About E2 Media

by Owen Holbrook, reporter

     For our "Album of the Week" pick, we're going with one of the most influential albums in the rock and metal world: Master of Puppets by Metallica, released in 1986. This album has been described by many as an aggressive and heavy album through and through, with some softer elements in a select few songs. It is widely considered to be Metallica's best album and one of the best thrash metal albums of all time, along with Anthrax's Among The Living and Megadeth's Rust In Peace. For those who are trying to get more into heavy and thrash metal, Master of Puppets is a perfect album for beginners, and even veteran listeners of the genre still enjoy it.

Battery is the opening track off of the album, with a soft acoustic intro that drags in the listener that quickly jumps into a heavier, faster, and aggressive riff that slaps you in the face and leaves you wanting more. Battery is a perfect opening track that sets the tone for the rest of the album.

     The title track is the most popular off of the album and one of Metallica's most popular songs, with over one billion streams on Spotify, made more famous by its appearance in the show Stranger Things, marketing it to a younger, more impressionable crowd. At almost nine minutes in length, it is a lengthy track, but worth listening to every second of, with its powerful opening and closing riffs, harmonic interlude, and epic breakdown.

     Welcome Home (Sanitarium) is more of a slow burn at the beginning, with a heavy and hard-hitting middle and end segment reminiscent of Metallica's first ballad, Fade to Black. The song is based off of the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest with Jack Nicholson, which can be seen in the lyrics. It's a perfect blend of Metallica's softer capabilities with their classic thrash sound, which has made it a fan favorite among fans.

     “Orion” is the album's only instrumental songs, and one of its longest as well. Written by the band's bassist, Cliff Burton, the song is meant to capture the feeling and essence of outer space, with a hauntingly beautiful atmosphere brought by Burton's bass and the twin harmonizing guitars. Listeners are taken on a cosmic journey through the song's eight-and-a-half-minute runtime, with many claiming it to be their best song, and a tribute piece since Burton's unexpected passing. 

     Other tracks off the album include “The Thing That Should Not Be,” inspired by the story Shadow Over Innsmouth by H.P. Lovecraft, Disposable Heroes, a song about men being sent off to die in war, Leper Messiah, which touches on the theme of preachers scamming money out of the gullible, and “Damage, Inc.,” the final song off the album and a manifesto of destruction, with a calm, eerie intro that explodes into an extremely fast and aggressive manifesto of destruction, and a bookend to the album.