The Metallica/Stranger Things love story continues. At their Thursday night (July 28) headlining performance at this year’s Lollapalooza festival, the heavy metal band paid tribute to the sci-fi show’s beloved season four character Eddie Munson while playing their 1986 classic “Master of Puppets.”
After breezing through their setlist of tracks including “Enter Sandman,” “Nothing Else Matters” and a cover of AC/DC’s “It’s A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘N’ Roll),” Metallica closed out the show with the song that’s currently in the midst of a streaming renaissance thanks to its inclusion in the finale episode of Stranger Things‘ latest season. Staged in front of a big screen playing the show’s standout scene — which features Joseph Quinn’s metalhead character epically shredding “Master of Puppets” on his electric guitar as a means of distracting killer bats in the Upside Down — the band synchronized their performance of the song with Eddie’s.
When the final two episodes of Netflix’s hit series’ season four dropped earlier this month, Metallica took to Instagram to express their excitement for the spotlight on “Master of Puppets” — which has also climbed to the top 40 of the Hot 100 since Eddie’s rock star moment, for which Quinn actually learned how to play guitar for the show. “We were all stoked to see the final result and when we did we were totally blown away,” the band wrote at the time. “It’s so extremely well done, so much so, that some folks were able to guess the song just by seeing a few seconds of Joseph Quinn’s hands in the trailer!
Trending on Billboard
“It’s an incredible honor to be such a big part of Eddie’s journey and to once again be keeping company with all of the other amazing artists featured in the show,” they added.
Check out NME‘s video of Metallica’s “Master of Puppets” performance at Lollapalooza below.
Hi, Eddie Munson!
ICYMI, @Metallica gave a shoutout to #StrangerThings as they played ‘Master Of Puppets’ during their @lollapalooza set 🎸 #Lollapalooza #Lollapalooza2022 #lolla pic.twitter.com/k6hC4DeSOb
— NME (@NME) July 29, 2022