
"Ride the Lightning" is the title track of the 1984 album by heavy metal band Metallica. The original version of the song was found on the Horsemen Of The Apocalypse demo with Dave Mustaine and Ron McGovney. The version found on Ride the Lightning is slightly different due to input from Cliff Burton so he was credited as well as Hetfield, Ulrich and Mustaine. The theme of the song is that of a man who has been sentenced to execution in the electric chair. He opens by acknowledging his guilt ("guilty as 'charged'"), but still questions who made the judge "God to say" that he should die. Later on the man starts to feel the fear while the execution is prepared and asks himself what he is doing in the electric chair. By the end of the song he just wants to get it over with. It is speculated that the song is based on a 1961 episode of The Twilight Zone written by Charles Beaumont entitled "Shadow Play". The episode begins in a courtroom, where Adam Grant (Dennis Weaver) is convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to the electric chair. Shouting, "It's happening all over again!", Grant insists that his trial, conviction, and execution are all part of a recurring nightmare, and that when he dies, the world around him and all its occupants will likewise cease to exist. In a live recording from 1983, James Hetfield states that "This one is dedicated to our friend in Georgia", leading to the possibility that it is about an actual person as opposed to fictional events. In an <b>...</b>
Metallica
James
Hetfield
Lars
Ulrich
Kirk
Hammett
Ride
the
Lightning
Robert
Trujillo
Cliff
Burton
Metal
Thrash