Master of Puppets (song)

"Master of Puppets"
Song

"Master of Puppets" is a song by thrash metal band Metallica. It is the title track of their 1986 album. It is probably considered as their signature song.

It shares a similar album structure with Ride the Lightning in having the title track as the second track, preceded by a shorter, high-speed typical thrash metal track. There are several such track similarities on Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets, and ...And Justice for All. "Master of Puppets" is also notable for its long instrumental section beginning about three and a half minutes into the song.

The song, as James Hetfield explained,"deals pretty much with drugs. How things get switched around, instead of you controlling what you're taking and doing it's drugs controlling you." The lyrics "chop your breakfast on a mirror" for instance refer to the act of preparing powdered cocaine.

Tracklist

7" Single Side A:

1. Master Of Puppets

Side B:

1. Welcome Home (Sanitarium)

12" Promo Single: Side A:

1. Master Of Puppets (Part 1) (03:32)

Awards

The song has been ranked as the third greatest heavy metal song ever by VH1.

In March 2005, Q magazine placed again at number 1 in its list of the 100 Greatest Guitar Tracks. The song was ranked #2 in Martin Popoff's book The Top 500 Heavy Metal Songs Of All Time. Popoff put together this book by requesting thousands of metal fans, musicians, and journalists to send in their favorite heavy metal songs. Almost 18,000 individual votes were tallied and entered into a database from which the final rankings were derived. It also came first in a recent 100 Greatest Riffs poll from Total Guitar. Rolling Stone magazine's top 100 guitar songs it placed thirty third place

Covers and usage

Master of Puppets has been covered by multiple artists.

• Ugly Kid Joe covered the song for Metallic Attack: Metallica - The Ultimate Tribute
• Green Day has covered a part of the song live as part of a jam.
• Therapy? have played the song's opening in concert, usually leading into their own song "Potato Junkie."
• Trivium recorded a cover of this track which was released on Master of Puppets: Remastered and the re-release of Ascendancy. They also regularly perform some of this song live.
• Primus has been known to play the opening of the song as a "tease" where Les Claypool, bass player and lead vocalist, plays the guitar part on his bass. The most notable performance of this "tease" was at Woodstock 94.
• Canadian punk band Sum 41 also covered it at a live medley at MTV Icon Metallica in 2003.
• Progressive metal band Dream Theater covered it live.
• Finnish band Apocalyptica released a cover of the song played only by cellos.
• German punk band Die Ärzte samples it in the middle of their song "FaFaFa".
• Anthrax sampled a short segment of Master of Puppets in their song "I'm the Man".
• As a tribute to Metallica, Underground New York rapper Necro recites the pre-chorus in his song "Underground" off his album I Need Drugs.
• Bobby Prince made an IMF version of the song for the popular computer game Doom by id Software.
• Limp Bizkit has covered it live, with Wes Borland singing instead.
• French band Justice remixed this song and often plays it at their concerts.

The song has also been used in various media as a theme song;

• The song was featured in the movie "Old School".
• Conservative talk show host Michael Savage uses this track as the opening of his radio show, The Savage Nation.
• The song is the theme song for the Philadelphia Phillies' third baseman, Pedro Feliz.
• It was also featured in the Simpsons episode "The Mook, the Chef, the Wife and Her Homer" when Hans Moleman drives away as Metallica is playing.