled. “So I was, like, ‘Well, I don’t think I can do those dates. But when I finish my commitment with Ozzy’ — whatever, eight-week run it was — I’ll jump on board.”
“And I remember Lars goes, ‘We respect your loyalty. It’s very honorable. But this train is leaving, and it’s moving fast, and you’ve gotta jump on board and jump on with us,’” the bassist revealed Ulrich’s speech. “I’m, like, ‘Okay.’ So I flew home that night, and I actually went to Sharon and Ozzy’s house and met with Sharon and said, ‘Yeah, I’m gonna join Metallica.’ And it was heavy. Yeah, it was just heavy ’cause I think when it’s all said and done, every musician, you’re writing music, you’re creating, you’re performing, so it’s all passion-driven.”
“So it’s hard when you’re losing a team member. Especially I had been [playing with Ozzy] for, like, seven years. So it was difficult, but I also felt that I needed to be there in person to tell him and tell her. And so that’s basically kind of how that went down. There was never any bad vibes… Usually when that happened in the past, it could get pretty ugly with anybody. I mean, you’re leaving a team, and it’s not good. And then, again, like I said, my life changed. All of a sudden I was a part of a new family, and I was living in a new area and it was just a different existence,” Trujillo added.
He accepted the offer, but apparently, playing in Metallica is a hard thing to do and not every bassist could do what he does in the band today.
“The biggest challenge has been with my bass playing. I’m not being disrespectful to all the bass players out there, but there aren’t many bassists that could do this job. Playing with Metallica is the most demanding gig there is,” he explained during an earlier interview with Bass Player.
Before joining Metallica, Rob Trujillo was already used to playing with big bands like Ozzy Osbourne and Suicidal Tendencies. But joining Metallica during a tough time for them came with its own challenges.
Still, he was well rewarded, getting a $1,000,000 bonus just for signing the contract. This moment was famously shown in the ‘Some Kind Of Monster’ documentary, where Trujillo struggled to stay calm when he got the offer.