2014 Blizzcon is in the books and my adrenalin is still pumping hard. There was a lot to discuss at the contention itself, but honestly I feel the highlight of the weekend was James Hetfield, Kirk Hammett, Lars Ulrich, and Robert Trujillo.
I took notes on the full set list that I’m happy to share with you as a recap. Afterwards, I’ll review the entire experience and give my final verdict for Metallica at this year’s Blizzcon!
Set List:
1. Ecstasy of Gold / intro – They didn’t really play it, but it starts every show.
2. Hit the lights – Classic, but not a song that they can play well 30 years later. Weak opener.
3. Master of Puppets – Brilliant. A lot of live improv spots here that take the song into 2014.
4. Ride the Lightning – Kirk’s amazing solo carries a song that hasn’t held up over the years.
break – “here to ruin your fun,” gwar joke – comparing some of the costumes to gwar’s?, kirk switches to white zombie guitar
5. Harvester of Sorrow – Really surprised to hear this song. Was decent, but did not expect it whatsoever.
6. Kirk Frayed Ends teaser, banging amp – Intermission for the rest of the band.
7. Fade to black – James has an acoustic on a stand. Token ballad, but I would have preferred Nothing Else Matters. This just doesn’t do well outside the studio track.
break – James says they are getting better over the years, and at a show like this they feel like teenagers again. Oh, but he has one announcement… GIMME FUEL GIMME FIRE GIMME THAT WHICH I DESIRE!
8. Fuel – Many people look at load and reload as the downslope in their career, but this song is still one of the best they ever wrote.
9. Cyanide – from Death Magnetic, new song – obviously written in their lack of inspirational years, but performed well.
break – James is excited about the crowd’s participation. Time for something heavy!
10. Sad but True – Would you call this heavy? I suppose their early stuff is speed and this is heavy…
11. <ONE> – Namesake of the guild. Never a bad performance of this.
12. For whom the bell tolls – Ultimate song for Blizzcon. Bass spotlight at the start. Very amazing song, just as amazing as it was 30 years ago.
13. Creeping Death – A good song for a show like this, but I did not expect it.
14. Enter Sandman – Expected a ballad to close the set, and then Sandman in the Encore. But either way, they did Mariano proud.
ONE MORE SONG Encore ~
BATTERY – Kirk absolutely rips this solo. It was breath taking. The entire show was great, but the encore songs were some of the best live music I’ve ever watched. Remember how difficult this song is to play live. They don’t do the truest rendition, but just knowing it was all done live after multiple decades is incredible.
James teases by taking guitar off then putting it back on. Final song..?
SEEK AND DESTROY – timeless riff and timeless song. The perfect way to end it if you ask me. I didn’t expect to hear the song, but its so energetic, I can’t complain.
They all spend 10+ minutes throwing picks, towels, and even drum sticks to a select few fans. Unbelievably lucky to receive a stick!
So that was 90 minutes of Metallica. I wrote a piece a few weeks back when it was announced where I predicted their set and gave my opinions on whether it would be good or bad.
Looking back, I called every single song correctly, but I anticipated a 45 minute set with ETC on before. I didn’t realize it would be so long!
I also claimed that they would be amazing only IF they played the classics and some songs that were relevant to the convention. For me, hearing For Whom the Bell Tolls was all I needed. This is easily in my top 5 metal songs of all time, and its honestly so relevant to Blizzard and fantasy in general I felt it needed to be play.
In my opinion, the show was spectacular. There were two main things that were a detraction for me, however. The sound channels were crap. They kept going between the crowd and the band, and the individual instrument channels might as well all been one. I honestly couldn’t hear a bass line for all but a few songs, and even the dual guitar riffs were very difficult to make out. When I did hear the bass, it was sooo muddy. I guess this is what Robby does now.
The other issue I had with the show was the pace. I felt like they rushed through songs in order to get as many done as possible. Maybe its because I don’t see them live often, but I felt a lot of the early song’s had severe tempo increases. I’m pretty sure if I play every song they had back to back without taking any time for the talking, it would equate to longer then 90 minutes. I recognize this is a fact of live performances, but just eliminate Harvester of Sorrow and Creeping Death and play songs that people were actually alive for the release of. Would have liked to see two ballads as well with the 90 minute set. Unforgiven or Nothing Else Matters would have been the icing on this cake.
Overall, I give the show a 9/10. Some small detraction was noticeable, but the ferocity with which they played the last few songs was unfathomable. I had no idea they were still so passionate about these songs, especially Battery and Seek and Destroy. These are OLD songs, and these are old dudes. But they absolutely rocked Blizzcon and should be invited back next year! They also didn’t make any retarded WoW jokes like Blink182. Major upgrade!