Metallica bassist Robert Trujillo says he was “close” to Jason Newsted before he replaced him, and calls “Ride the Lighting” the “ULTIMATE” album.

Metallica has had quite a few bassists over the course of their history (including Cliff Burton and Jason Newsted), but, after joining in 2003, Robert Trujillo is by far the band’s longest lasting. By his own admission, Trujillo was a massive Cliff Burton and Metallica fan long before he ever became a part of their lineup.

Now, while being interviewed on the “Toby Morse One Life One Chance” show, Trujillo revealed that Metallica’s “Ride the Lighting” was one of his all time favorite albums nearly 20 years before he joined forces with James Hetfield and co. The bassist even went as far as to call it the “ultimate” metal album.

Trujillo said that in his youth he used to run trails through the Santa Monica Mountains while listening to the iconic record. “That was the album I would train to,” he said. “The other one was Slayer’s ‘Reign in Blood’, and sometimes I had some Anthrax in there too. But ‘Ride the Lightning’ was really the ultimate album for me. The thing that was so great about Metallica — and I didn’t, unfortunately, get to see Cliff [Burton] play, and it’s really weird because I became such good friends with Mike Bordin [drummer & Burton’s bandmate in their first band EZ-Street.]. They were really close, and Mike’s Ty’s godfather…”

“This happened naturally, so when I was auditioning for Metallica, Mike, knowing those guys but doing his own thing, was very supportive… I was crashing out on his couch. That’s where I would stay when I would come up to San Francisco, to the Bay Area, [when] we were working together in Ozzy’s band. There was a photo of Cliff he had, and I remember when I was actually preparing for the audition, it’s two in the morning, and I’m looking up at the photo, and Cliff’s like staring at me.”

While Trujillo may have never had the chance to see Burton play live, he did end up developing a friendship with his predecessor Jason Newsted. Trujillo described his relationship with Newsted prior to taking over his role in Metallica, saying:

“I even talked to Jason before I joined the band. I was tighter with and closer to Jason than I was to the other guys in the group back in the day. I mean, he used to wear Infectious Grooves shirts.”