His face when that first bass growl comes in 😂. Cliff was a maniac, a genius musician

It's amazing how he can just hear the entire songs and recreate them like he does on the piano! Highly trained ear and highly skilled musician! Awesome!!!!

This song delivers that Lovecraftian feel like no others. Cliff truly understood both the menace and grandeur of Cthulhu emerging from the depths (at least this is how I perceive it).

In this song Cliff plays his craziest bass parts, I've ever heard of him. It's so unique and amazing. And think about it, they where about 21, when they wrote this Masterpiece

I like how these instrumentals can tell a story. Lead you through. The guitars speak, sing, cry and scream. Build the whole landscapes you immerse into

Imagine being 20- something and composing masterpieces like this.🤯

You guys are killing it. Love the awkward energy.

" who dunnit " lol 😂. I like that guy

The otherworldly bass parts are what make this song stand out above anything else. It's like the fabrics of time and space disintegrating musically and spawning forth the end times. I listen to this song and it just always evokes this feeling of reality unraveling. I absolutely love it.

To me Cliff is the highlight of this track. This is one of Kirk's best solos as well.

The acoustic intro was written by Dave Mustaine. He uses these chords later on in his songs Hangar 18 and When. I also believe he re-used a chromatic section of this song in the chorus for Public Enemy No. 1.

I heard Ktulu live for the first time two weeks ago. I damn near cried.

It’s interesting that you interpreted the opening as feeling like a detective story, when that is basically how the written story by Lovecraft is structured. In it, a man finds a clay bas relief in his great uncle’s belongings, after the man’s death, and the man reads his great uncle’s earlier investigation and sets out to follow the clues and investigate further into this being known as Cthulhu.

I was fortunate enough to hear Metallica play live this past weekend. This song gives me goosebumps every time.

I have long felt that the rest of the band is the sea and the travelers upon it, while Cliff’s bass is the hidden cosmic horror lurking under the surface, perceives mostly by the ripples on the surface, with the occasional snarling acting as a brief moment when some part of the great old one breaks the surface.

One of the greatest pieces of music ever written.

In this song, Cliff plays his craziest bass parts I've ever heard of him. It's so amazing. And think about it, they where about 21 , wenn they wrote this Masterpiece

Love the reaction of both of you of course, but i must say Judson's got a pure talent of listening to the new music, absorbing it inside and then showing it to rest of the world in his own way without any time to learn. Huge respect.

I love the part when he plays the song on the piano after listening to it just once! Amazing talent!

This is feeling like some serious kismet for me. These three Metallica instrumentals have been some of the most important pieces of music in my life. Almost exactly 24 hours ago, I found a new one, when I randomly decided to finally watch Hi Ren. It floored me to the extent that I proceeded to spend the rest of the day doing almost nothing but watching dozens of reactions to it. When I woke up the next day, an hour ago, the first thing I saw was the Hi Ren reaction by this channel. When it finished, what do I see - this channel just happens to have completed the Metallica trilogy of instrumentals the day before. This is a 'classical musician reacts' channel. Metallica is in my top 5 favorite bands, even though I don't care for metal - as a kid, my favorite music was classical. That's what drew me to Metallica as a teenager - their songs (on these three albums in particular) sounded to me like the classical compositions I had grown up listening to. Because of this, when I was 17 and their S&M album came out, a performance with my hometown's own symphony, I was completely blown away by how perfect of a fit it seemed to me. So, yeah, considering my wild day yesterday of being completely consumed by a new intensely personal musical discovery, that it should wind up leading me here, with such perfect timing, seems pretty special.

One of the greatest rock masterpieces ever recorded.

This is turning into one of my favourite reaction sites.....👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽🤘🏼🤘🏼

As a musician who likes to learn by ear, you my friend are impressive and fun to watch.

A friend of mine gave me this album on my 17th birthday, I listened to it and was blown away... since that day I was a deeply metallica fan . They are legends of creative music creators on my top list , such as Pink Floyd, Deep Purble, Queen, Bee Gees, Steve Wonder and many others . ' Cliff asked an instrument shop owner who also repaired guitars and knew him well if it would be possible to install a guitar pickup into his bass to get a sound that would allow him to combine bass and lead/solo guitar playing '. This man did and It was a magical moment in the history of metal music. RIP Clifford Lee Burton

Glad you guys did this song, such a masterpiece. FYI, they just put up a live version of this song from their European tour in Germany, May 26th 2023 - a must see! Maybe you guys could do a couple live songs from the current tour? "Sanitarium" is up on their YTube page, and a handful of others. "One" would be great too! They are really killing it live these days! Thanks for another great reaction, looking forward to more! Love the piano work!

you guys are a great duo! great to watch keep it up guys, love the songs picked by richard and love the analysis and banter by judson

YES!!! I was hoping you would do this one!!

I love this kind of content! It's always very interesting to me what a classically trained musician thinks of some of these metal classics!

S&M no leaf clover would an awesome reaction, being that it has a whole orchestra

As Mustaine co-wrote THE original composition/version of this song before he was booted, he wrote something similar in the opening of Megadeth “Hanger 18”.

I have read somewhere the reason they spelled Ktulu with a "k" is because the lore is if you speak the name of cthulhu, he will draw nearer. So they mispelled it on purpose to play on that.

2 great guys. Keep up the great work! You are both truly wonderful.

So, as a bass player, I’ll let you know the technical stuff that is behind some of the wild sounds Cliff got. Most of the song is played with a Morley Power Fuzz Wah, so he has both a fuzz type distortion and a wah pedal to accentuate certain parts. Single note runs accentuated with the wah make that wailing sort of sound, and the snarls that come out of the mix on a regular basis in the first half are an A with an A and octave up and an E a fifth above that (so, a 13th over the root, I think?) while really pushing the wah down hard and fast. With distortion and wah, a chord on a bass comes out like that. Forgive the question coming from a bass player who is trying to catch up his long neglected theory, but that chord would be an inversion of a power chord, yes?

If you show him Master of Puppets, please show him the S&M 1 version. 👌

Your guys dynamic is so funny 😂. Super excited for this one. So much interesting stuff going on in this one. It’s insane to think of how young they were when they came up with this.

The more you listen the bass line, The more you'll amazed. This song is a masterpiece!

The 'grand finale' when seeing this song played live certainly hyped me up a few weeks back & wow, Judson is one talented musician to play different parts of the song after just one listen. Great video guys.. Keep em' coming 🤘🤘

Very well done analysis! Thank you guys and just subscribed!!!

One of my favorite elements of this instrumental is Lars’s use of the cymbals. Every instrument accompanied by constant cymbal crashes reminds me of a violent storm with surging waves crashing against jagged rocks, lightning, and thunder. Then a reprieve followed by a dramatic end. It totally goes with the Cthulhu theme.

Thank you! Another banger from you guys, much appreciated :D

you guys always make me laugh, i love the interaction and banter between you two

The reaction at 15:35 is our reaction as well! For Judson to be able to capture the essence of the piece and get it right after one listen is absolutely incredible. And no matter how many times you experience it, it's always amazing!

I love this guy on the piano, thank you kind sir for your thoughts

17:15- you say “we get it,” but I actually really like hearing him play the piano version after hearing it only once. Having an ear for music, while being able to play it on an instrument like the piano, I’m completely fascinated with. You can tell he’s been playing for quite sometime and I respect that a lot. Let him play that piano of some riffs man! Lol 🤘🏼☕️

Should have played the S&M version with the orchestra in the background. Missed opportunity.

You ought to take a crack at Ne Obliviscaris - And Plague Flowers The Kaleidoscope (Live in Colorado 2016). Six peerless musicians and a song so complex that it's taught at the Sydney Conservatorium For Music, as part of the Compositions coursework

Fire 🔥 30 years later can’t be duplicated!

Hooah!!! I’ve been waiting for you to get to this one.

I used to fall asleep to this song every night as a kid. It always gave me the feeling of flying upwards through the clouds, in the middle of a lightning storm, in a battle with some unknown force of darkness. And it still does 😎

Always reminds of "Hall of the mountain king". That evil thing lurking behind you, trying to catch you. Music gets faster/louder and more intense.

Cool stuff man! So glad to see this reaction, I play piano and guitar and this song is just fun to play along with I’m sure you gonna like this one🤟🏼

excellent reaction man. really. was a pleasure watchin you see and feel the music we came to love also. really happy you enjoyed it as much as we do. im here for all your metallica reactions . you have so much talent. id love to hear your take of this song on piano actually. its also validating to all of us metallica fans when someone of your talent and skill can appreciate what was generally considered crap music. more metallica reactions please. give him the lyrics also if there are lyrics . he may appreciate it more. and your whole format really is entertaining and the sound is great. keep it up

Dude's face when the huge tom crescendo in the end happened. :D :D :D :D Loved it. And I haven't listened to the album version for a while. Didn't remember how atrociously HARD Lars hits that drum. Also, I love how Judson learned the damn song from the first listen! You gotta do the symphonic version. :D

I had the pleasure of seeing this very tour in January 1985. Cliff stole the show...

That main riff back and forth back and forth- sounds like a straight up horror movie!! Ever seen Psycho the movie? The build up? You know something is lurking- that’s what it sounds like- just brilliant!!!

"starts playing the song at the end" shows just how much he liked it.

Just saw them last night, they did an ode to this and while Robert Trujillo is NOT Cliff Burton, he is still an excellent bassist who sounds great in concert...

This song will bring forth emotion to anybody that listens to it! Guaranteed!!

I would love a mirror series of this where classical musician plays classics to metal musician

Dave Mustaine is indeed credited as one of the co-writers of “The Call of Ktulu” by Metallica themselves on the cd insert for the album. He got co-writing credit for the song “Ride The Lightning” too.

Dude I love your reactions when he starts playing it right after hearing it.

Had the privilege of seeing them play this live

I wanna meet this fella sometime and talk music. He has a real authentic aura about him.

These two have just such a great friendship, the way anything Judson does or says has Richard seemingly right on the edge of being fed up with his shenanigans, I love it!

pls do more songs from this album!!

I really love you guys, you are so funny! Like, for reacting to songs like these. I did learn the basics of playing electric guitar and metal with Metallica, specially this song which probably was one of the first guitar solos I did learn, I consider Metallica my first teachers on how to play metal on guitar and drums. Brings me good old memories of playing this song over and over with my band, along with lots of Metallica's songs. I'm not sure if I want to see more Metallica's songs reactions, at this point I'm kinda bored about those songs, but I will keep Metallica forever in my heart.

We all need to hear the song played on piano by him.

The best Metallica reaction channel on KZfaq thank you Gentlemen 🤘

The musician guy (Justin) is cool as hell! 😊

Wow! I've watched a lot of reaction channels but you guys might be the best. He doesn't hear the music, he feels it. That's awesome to see someone else react as I would. Does that make sense? Lol

This is cool. Fade to black or anything from S&m would be cool. If you venture off from Metallica maybe do Diary of a Madman by Ozzy

This song and Orion are just awesome, can totally escape into the music.

Him playing it on piano at the end is always my favorite part :D

Hearing it played on a piano makes it sound a lot like Ennio Morricone. Metallica plays his "The Ecstacy of Gold" as the intro to their live shows.

14m33s, after Phish was mentioned, my husband and I had to pause to have a discussion & Both of Us agree that We would enjoy sessions where Richard brings his guitar to intro & Judson introduces new song to the "Metalhead".... already loved the Fiona Apple, Pearl Jam, Beatles, and many more Judson has chosen to play as intros... Great Stuff! Love Yall!!

If you did a separate channel covering these songs strictly on piano, that would be amazing. 🤘🤘🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

So one night I was listening to the radio and they used to have a program called mandatory Metallica, which means that two requested songs by Metallica would be played at a certain hour. And I heard this. And my respect for them was catapulted to a whole Nother level, because I never knew that they had the capability to write this sort of song. Because I was only shown before then what my brother liked. But it was this one that I think truly drew me into Metallica. It took me a while to get really hooked on those guys, but it was this song and I wish they would write more like it.

You guys should check out the version of this song they did for the S & M concert. Really good.

Maybe "The Greatest show on Earth" by Nightwish live would be interesting? Tampere or Wembley.

Wait, you heard that just once... and were able to play it from memory on one play? :O You are seriously talented, sir!

This by far is my favorite album from Metallica 🤘🏻💥🔥🙏🏻

Forget about the virtuoso's reaction, your reaction to his recreation of bits of the song is the best.

I love you guys.

I absolutely love this channel and hearing thoughts from a classical musician on metal music! If ever you decide to dive into Iron Maiden, I have six fun recommendations: Rime of the Ancient Mariner Phantom of the Opera Fear of the Dark Hallowed be thy Name El Dorado Caught Somewhere in Time

Perhaps the greatest bass player of all time! What he could make it do.

There are riffs written by Dave on the Ride the Lightning album. Some in The Call of Ktulu. They were written while he was still a member of Metallica and simply repurposed later (which he didn't like at all actually).

Wow, for the first time I really hear how the main guitar melody after the intro could be something that would be played on or maybe at least written on a piano. And yeah, lol that's the bass screaming. I could be wrong, but I think Cliff's got some major crazy wah pedal bass licks going on at the end of certain bars. He was a freak of nature. I know he loved classical music and composers from the 'Classic' era of music and he really delved into the music theory stuff and created some wonderfully unique sounds and feels.

Should've given him a snippet of the enhanced bass version afterwards, Cliff plays some wicked stuff that you barely/don't hear

Jeeeezzz who is this guy???It’s just amazing his way to elaborate the song at the first listening!!! Happy to follow you🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻

What cliff does in this song with his bass is so tasty and genius

The "wild cat bass screams" reaction was hilarious. I still remember myself years ago being puzzled when I found out its Cliff Burton dong this.

Early Metallica was a lot like a symphony. Harmony and flow of the music twist your emotions. If you want more of an Opera experience might I suggest Iron Maiden. Hollowed Be Thy Name would be a good start.

Yes... Cliff could make the bass scream. He was so freakin amazing. THE GOAT!!!

Grammy winning S&M version of this is required reading friend. Live and in their prime Metallica with a full symphony behind them, right up your alley correct?

Great video

"And justice for all..." next would be good, nice video ❤

You guys should react to the call of katulu live with the San Francisco orchestra

@15:00 min mark... You can tell MUSIC is in that mans soul! Love it!

The "t" is silent in Ktulu, the "Kt" is pronounced as "khal", the first "u" is "ah" and the "lu" is "loo", altogether pronounced "Khal-AH-Lu". The original spelling is "Cthulhu" H.P. Lovecraft wrote the story in 1928. It's a fictional word in a fictional language called R'lyehian and is based on The Kraken in Scandinavian mythology.

1:35 - Nope, that is why they spelled it Ktulu not Cthulhu , they didn't want to summon him! Fun fact, 'The thing that should not be' is also about him and the bass on 'The call of Ktulu' does noises that sounds like his call! There is also another song about him called 'Dream no more'.