James Hetfield

The "Unforgiven" is the actual touring acoustic guitar of James Hetfield. It's a custom-made guitar designed in Milan, Italy. Black top with a finish made with pyrography. It's actually a Line 6 Variax 700 Acoustic with some of the lyrics and scenes from the Unforgiven II song and videoclip.

In this image we can see James playing one of his custom Ken Lawrence Explorers. The guitar is also listed on Metallica's official website.

James used this guitar to record the intro on “The Unforgiven II” from the 1997 album “Reload”, and it was seen in the music video for the song.

The guitar is a mid 90s reissue of the 1952 Fender Telecaster, featuring ash body and maple neck. It is custom fitted with a B-Bender system, which allows you to mechanically bend the B-string up a whole tone to C-sharp.

One of the only videos where we see James Hetfield using a Fender Stratocaster.

An earlier stillshot of the Guitar can be seen here.

James had a king v a year before Dave did, and used it throughout most of the master of puppets album and tour, but snapped the neck in later years and never had it repaired.

This Guitar, a 1963 Gibson SG was given to Hetfield as a gift by then-producer Bob Rock. This Guitar has a Mahogany Neck and Rosewood Fretboard. The guitar appears to have an uncovered Maestro-Style Tremolo Bridge and the Pickups are most likely the stock 1963 Humbuckers however this is unclear.

This Guitar was used in the Music Video for “Turn the Page”.

This guitar was used as one of James’ main guitars for the album St.Anger released in 2003, both in studio and for the tour. It was most likely brand new.

The guitar features matte black finish and tarnish metal pickguard. Rest of the specs were transferred over from his earlier guitars, including EMG pickups and Tune-o-Matic bridge.

James can be seen with this guitar at 0:32.

The guitar was James' first ESP guitar. He bought the guitar around c.1987 and used it to record parts of And Justice For All. James added the EET FUK logo in 1988 while finishing up the master recording for the album it also sports middle finger inlays. This was his main axe through out the damaged justice tour. He retired this guitar right before the black album was recorded and he now uses as a recording guitar. He used the guitar to "warm up" for practice sessions during the recordings of Death Magnetic.

This was James' first Guitar.

James bought this Guitar from a friend from high school who played with him in the school’s jazz band. His mother helped him out with the payment, which was around $200.

James used this Guitar to write some of his first songs and while playing in couple of high school bands. He would Later trade this guitar for his iconic, ''ELECTRA'' flying v copy.

The Headstock of this guitar can possibly be seen here.

In this Guitar Center video, Metallica's James Hetfield discusses how he became a musician, and his rise to fame. Throughout the video, he can be seen playing riffs on his one of his signature ESP guitars, the Iron Cross James Hetfield Signature Electric Guitar (Snow White color).

Hetfield goes into some details on some of the principles behind building this guitar: "…I wanted to play drums on guitar pretty much so I wanted a really percussive sound. One that really reacts quickly and is punchy, but also if you hang on a chord, it’s gonna fill the room.

I wanted a Les Paul shape that was a little lighter, a little more road-worthy. This has a little cut-out for me. I like to wear my guitars pretty low, this has a little more sharpness to it, I can get up a little higher even though, you know, you don’t want to hear me solo.

I've tested - probably - I think we went through about 30 different kinds of poles, different kinds of windings, different kinds of metals. I wanted a traditional look, but also have an active pickup. So combining passive and active together - smooth distortion, but with some aggressive mids that some of the passive pickups have. They’re a little more focused in the mids and there they're pushy, which I like. But the warmness, and the wideness of the active pickup. So combining those two together was the challenge.

And that's what I want in a guitar sound - but not abrasive - something that's gonna give you complete ear fatigue after a concert."

In this photo taken from an Ultimate-Guitar article, James Hetfield can be seen playing the little seen Gibson Moderne.

Hetfield bought this guitar in 1980 for $200, and it was his second electric guitar. He played it on Metallica’s first album “Kill ’em All”, and kept playing it up until 1984 when the neck snapped after an accident on stage. At that point the guitar had two Seymour Duncan Invader humbuckers, a Tune-o-Matic Bridge.

Just prior to recording “Death Magnetic” in 2008 Hetfield decided to restore this guitar. He changed a couple of things, including the pickups which he replaced with the EMG 81/60 set, and reparation of the headstock which was broken more than one time in the past.

James’s first ESP, and one of this most recognizable guitars. He bought it just prior to recording “And Justice For All”, and used it as his main axe during that period. The guitar featured neck through body construction (as with all of James’ ESPs), with mahogany body and neck featuring rosewood fingerboard and custom middle finger inlays. The guitar was also equipped with a Tune-o-Matic bridge, Gotoh tuners, and EMG 81/60 active pickups.

In this picture, James Hetfield is pictured singing and playing the white ESP Flying V on stage.

James Hetfield can be seen here using a Black BC Rich Wrath. This was probably used once only as he cannot been seen again with this guitar

In this source picture, James Hetfield is using the Trussart Metal Explorer electric guitar for live work.

The front-man and rythym guitarist for the Legendary Metallica, James Hetfield, poses for an advertisement from ESP guitars holding his custom made ESP MX-250 entitled "Man to Wolf". The 24th fret of the "FAKE" Replica versions features an inlay that says "MetalliFu%$inyeaH". The original guitar will not have this.

James is playing this guitar during the unforgiven II

James Hetfield acquired the Gibson Custom Les Paul "Cliff Burton RIP" in 2008 and used it for select live performances. This usage is documented in a user-uploaded photo on Guitarscollector.

This video from Metallica's performance from Yankee Stadium in 2011 shows James playing this guitar for Fade to Black.

In this Instagram photo posted by ESP Guitars, Metallica's James Hetfield can be seen wielding his signature ESP James Hetfield Snakebyte Electric Guitar (Snow White color). This particular one has a San Francisco Giants decal/logo on the body.

"@papa_het_ with his custom ESP snakebyte with @sfgiants logo. #espguitars #metallica #jameshetfield #sfgiants"

James started using this guitar around the release of the “Load” album in 1996, but it was likely used during the studio sessions as well.

The guitar was built by ESP and painted by Dino Muradian to feature an elk skull surrounded by barbed wire. Dino used a technique called pyrography – a process of burning a design on the surface with a heated metallic point. The barbed wire extended on the fretboard as well, serving as inlay.

This is an amazing guitar that was created by Ken Lawrence in the style of James' usual Ken Lawrence explorers, but with a cool twist. It was made using the wood from the garage where Metallica wrote Ride the Lightning and Master of Puppets.

The fretboard art depicts James, Lars, and Kirk together, them meeting Cliff, his death, and them all returning to the garage forever. A very meaningful guitar and a work of pure art.

An interesting photo of James using a Jackson RR5 Rhoads Black And Gold!

This is actually Kirk Hammett’s guitar that he uses live for D Standard tuned songs such as Sad But True. This picture is from Lisbon 2019 on their WorldWired tour; James was having some sort of issue with his guitar for this song, so Kirk lent him his 1984-ish modified Jackson Rhoads RR5 to use at that moment. James has only used that Rhoads once (though he looks pretty awesome with a Rhoads too).

In the URL it's possible to see Hetfield using the ESP JH-1 in three different scenarios.

James Hetfield used the ESP JH-1 mostly in the Load "era". He also used a green version of the guitar, but in green colour instead of red. Apart from the colour, the guitars are identical.

Ken Lawrence Flying V, can be seen used by James Hetfield in Making Of "Atlas, Rise!"

In this Photo, taken in 2006 live in Seoul, we can see Hetfield with his Black ESP LTD Viper Baritone with a Light Green flames, Hetfield Usually has this Baritone in Drop-D Tuning.

This Baritone first appeared around Metallica's "St. Anger" Era, it has only been seen live however may have been used in the studio recorings for "St. Anger".

James Hetfield has been seen performing with a 1973 Gibson Les Paul Custom, known as the "Iron Cross," on multiple occasions. The attached user-uploaded photo provides visual evidence of his use of this guitar.

During Metallica's performance at Lyon Halle Tony Garnier on September 12, 2017, James Hetfield was seen playing a Gibson Explorer Korina, as captured in the concert footage on YouTube.