During a recent interview with Spin, Jason Newsted discussed his past painkiller abuse. The bassist, who left Metallica in 2001 due to addiction, says the issue was worsened by injuries and surgeries.
Newsted said the following:
“In the mid- to late ’90s, I had a lot of pretty serious neck and spine issues. It’s easy to see the map of why this is fucked up. In that time, I would start taking Vicodin and get through some days. I kept going and going and going. The injury was in a place that couldn’t really be repaired. Within the addiction, I would say probably 10 or 12 years on painkillers, off and on but 2004 to 2008, full on because the surgeries did what they did. I got out of one right back into another. I finally got off that shit by the time I was just about to do my first exhibit. It was 16 years ago this week in San Francisco, May 2010. I had peeled myself off the drugs and started getting back to get back to myself again. That’s when the global art thing started happening for me and the Paris gallery representative. I had about 10 years of that.”
Metal Anarchy 
Leave a comment