10 Cars In James Hetfield's Collection That Prove He Has Great Taste

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By Mark Cowley/Dec. 22, 2022 11:15 am EST

James Hetfield might be most famous for fronting one of the world's foremost metal bands, but when he's not busy writing hits in the studio or tearing up arenas and festival stages worldwide, he's an avid car enthusiast. It turns out that the Metallica frontman is a big fan of classic metal in both senses of the word, with many of his cars originally hailing from the '30s, '40s, or '50s. Not that you'd recognize many of them at first glance, as Hetfield has extensively reworked nearly every one of them, with custom bodywork and unsurprisingly, some meaty engines under the hood.

Usually, piecing together a celebrity's car collection requires scouring car spotter sites or Instagram posts for a glimpse of a said celeb at the wheel of their prized possession. Hetfield helpfully exhibited all of his custom creations at the Petersen Auto Museum through 2020 and 2021. If you weren't lucky enough to catch them in real life at the exhibit, then worry not. Here's a quick roundup of ten of his coolest cars, proving that the metal legend has impeccable taste in both music and automobiles.

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While many of Hetfield's cars are modified versions of old-school classics, his Slow Burn custom isn't quite as old as it might first appear. It actually started life as a fiberglass-bodied recreation of a 1936 Auburn 852 Boattail Speedster, rather than an original '36 model itself (via Teamspeed). Slow Burn is one of several of Hetfield's creations built in collaboration with Rick Dore Kustoms, and it was Dore that was responsible for redesigning the car's exterior.

The original roof was removed, and a sloped convertible top was installed in a shade of white that matched the whitewall tires. The car was also repainted with a two-tone paint job that includes Root Beer Brown, a hue that pays homage to the early days of hot rodding. The grille and wheels were also redesigned to Hetfield's tastes, and the original interior upholstery was ripped out and replaced with luxurious tan leather. It might not be an original Auburn, but Slow Burn is just as classy as anything that left the automaker's factory in the Thirties, and then some.

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Originally, Hetfield bought himself a Ford F100 with the intention of turning it into a daily driver, but it ended up turning out a little different. He bought the truck online, reports MotorTrend, and sent it to Blue Collar Customs for some light mods and restoration. However, it turned out that the truck had some issues that Hetfield wasn't originally aware of, and as they were fixed, the F100 started looking more like a show car than a regular daily driver.

By the time it was delivered back to the Metallica frontman, it had undergone a full overhaul, with the 445ci engine being rebuilt by a specialist racing tuner and air suspension added for the perfect stance. A custom suicide hood was installed and a unique tailgate was built to fit in with the theme of the rest of the build. Despite its new-found show car status, Scott Mugford of Blue Collar Customs claimed that Hetfield would still get plenty of seat time in Str8 Edge, saying "we know he'll get in the thing and go 90 mph. He uses his stuff for sure."

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While most of Hetfield's cars end up modified in some way or another, his '32 Ford Roadster 'Blackjack' is not like the rest. In an interview, Hetfield confirmed that the car is almost a complete stock restoration, as he claimed the original car was "difficult to improve." Sure enough, the car looks as good as if it had rolled straight off the production line, albeit with a few subtle improvements here and there.

Hetfield said that he didn't put too much thought into ensuring everything was one hundred percent period correct, instead approaching the project with the attitude, "what would it be like if some kid from the '40s got ahold of his dad's old car and wanted to hot rod it?" He admits that, with many of his show cars, how they drive and handle isn't his biggest priority, so things like engines are in many cases an afterthought. He doesn't specify exactly what engine is in Blackjack, only saying "it had to be a flathead."

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The VooDoo Priest is a 1937 Lincoln Zephyr with much of its original art deco styling kept the same, apart from the '38 rear quarters, lowered deck lid, and custom rockers. It reportedly spent much of its life in disrepair on a driveway in California, after its original owner went missing shortly after returning home from service in Vietnam (via Kustomrama). The Metallica frontman bought it in unrestored condition and reworked it into its current state.

The car's original engine, a 4.4L flathead V12, was retained and rebuilt by a specialist into show-winning condition. The car's interior was also reworked in Candy Apple red, white and black, with the same art deco theme conveyed throughout the rest of the vehicle. The VooDoo Priest is one of the most well-traveled of Hetfield's hot rods, with Kustomrama reporting that the car was shipped to Sweden for exhibition in 2013 before spending a short time on display at a Ford dealer in Sacramento.

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One of the most complex builds Hetfield has undertaken is that of Black Pearl, which started life as a 1948 Jaguar Mk4. Discussing the creative process for designing the one-off, Hetfield said "We started out with a left-hand-drive Jaguar, [but] we couldn't get what we wanted out of it so we just kept drawing" (via Hemmings). It's loosely inspired by the art deco style of European coachbuilders of the era, but Hetfield said that it mixed in American hot rod influences too.

The car was built in collaboration with Rick Dore, with the hand-beaten panelwork built from scratch by Marcel and Luc De Lay. Eventually, very little of the original Jaguar chassis was left, with most of the car being totally rebuilt. Sitting under the hood of the Black Pearl is a 302 ci Ford V8, which is mated to a Ford C4 automatic transmission. The car won the Goodguys Custom of the Year when it was revealed in finished form in 2014, and it also formed a central part of the exhibit at the Petersen in 2020.

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The first custom car to emerge from the collective minds of James Hetfield and Rick Dore was Skyscraper, a pastel-colored Buick Skylark. Petersen Auto Museum broke down exactly what the build entailed – the badging was removed and the front bumper was smoothed out, and various small tweaks were made to accentuate the car's shape, including chopping the roof. The interior was also completely overhauled, with several references added to commemorate the car's rockstar owner.

The accelerator pedal is taken off a bass drum, says Petersen, and the interior gauges were made to resemble Fender guitar picks. Hetfield often displayed his matching ESP guitar and Mesa Boogie amplifier alongside the car at shows, in case it wasn't already obvious what its owner did for a living. The Skylark isn't usually a model that's seen in hot rod form, as it's usually the preserve of purist collectors who prefer to keep the car exactly as it rolled off the production line. But, it was Hetfield's unusual request to work on the car that reportedly got Dore's attention: "When James asked me, I said, I'd love to do it. Who gets to do a Skylark?"

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As well as sending his cars off to various shops around California, Hetfield has also been known to work on them himself. One of his home-brew projects was his '36 Ford, nicknamed "Iron Fist," which he originally built as a rat rod and displayed at a number of local car shows (via MotorTrend). After deciding that the car needed a freshen-up, he turned to Blue Collar Customs, the same shop that had worked on Str8 Edge, his Ford F100.

The shop gave the car the once-over, installing air suspension and altering the bodywork to it to drop completely to the floor. Originally, the plan was to finish the car in black, but after seeing it in its bare-metal state, Hetfield opted to keep it with a slightly unfinished look. It might still look a little rough around the edges, but it's fitted with a cleverly-disguised air-con system to make it one of the metal legend's more comfortable cars to ride in. MotorTrend reports that the shop carefully fitted an all-electric AC system between the seats and the trunk, so it's totally hidden from view. Air is blown into the cabin through vents sourced from an old boat.

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With a name as controversial as "The Dead Kennedy," Hetfield's 1963 Lincoln Continental was always going to draw attention. Not that it needed to borrow the name of one of punk's finest bands to turn heads, as its lowered and modded look took care of that by itself. Petersen Museum notes that it was the first car "that Hetfield extensively modified by himself," giving the car a full repaint, adding new wheels and tires, and altering the grille to sit in front of the headlights.

Under the hood sits a 430 ci V8, although it's not clear what power it's putting out (via GQ). Suicide doors complete the death-themed car, which as its name suggests, is the same model that JFK sat in when he was assassinated. Petersen reports that the car was originally painted seaweed green with flames on the side and hood, but clearly, Hetfield decided the two-tone black paint was a better fit for this darkest of custom cars.

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Another of the more extensively modified cars in Hetfield's collection is Aquarius, which is built on the chassis of a '34 Packard (via The Drive). Like the Black Pearl, the bodywork of the car was created by hand by Marcel and Luc De Lay of Marcel's Custom Metals, with the resulting shape being a totally unique one-off creation. Under the hood, things are a little different than many of Hetfield's other cars, as there's no period-correct engine here. Instead, Aquarius packs an LS3 V8. That's right, even a collector as particular as Hetfield can't resist the odd LS swap.

The unique design of the car allows the driver to sit almost on the floor, with the axles sitting roughly in line with the driver's waist. Like so many of the other cars here, Aquarius was built with help from Rick Dore, but it was mostly Hetfield's ideas that shaped the design. Dore said in an interview, "James definitely knows what he wants [...] and I give him a little guidance when he needs it."

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The last of the ten cars exhibited at the Petersen by Hetfield was Crimson Ghost, which started off as a 1937 Ford Coupe (via Hagerty). It appears to have been given a few modifications in Hetfield's signature style, including the new, bigger grille and revised headlights. It also sits so low to the ground that it's likely to be on air suspension, although this hasn't been confirmed by Hetfield himself. Like much of the rest of his collection, the chopped roof and sloped rear end pay homage to an era of car design when looks mattered more than anything else.

With the rise of increasingly homogeneous SUVs and crossovers, that era is long gone, but at least collections like Hetfield's keep that spirit alive. However, he's no stranger to cutting-edge vehicles – in a 2020 interview, he said his daily drivers were now a Tesla and a Ford SVT Raptor, both a far cry from his opulent art deco show cars. Clearly, even a man with as impeccable tastes as Hetfield's isn't immune from the charms of Elon Musk's segment-defining EVs.