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Metallica Live
in Earl's Court, London
Lined
up for over an hour with London's Rock enthusiasts- which comprised of a
weird mix of grandmothers (toting grandchildren!), wheelchaired rebels,
at least one blind person, at least 3 Santa Clauses and hosts of goth
rockers.
The air was electric and as expected veteran Tallica fans
were abundant- debating about the intricacies of the Black Album and
many theories behind Newsted's split from the band etc. And we
waited in the cold. The place was huge- Godsmack opened
with a bang and did a great job at warming up the crowd. The vocalist
did an amazing percussion duet with his drummer on two revolving
drumsets. Being the last leg of the European tours- they threw at least
6 pairs of drumsticks to the crowd- my seats were to the left of the
stage- seated- and (so i thought) would not be getting anything thrown
in my direction.
Then the Gods of Metal rock descended unto the stage- from where i was
sitting, i had a good view of Kirk Hammet doing 20 pushups back
stage before grabbing his axe and marching with the others to appear on
stage with strains of "The Good, The Bad, The Ugly"
playing. It was surreal, after spending many teenaged afternoons
watching Metallica live in concert bootlegs with Hairy
and kumar back home, I was there being part of the
singalongs, the "Oi Oi Oi Oi Oi" of "For Whom the bell
tolls", lighting a lighter for "Nothing Else Matters",
doing the prayer in "Enter Sandman", raising my fists
proudly proclaiming things "Sad but True". Their
showmanship was excellent. Pleasuring the fans with more then enough old
stuff and pulling off their new St. Anger stuff without making it
look like flacid penises amongst a hosts of Metal Rock erections like
"One".
Being there in the sea of lit lighters during "Nothing Else
Matters" was fucking fantastic. I could try and wax poetic and
say it was ethereal and magical- but to put it bluntly- fucking
fantastic sums it up best. I was surprised they even went on and did
3 encores- really giving their all to the fans- and even more surprised
they pulled off "Enter Sandman" without a hint of
reluctance. All the classic Metallica stunts were there- Lars
Ulrich taking off his shirt, cussing the audience and wringing the
sweat out of his shirt and drumming while standing up every now and
then- exactly the stuff I watched them do in those bootleg VCDs we saw
back home years ago. Fuck what people say about their prime being over-
they were in Top form. With Robert- the new bassist holding his
ground excellently- and they would face each part of the stadium while
playing- each of them acknowledging every single member of the crowd at
least once. Legends are legends, no question about it. When you feel a
band play a stadium the way Metallica does- milking the
crowd and knowing exactly how to get them to do anything- that's what
live should be- beyond the "Get the Fuck Up!" and "How
does it feel to be ALIVE ?" they worked the crowd good.
There even was an impromptu jam session with Kirk Hammet on drums
and Lars playing the guitar intros for "Smoke on the
Water" and "Nothing Else Matters". And
pyrotechnics- in the intro of "One". Just when we
thought after one encore - the show was over- the machine gun fire came
on and damn it was good.
I might be boring alot of you with this, but I'm trying to record as
many details as I can so I can read this some other time and relive the
fucking awesome experience of the Earls Court concert. And get this- I
caught not One but TWO picks!
It says 'Tallica for Life' on one side and Metallica on the other. The
were extremely generous at the end of the show- being the last leg of
the European tour, throwing stuff for each side of the audience- even us
at the sides ! God bless them- and the Indonesian friend came along with
me too. Bought the t-shirt too with tour dates!
I dont think any other Rock show is going to live up to this...
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