The first logo (1) was designed by James Hetfield way back in the early 80s. James is the designer in the band and has done the logo, the scary guy mascot as well as a few single covers. It was originally white, printed on black background. Metallica used it on t-shirts, demo tapes and business cards.

At that time, before they signed to any label, Dave Mustaine was a member of the band but was kicked out because of his drinking problems. He later formed Megadeth, another popular trash metal band. He took the fish-hooks from the logo and included it in the Megadeth (2) logo.

Lars & Co got their record contract and changed the logo a bit. James deleted the border to make it cleaner (3). The color choosen was now Coca Cola red, and this is the logo that will forever be remembered as the original, all other versions are modified copies. It was used on Kill 'em all and the following singles "Whiplash" and "Jump in the fire". It has also been used on later singles with different colors, and are today still the logo to be used on most t-shirts and merchandise.

With "Ride the lightning" came another version, a 3D model with a pattern to match the sleeve. This survived for many albums and can even be seen on the black album released 7 years later, only interupted by the freehand style "Garage Days" logo (5) which probably ended up like this to show us that the EP was a un-formal release, and the "Justice" (6) and "One" (7) logo which both was a part of the cover. Later the "Bing & Purge" pox set was released, and another version saw the light of day, this time a "Spray painted" "Kill 'em all" logo, Nice.

With Load came a new area for the band. It was released 5 years after their previous studio album and Metallica needed to show the fans that they had changed. The result was the Load (9) logo, very different and you have to look hard to actually find the fish-hooks which made their logo a trademark. It shows us that the band has slowed down and been more "mature" and "modern". On the other hand, they created the ninja-star logo which was 4 "Kill 'em all" styled Ms. A nice idea, Metallica had to make clear that they still had their roots and feets on the ground.

Now, several years after last studio album with new original material Metallica release another new logo. This time it is heavy and agressive, probably to tell us that the new album will be hard. At the same time they need to look back, the hooks are there, and in my eyes it looks someting between the first logo and the "Kill en all" logo, nice!