An indispensable and one of the greatest figures in the history of heavy metal, today marks the death anniversary of Metallica’s legendary bassist Cliff Burton who died on this very day in a bus crash in 1986.

His ferocious, innovative and virtuosic bass playing were definitive of the band’s first three studio albums, and his death is something that has left a hole not just in Metallica, but in the world of metal and one that it can never fully recover from.

These days Metallica have become a brand in and of themselves in a way similar to Led Zeppelin or Deep Purple, but in their early days as a garage level thrash metal band, they were aggressive, heavy and ferocious, a style defined as much by the guitar playing of James Hetfield, Dave Mustaine( later Kirk Hammet) and the drums of Lars Ulrich as by the Motorhead and Iron Maiden marriage bass act of Cliff Burton.

Since his death, the band has not been the same having only produced one more legendary album that could rival and even surpass the likes of Master Of Puppets and Ride The Lightning, that is And Justice For All.

After that, while the band remained good and had released some great stuff with their self titled album (also known as the Black Album due to its black cover), their hard rock stuff in ‘Load’ and later their thrash metal revival with ‘Death Magnetic’ and ‘Hardwired... To Self Destruct’, they were just not the same.

Even though both Jason Newsted and Robert Trujillo are masterful bassists, it seems that a part of Metallica’s soul died with Burton, unable to channel the same kind of power they could in their early days.

Thrash metal was wild, aggressive and not particularly driven by musical sophistication. Cliff Burton was a big part in changing all that.

Heavy metal had few bassists as good as the likes of Steve Harris (Iron Maiden), Geezer Butler (Black Sabbath) and Lemmy Kilmister (Motorhead), but Cliff Burton was with them in that elite club of metal bassists who helped really polish and refine bass playing in heavy metal.

R.I.P Cliff Burton