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Master of Reality

by John Darnielle · 2008

John Darnielle hears [Black Sabbath's Master of Reality] through the ears of Roger Painter, a young adult locked in a southern California adolescent psychiatric center in 1985; deprived of his Walkman and hungry for comfort… more

8 quotes ★ 4.06 (2,315) Fiction

Quotes from the Book

I wish they'd conduct a national poll to find out who feels out of place and who doesn't. Just to get the numbers, you know? To get a feel for how many of us there are.
9
People always talk about good time rock and roll, Chuck Berry or whatever, like this liberating force for feeling good. But what I need in my life is to be liberated into feeling bad. Not sad. I have plenty of sad. What I need is a place where I can spray anger in sparks like a gnarled piece of electrical cable. Just be mad at stuff and soak in the helplessness.
5
That's what it is. That's what my morning was like: all these real physical heavy positive vibrations, the soul of this tape. The fuzzy groove. The meaning of it all, if it has one: All love, all the time. Peace and happiness in every day. Peace and happiness with cow blood dripping from your hands, bright blood staining your fingerprints because you didn't glove up since you don't normally do prep work. Peace and happiness when you're making a list of everything that's wrong with the world and squinting your eyes tight trying to imagine your way out of it. Peace, peace, peace, happiness, happiness, happiness.
3
I don't even want to be rich I just want to be alone.
3
When you listen to early Black Sabbath, you know that the main difference between them & you is that somebody bought them guitars and microphones. They're not smarter than you; they're not deeper than you; they're a fuck of a lot richer than you, but other than that, it's like listening to the inside of your own mind. So when they write songs, they sing about wizards. And witches. And robots.
1
The guitar tones and the thumpy thumpy drums soaking into me so hard. People always talk about good time rock and roll, Chuck Berry or whatever, like this liberating force for feeling good. But what I need is to be liberated into feeling bad. Not sad, I have plenty of sad. What I need is a place where I can spray anger in sparks like a gnarled piece of electrical cable. Just be mad at stuff and soak in the helplessness.
I could feel myself getting younger and angrier. Or maybe I could feel the young angry person I really am and will always be rising up and taking over, Incredible Hulk style. I don't know. I probably will never know.
I can't draw pictures! But that's OK because there are no pictures on the the cover of Master of Reality. It is just words written in a wavy style which you would probably say is just drugs but I think the point is to make you say "What is reality?" which sometimes you might say is a stupid question. But I would say to you then, oh really?

About John Darnielle

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About the book

John Darnielle hears [Black Sabbath's Master of Reality] through the ears of Roger Painter, a young adult locked in a southern California adolescent psychiatric center in 1985; deprived of his Walkman and hungry for comfort, he explains Black Sabbath as one might describe air to a fish, or love to an android, hoping to convince his captors to give him back his tapes.

Book details

First published
2008
Genre
Fiction
Goodreads rating
4.06 (2k ratings)

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