James Hetfield has never shied away from openly being a big Motörhead guy. Time and time again, he has cited the English band's influence — which, upon Metallica's rise to prominence, enabled him to befriend frontman Lemmy Kilmister prior to his death in 2015.
While Kilmister's hometown of Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent in the UK is planning to erect a statute (notably not a playground) of the late singer-bassist, Hetfield has come up with his own personal monument to Lemmy: a tattoo inked with some of his ashes.
In a callback to Motörhead's signature song, "Ace of Spades," Hetfield revealed via the Metallica Instagram account that he had gotten the suit tattooed on his middle finger to memorialize his hero and friend. "Without him, there would be NO Metallica," the frontman wrote.
"Black ink mixed with a pinch of his cremation ashes that were so graciously given to me," Hetfield continued of the piece by artist Corey Miller. "So now, he is still able to fly the bird at the world."
Nothing else matters, after all.
