James Hetfield confessed that his hobby is bee-keeping.

With their concert in Antarctica on December 12th 2013, Metallica became one of the only bands in the world to play a show on all seven continents.

In 1989 Metallica was nominated for the best hard rock/heavy metal performance Grammy, but lost to Jethro Tull. When they won two years later, they thanked Jethro Tull for not doing an album that year.

Metallica has won four american music awards: 1992 (two awards), 1993 and 1997.

Metallica has won four MTV Video Music Awards.

In 2009 Metallica was elected into the rock and roll hall of fame.

The band Apocalyptica released a tribute album for Metallica, doing Metallica's songs in cello versions.

Metallica is the fourth best-selling music artist since the SoundScan era began tracking sales on May 25, 1991, selling a total of 52,672,000 albums in the United States alone (December 2009).

The band's 1991 album, Metallica, has sold over 15 million copies in the United States, and 28 million copies worldwide, which makes it the 25th-best-selling album in the country. In December 2009, it became the best-selling album of the SoundScan era, surpassing 1997's Come on Over by country artist Shania Twain.

Metallica have had five consecutive album debuts at number one on billboard, making Metallica the first band to do so.

Metallica has received nine Grammy Awards, six were for the "Best Metal Performance" award in 1990, 1991, 1992, 1999, 2004, and 2009

Lars Ulrich was a big fan of the swedish hard rock band E.F. Band. In 1981 he asked then if he could be their drummer, but they turned his offer down.

The day before Cliff Burton died, Metallica drew cards. The winner was allowed to choose which bed he would later sleep in. Cliff won, and chose Kirk Hammett's bed, which would cause him his death.

The song "Trapped Under Ice" is based upon a demo song of Hammett's former band Exodus entitled "Impaler", which was later released on its album Tempo of the Damned (2004).

"The Call of Ktulu" off of Ride The Lightning was intentionally misspelled because the band did not want to actually call upon the mythical creature by spelling out its full name.

One of the bassists to audition for Metallica, following Cliff Burton's death in 1986 was Kirk Hammett's friend Les Claypool (Primus, Blind Illusion), but he was rejected for playing too well. This was confirmed in an episode of VH1: Behind the Music.

Layne Staley (deceased Alice In Chains vocalist) was reportedly a source of inspiration for the title of Metallica's 2008 album 'Death Magnetic'. Lead guitarist Kirk Hammett brought a photograph of Staley to the studio where Metallica was recording. "That picture was there for a long time," said Hammett, "I think it pervaded James' psyche."

The intro riff to the Metallica song "Don't Tread on Me" from the album 'Metallica' was borrowed from the song "America" in the movie West Side Story.

Lars Ulrich used to be a tennis player during child/younghood and played some important matches at European level with young tennis players such as Boris Becker.

Metallica's first ever gig was on 14th March 1982 at Radio City in Anaheim, California.

When the covers for Ride the Lightning were being printed, an error occurred at the European printing press and a few of the covers came out green instead of blue. The records with the green covers are now considered to be extremely rare.

Frontman James Hetfield was originally in a short-lived band named Leather Charm, alongside bassist Ron McGovney (who spent only a year in Metallica). When Hetfield decided that his band Leather Charm should move to be more serious, the band broke up. Shortly after, Metallica was born.

In 1991, Hetfield blew his voice doing a cover of the song "So What" during the recording of the album Metallica, and had to be completely retrained.

As a reaction to the PMRC language warning labels, Metallica put a sticker in the shape of a stop sign on early pressings of their 'Master of Puppets' album, that read: "The only track you probably won't want to play is "Damage, Inc." due to the multiple uses of the infamous "F" word. Otherwise, there aren't any "shits," "fucks," "pisses," "cunts," "motherfuckers," or "cocksuckers" anywhere on this record"

St. Anger is dedicated to one of Hammett's major influences: Kenneth Anger. Anger was an active esoterist (which some of his films reflect) and a sympathizer of Aleister Crowley's "Thelema" philosophy. Anger is also a member of the secret society known as Ordo Templi Orientalis. Anger is well known in Hollywood for movies such as "Hollywood Babylon", which is also the title of a song by the Misfits. Anger was a friend of the Rolling Stones and Jimmy Page, and was a huge influence on Hammett.

In their song "St. Anger", the refrain contains the phrase "Fuck it all and fucking no regrets", which also appeared 17 years earlier in the lyrics of their song "Damage, Inc."

From the album 'Ride the Lightning', "For Whom the Bell Tolls" is based on the novel of the same name by Ernest Hemingway.

The cover artwork to the band's 1996 album 'Load' was a photo by artist Andres Serrano entitled "Blood and Semen III". The photo actually contains a mingling of bovine blood and the artist's own semen between two sheets of Plexiglas. 1997's 'Reload' had similar cover art - Serrano's "Piss and Blood" - which was created with a similar method. Kirk Hammett got the idea to use the images after seeing Godflesh's video clip for "Crush My Soul", where Serrano was also involved. Load was also Metallica's first studio album whose booklet contained only a few lines of lyrics from each song, rather than in their entirety.

"Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" is based on the book/movie One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest.

The famous intro to "Blackened" which opens the album '...And Justice for All' was originally recorded "backwards" compared to how we hear it today, being flipped in reverse for the 1988 release.

The introduction of the song "The Frayed Ends of Sanity" (...And Justice for All) was taken from the movie The Wizard of Oz (1939). The Wicked Witch's guards are singing the exact same tune when marching in front of the witch's castle.