James Hetfield

Singer-songwriter-guitarist James Hetfield largely defined the sound and scope of the formidable heavy metal band Metallica, which rose from the underground thrash metal scene of the early 1980s to stand astride not only their chosen genre, but much of popular music as a whole during its tumultuous three-decade career. Hetfield's leonine presence and gale force vocals pulled metal away from the spandex- and hairspray-fueled acts that dominated the scene at that time and returned it to its fiercely middle- to lower-class roots, which defined metal not by flash and fashion but by channeling the rage and frustration of its listeners into explosions of sound and force. With drummer Lars Ulrich and a rotating list of guitarists and bassists, Hetfield supercharged Metallica's ferocious sonic impact with the furious speed of punk rock and the high intensity anthems of British metal acts like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden The result was songs like the Grammy-winning "One," "Enter Sandman" and "Nothing Else Matters," which were punishingly loud and emotionally resonant to young listeners who made Metallica the leading metal act by the late 1990s. Their rise to fame came at the expense of Hetfield's health, which collapsed under the weight of alcohol addiction in 2001. After regaining his sobriety, Hetfield and Metallica once again seized the reins of the metal world with such No. 1 albums as St. Anger (2003) and Death Magnetic (2008), which cemented his position as the chief architect of one of the world's most popular musical acts.