Last among legends still makes you a legend. While perhaps more thoughtful than some of Metallica’s peers’ rants against the church, the track is the only one on this album that could’ve potentially been written by another band. The reason it ranks lowest on this list, though, is that it’s only a killer anti-religious metal song. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with “Leper Messiah” - it is to this day a killer anti-religious metal song. But to honor this album turning the big 3-5, we decided to arrange the eight tracks (only eight!) thereon in order of radness. Ranking the tracks on Master of Puppets is harder than ranking orgasms even orgasms can be disappointing or ill-advised, and this record is awesome every goddamn time.
The result was Master of Puppets, an album that proved heavy metal was more than a kids’ game over the course of eight crushing tracks (it’s sometimes mind-blowing that Master is that short - changing history in under 10 songs is a truly incredible feat). Coming off of the mounting success of 1984’s monumental Ride the Lightning, the California quartet upped the size of their thrash metal sound while incorporating heavy doses of atmosphere, melody, and believable anguish. 35 years ago today, Metallica left a crater in the metal world that no other band has ever been able to replicate or fill.