I remember the day I bought the album Master of Puppets. I remember my thoughts upon seeing and hearing it. It goes something like this. I was at Walmart of all places. I went to go buy two albums. They were Van Halen’s 5150 and ZZ Top’s Afterburner. Now these are great bands and I enjoy them still to this day but looking back I can say I was not connected to anything via these bands or any others.

So I am looking through the albums and I saw Van Halen but no ZZ Top. My eyes glanced down and there was Master of Puppets. I had heard some of Ride the Lighting while riding around in a dude named Glen’s car but it was just a piece. I picked it up and looked at the cover. It was really different.

Rows of crosses and hands holding strings attached to the crosses. The big block Metallica lettering. It meant something but I didn’t know what. I turned it over and saw something I had not seen on any album. I saw 4 guys that looked like me. No rock star hair, no posing. Just 4 dudes with T-Shirts and Jeans. James Hetfield looked like a bad ass. I mean there was something so real about them. The fisheye pic of I believe Day on the Green concert was special too. It wasn’t of the band. It was of the crowd. Looking out from the stage. The whole thing was just fucking cool. So I bought it.

Now mind you I really had no idea what I was buying. I was still in that stage where you are swayed by packaging and all that. I was a kid you know. I had not had a musical awakening but it was coming in about an hour.

I got home and pulled out the record. Straight to the turntable. I had just started playing guitar about a year before so I really wanted to hear the guitars. I stood there and waited. Then the intro starts and it’s a Spanish flavored intro of the main theme to come. All these layers are added, electric guitars with melodies and then those 5 power chords. E5, B5 G5 , fucked up chord B/D#. You may now commence insane riff from hell. Oh my God my head was like WTF! The riff was so fast, and so intense. The accents. Then they all come in. Like a motherfucking freight train. I could not believe they were playing that fast. Those triplets. The riff. The timing. It was so fucking bad ass. I read the words and I knew at that moment I had found something for me. It was like poetry to me. The way the lyrics were written. I listened to that song over and over that day. Knowing that I had made a connection to something more exciting than I had ever encountered. I had my musical awakening. My best friend Jack was learning guitar and I was witnessing like a zealot to him. Soon he was hooked. My mission had just begun. To this very day I can listen to that song and remember those exact feelings from that day.

Music is so deeply ingrained in my neurons that I hear it constantly. I can’t sleep sometimes because the music won’t stop playing. I hear songs. I try different riffs in my own songs. I can’t stop, and I don’t want to. My life has been shaped so deeply by music and that one event set me on a course that led me on a wonderful musical journey with friends and has allowed me to connect music to other events and made my life that much richer. Thanks to Metallica.

Metallica — Blackened-New Bass

Recently out of the blue I received a message on Facebook and it was my best friend from high school, Jack. We started our first band together and rode the wave from garage to clubs to implosion. It was a hell of a ride that’s for sure. After all these years it seems like we just left off. So even though I bitch sometimes about Myspace and Facebook I have to say thanks to Facebook because it brought someone back into my life that was with me during some of the best years of my life and it’s really cool to see where we are in life and realize that even over time friendships really can last. Ok well that’s about it. Oh yeah Jack and I wrote and still write the most crushing riffs you fucking losers!

Oh my god that was one long run on sentence. 59 Words!!!!!!! Damn I’m good…