Lars Ulrich

Ulrich was born on 26 December 1963 into an upper-middle-class family in Gentofte, Denmark; the son of Lone (née Sylvester-Hvid) and tennis player Torben Ulrich. The family lived at Lundevangsvej 12 in Hellerup. His paternal grandfather was tennis player Einer Ulrich. His paternal grandmother, Ulla Meyer, was from a Jewish family; as a result, Ulrich's grandfather was persecuted by the Nazis during World War II. Saxophonist Dexter Gordon was Ulrich's godfather, and he is a childhood friend of musician Neneh Cherry. In February 1973, Ulrich's father obtained passes for five of his friends to a Deep Purple concert held in the same Copenhagen stadium as one of his tennis tournaments. When one of the friends could not go, they gave their ticket to the nine-year-old Lars, who was mesmerized by the performance and bought the band's album Fireball the next day. The concert and album had a considerable impact on Ulrich, inspiring the start of his music career. As a result of his newfound interest in music, he received his first drum kit, a Ludwig, from his grandmother around the age of 12 or 13. Ulrich originally intended to follow in his father's footsteps and play tennis, and he moved to Newport Beach, California, in the summer of 1980. …

Ulrich's first marriage was in 1988 to Debbie Jones, a British woman he met on tour, but they divorced in 1990 during the recordings of Metallica. His second marriage was to Skylar Satenstein, an emergency medicine physician, from 1997 to 2004. They had two sons before divorcing. Following his divorce from Satenstein, Ulrich dated Danish actress Connie Nielsen from 2004 to 2012. They had one child together. He married American fashion model Jessica Miller in 2015. Ulrich's sons Myles and Layne play in a band named Taipei Houston, which released its debut album in 2022. Ulrich resides in San Francisco, California, but only has Danish citizenship. Ulrich is a friend of Noel Gallagher and his band Oasis and claimed Gallagher was his inspiration to give up cocaine in the 2000s. He also has a passion for fine art. In 2002, he sold a painting from his own collection, Self Portrait by Jean-Michel Basquiat, 1982. With a pre-sale price estimate of $5 million, it ultimately sold for triple that at Christie's Auction House. In 2009, Ulrich revealed he suffered from tinnitus due to many years of touring without the use of any auditory protection. To unwind after some gigs, Ulrich listens to jazz.