“Most of these dudes don’t fall quite as far as I did. They don’t develop a meth habit and end up shoveling dog s**t for $6 an hour”: Gary Holt on his thrash metal redemption story, balancing Exodus and Slayer – and why even Hetfield cheats on downpicking

Gary Holt with arms out wide as Exodus play Alcatraz Metal Fest, Belgium. He plays his signature ESP single-cut.

There is no shortage of tell-all autobiographies from pioneers of thrash metal. While none of the current members of Metallica or the founding members of Slayer have released memoirs yet, the glory days of the San Francisco-area movement and other major thrash scenes have been well documented in books by members of Megadeth (Dave Mustaine, David Ellefson, Marty Friedman, Nick Menza), two guys from Anthrax (Scott Ian, Frank Bello) and Testament guitarist Alex Skolnick.

So, why did it take thrash veteran Gary Holt so long to throw his tales in the ring when he was there from the very start? After all, Holt was hanging out with Kirk Hammett in Exodus long before the latter left to join Metallica – and he is the only SF guitarist to play on every Exodus album and perform live in Slayer from 2011 to 2019 and again at their recent reunion shows.