MASTER OF PUPPETS

Similar to its previous album "Ride The Lightning" this album of Metallica starts with a quiet acoustic intro of the song "Battery", a very gloomy and slow, more melodic introduction to an song which mostly is very heavy, with some aggressive singing of James Hatfield, with fast beating rebelling drumming of Lars Ulrich and some great fast technical solos of Kirk Hammett. The first solo in this song is not very fast but more melodic and right after that comes a really fast technical solo, a more "Metal" solo. After all of this interesting soloing, the song gets back to its verse and chorus and then ends.

The second track is one of the best-known metal songs ever to be exist " Master Of Puppets" the title track, is a pretty long one and it is crafted of two parts of the song, the first one starts with a very fast and heavy riff, as all of the part, with some fast pretty technical solos, and continues to a very emotional more slow and much more melodic part with a beautiful amazing solo of Kirk Hammett the lead guitarist of Metallica. The lyrics in this song are talking about the addict of the band members to drugs and alcohol, and how it reacts on their brains and their life. The lyrics are very powerful and simulating the band members as some puppets which are controlled by the "Master Of Puppets", The booze and the drugs, there are some very detailed and brutal parts in the lyrics as this one, which describes what the "Master" is doing to his slaves, the people who are addicted to drugs and alcohol, of course it is a little exaggerated description to what drugs and booze are doing but still it is very bad: "Master of puppets I'm pulling your strings Twisting your mind and smashing your dreams Blinded by me, you can't see a thing Just call my name, 'cause I hear your scream" The second part is a very emotional one that starts with a fantastic melancholic solo of Kirk Hammett, then enters a little more heavy part, and then gets back to a heavy part with a very technical and fast solo which is showing the guitar talent of Kirk Hammett, more than the emotional feeling of the guitar, the song gets back to the verse after that solo then there's a break after the main riff with some dark gloomy laughs at the and and a fade out.

The next song "The Thing That Should Not Be" starts very quietly but then proceeds to a heavy riff then clean, pretty high vocal of James Hatfield enters and the verse continues playing. The lyrics in the song are talking about the story "The Shadow Over Innsmouth" by H.P Lovecraft, and describes especially the character Chtulu, a great formidable monster which lurks in the sea, the song has no long emotional solos and it is pretty short it has one very short and technical solo but it is adding to the atmosphere of the song, and ends with a fade out of a riff.

" Welcome Home (Sanitarium) " is the next song on the list and it starts with artifical harmonics then proceeds to a fantastic dark riff which is the main riff of this song, the first part of the song is pretty emotional and less thrashy and heavy. The song includes 4 solos, 2 of them are more emotional and well though, and the next 2 are more technical and fast solos. After the main intro comes the main riff, then a very emotional delight solo, with some perfect bends and fantastic picking. A clean beautiful vocal of James Hatfield enters, it matches the main riff perfectly, after the pretty heavy chorus, enters a beautiful solo which is a little similar to the first one but a little more technical than the first, the song gets back to the verse after that enters to the chorus, which after it comes the heavy part with some fantastic heavy power chords and fast picking, after that comes the very fast solo with a lot of skill and technique more than emotion. A quick power chord break gets us into the last solo of the song which is heavy but pretty emotional with octaves playing together, matching perfectly into one carefully crafted solo which is combined perfectly with the rest of the song, after the solo there are some powerful power chords with some slow but interesting drumming at the end, with an almost last chord, there is a little drum solo which is fast and interesting for itself, then a last fast power chord comes and that's how the song ends. The song talks about the sanitariums over the world and how easily you can be considered as an insane person, in my opinion, it is talking about the drugs and the booze which gets you insane.

Next on you can see the anti war track named "Disposable Heroes" which is very heavy and aggressive, the main riff is pretty catchy and a little less exciting than the other riffs in the album, the song reminds a little of the punk genre too, especially because of the drumming and the lyric theme. All the song is very fast and got almost no melody at all, with a very technical, unemotional solo, it is fast and heavy much more than well thought, but it has some interesting a little more combined highlights, this song talks about how the "kids" who go to war are just like disposable, and they are used by the military and the state itself.

The next song is "Leper Messiah" which starts with some counting and proceeds to a heavy riff, then to some fine bass with some guitar down strokes along with it. All the song is heavy and got almost no melody, except for a few parts of the song the solo is pretty fast and technical with almost no emotion, after the end of the solo, the song gets back to the main riff and the song ends with a power chord and some hits on the snare. This song is very anti christian and very anti-church, and it is talking about the church which is a tycoon business that takes money, "for god".

The next piece is an instrumental one, and it is the most progressive and most emotional track of this album, it is mostly written by Cliff Burton, Metallica's bassist, the song starts slowly with a fade in of bass with some special effects, then gets to a melodic, emotional riff which I like a lot , gets to a highlight of a new riff which starts with no drums, then a slow emotional drumming comes and then another riff is coming on the base of the first emotional riff, the drumming here is very interesting too, it is very emotional and technical at the same time. There's a little solo which is not very heavy and it is more emotional it is played along with the main riff of the song, then proceeds to some power chords and gong hit, which gets us into a brand new part of the song, which starts quietly with a very soft and mellow bass riff, which starts a very beautiful emotional solo, there are some very interesting bends in this solo, it also includes some very emotional highlights which I listened to a lot of times, this solo is one of the most emotional, mellow, soft, well though solos which Iv'e heard from Metallica ever, it is genius. After that there's another solo which is pretty similar to the first one but it is much shorter. The song proceeds to a more heavy part with a more technical and fast solo, but it has some interesting highlights too, it is pretty emotional even though it is technical. The song gets back to the main riff with some fast double bass drumming that fades out and ends this stupendous piece of Metallica, a very progressive well though one, which is one of the roots of the prog metal sub-genre, at least in my opinion. Very good job of Cliff Burton and the other band members, congratulations Metallica, you wrote one of my favorite instrumentals of all time, two parts of a very emotional progressive song which are carefully crafted into one piece of art, good job.

Next in the album comes " Damage Inc. " which starts with some volume swells that are pretty gloomy, then fades to an aggressive riff which is more technical than really mellow and well thought, it only shows Metallica's virtuoso skills, a very aggressive clean but very heavy and loud singing of James gets in, then gets to the main riff again and continues this, in my opinion, a down in this album. A very technical solo, in my opinion too technical is played along to some riffs, I am not amazed by this solo and by this song at all, the drumming is pretty punk- like, and the song structure is too simple and not really well thought, I feel that it's a pretty boring track compared with all the other tracks in this delightful, heavy and technical but emotional album, and it is a bad ending for this album.

You can't mention the album without reminding of the great artwork. On the artwork which is found on the cover of "Master Of Puppets" album, you can find crosses, graves actually,that are all tied to two red big hands, which are as you can guess, the hands of the frightening master of puppets. You can describe the master of puppets as the drugs and the alcohol which the band members were addicted to, and the graves as the graves of the victims that died young because of the drugs and alcohol and are now at the grave. Amazing artwork indeed.

in my opinion, this album is a very good one, maybe one of the best of metal. I think that this album was very political, and shows the band's political and religious views: anti war and anti christian views. Sadly, after this album Cliff Burton died, in a tragic traffic accident which was a real inversion for Metallica , that got themselves a new bassist Jason Newsted, this changed their style a little and until the album " Load " which was in my opinion, a bad inversion for the band.

I would give this album 83/100 because it has some pretty boring songs, but the overall of the songs are very good in a very high quality as we can only imagine from Metallica.

R.I.P Cliff Burton, we all miss you, brother.

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