Lars Ulrich admits seeing ‘Master of Puppets’ become “a phenomenon” has been “such a mindf***”.
The Metallica drummer is blown away by the renewed success of the song – which features on the hard rock legend’s 1986 album of the same name – after it was featured in the ‘Stranger Things’ season four finale.
Appearing on SiriusXM’s ‘The Howard Stern Show’, Lars said: “It was such a mindf*** to see how that became a phenomenon, and we were so proud.
“I mean, who would’ve thought 40 years later that these songs could still have that impact? So we were psyched to be part of it, absolutely. It was just so unexpected.”
In the pivotal scene, the character Eddie Munson – who is played by Joseph Quinn – can be seen playing the song on guitar in the Upside Down in an attempt to distract a horde of demon bats and leave Vecna (Jamie Campbell Bower) more exposed.
Lars admitted the group always refused to license their music for TV and films, but they have softened their stance over the years.
He added: “It used to be, with Metallica, we were always the ‘no’ guys. ‘Hey can we have this song for this? Can we have that song for that?’
“It was just no, no, no, no, no. And a few years ago we kind of reversed it. We did a 180.
“We just said, ‘You know what? This is stupid. Why are we hanging onto these songs like they’re so important, like they’re the crown jewels?’
“Let’s share our music with the world. So a couple of years ago we started saying yes to everything.”
The group previously praised ‘Stranger Things’ bosses the Duffer Brothers for the role music plays in the Netflix series.
They wrote on Instagram after the last two episodes dropped: “The way The Duffer Brothers have incorporated music into ‘Stranger Things’ has always been next level, so we were beyond psyched for them to not only include ‘Master of Puppets’ in the show, but to have such a pivotal scene built around it.”