Cool! I didn't know that about Cliff's Ric. Did he record anything with that bass? Did it sound good?
I don't know but I'll speculate that
Garage Days Revisited probably had that bass with the new pickups. That's their covers of "Am I Evil?" and "Blitzkrieg."I have the
Cliff 'Em All DVD (and laserdisc) and can attest to the Ric NOT having different pickups in it, which was shot right around when
Kill 'Em All was released, so it was probably the bass on the record (which certainly sounds like a Ric) with its stock pickups. It looks like it was also the bass used on
Ride the Lightning, at least according the album photos and gear stories I remember. If he used the Aria for
Master of Puppets, that would go a long way towards explaining how much less prominent his bass was compared to the other two and and it
Lightning were otherwise mixed identically by Fleming Rasmussen. I still contend the only decently mixed Metallica
album was
Kill 'Em All, but their best sound, bass especially, was on the
Garage Days Revisited EP, which would make it the Ric with the changed pickups. Short answer:
Garage Days Revisited and
Ride the Lightning had the Ric with the Mudbucker and Jazz pickups.