As thrash legends Metallica return with a new album, \u201872 Seasons\u2019, Rock Candy Mag goes back to 1986 to look at the band\u2019s classic \u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 over 14 pages. Guitarist Kirk Hammett discusses the making of the album, how it changed Metallica\u2019s career trajectory, and how he looks back on \u2018Master\u2026\u2019 today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe weren\u2019t trying to make an album that 35 or so years on people would put on and think still sounded great,\u201d Hammett tells Rock Candy Mag editor Howard Johnson. \u201cWe didn\u2019t set out to do anything, really. We were just trying to make the best album we possibly could and that\u2019s what came out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Released on 3 March 1986, \u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 was the thrash band\u2019s third album \u2013 recorded in Denmark with producer Flemming Rasmussen \u2013 and it went on to sell over six million copies in the US alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFrom a technical viewpoint, when I listen to the album I\u2019m really surprised at how good it sounds so long after the fact,\u201d says Hammett. \u201cThe recording of the album, the recording of the songs, the production\u2026 it all holds up still.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 proved to be Cliff Burton\u2019s swansong with Metallica. The bassist sadly died on 27 September 1986 in a coach accident while on tour promoting the album.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cCliff\u2019s contribution to \u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 was very melodic and very musical,\u201d explains Hammett. \u201cHis contribution wasn\u2019t so much the big heavy riffs. It was all melody bass, and it was a lot of really, really cool stuff. When Cliff went it was the end of an era, and we all knew it. We knew it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
More than 35 years after it was first released, \u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 is an acknowledged classic of the thrash genre and proudly sits in the US Library Of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry on account of being \u201cculturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.\u201dHammett thinks he knows why.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA lot of the music from that time now sounds samey and similar,\u201d he says. \u201cBut there\u2019s really nothing on \u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 that dates it to any particular period \u2013 sound-wise, production-wise, recording-wise. \u2018Master Of Puppets\u2019 is my favourite of all the albums we\u2019ve ever done.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can read our 14-page Metallica special, together with fascinating stories about L.A. Guns, Kansas, Bad English, Winger and many others in issue 37 of Rock Candy Mag. For more details visit www.rockcandymag.com.<\/p>\n\n\n\n