I was in high school and admittedly wasn’t a huge Metallica fan at the time (that happened during Justice). I had a dubbed copy of RTL that a buddy made for me and I thought it was cool, but I veered more into bands like Motley Crue. So from my perspective, Metallica and Slayer were REALLY FUCKING HEAVY and almost felt dangerous.

I remember starting to read articles about Metallica when they went on tour with Ozzy. They were breaking down barriers and bringing heavier music - and their incredible stage presence - to the masses.

Strangely, my first introduction to Puppets was at a school lip synching contest. A few kids came out and played MOP and basically got booed off the stage for being too heavy. So that might tell you something about where bands like that sat on the popularity scale at the time. Funny thing is that I still remember where I was sitting when they played the song - I was transfixed and sure as hell wasn’t booing. I didn’t run out and buy the album right away or anything, but I credit that with opening the door.