Metallica In Cardiff was so awesome, it was almost sad

My teenage years were all about Metallica. To say they were my “favourite” band would be a serious understatement; I could name every song in order of release. I learnt the guitar mostly because of my love of James and Kirk's guitar work. The highlight of my childhood was flying to Belfast to watch them with my best friend of the time, feigning sickness from school. I had sky high expectations for my first gig but somehow they exceeded them. As soon as the introduction to “That was Just you life” came on I was in metal heaven.

I have seen them a few times since but their first time to Cardiff in twenty years was the first for a while. I was a little nervous it might not be the same. All in their early sixties now, surely they weren’t the same as the relatively spritely forty years olds I had seen in Belfast, or even the fifty olds I had seen later on. Too lethargic and slow for thrash metal? But somehow they were just as awesome as they have always been.

Yes, there were a few more gaps between songs than fifteen years ago but when they were playing they didn’t hold back. Lars still bounced around, not shying away from those double bass drums. James’s voice is as good as ever, maybe even better somehow than in Belfast. Kirk comfortably shredded as if he was still a young man. All skinny and fit, I suppose fat rock stars have to retire early. 

The sound was noticeably good. Everything was perfectly audible and the tone was heavy. I have been to gigs where either the solos were inaudible or made you ears bleed (not in a good way), but it was perfectly balanced. Highlights of the show were: Fuel, so good live despite not coming from one of their best albums. Sad But True, heavy! And of course one of the greatest metal songs of all time, Master Of Puppets. 

The stage was a great design, every part of the stadium got a view of all four of them at some point during the gig. The snake pit was probably envisaged by the manager looking for another opportunity to upsell tickets, but it was still a spectacle. The millennium stadium was mega sold out to the point where the gig broke the stadium’s attendance record (for a metal gig!!). As you can imagine the atmosphere was fantastic, I was not the only one there who knew most of the words.

So in short, if you're considering going to a Metallica gig anytime soon and you're worried that they might be over the hill, then don’t. They are as brilliant as ever and are still one of the best live experiences on the planet. However, there was something quite sad about it.

There will probably never be a metal band this big again. A metal gig to a record sell out crowd in a huge stadium will be something future generations will never experience. It will be at most arenas or a crowd of fans from many bands to fill a small field at a festival. 

There was a unique set of circumstances that made Metallica so big. Metal was at its height of popularity in the 80s when they began. It was early enough that metal hadn’t fractured into lots of different sub-genres. Rock music in general was bigger than today. With rock albums such as the Black album (technically called Metallica) or Back in Black selling millions of copies. Metallica maintained that popularity by playing stadiums all over the world year after year. But a new metal band could not build that from scratch even if they had Metallica’s song writing brilliance. Starting today, they would have to deal with the shift in music to corporate pop. The music landscape is dominated by models with more ass than talent. Guitar music in general is not in vogue with people preferring sterile computer music. Which is fine through headphones, but will never have the live presence and power of distorted guitars. 

Metal has divergenced into a tree of different sub-genres making it hard to gather the few metal fans that remain. I do not despair though. Metal will never die but may forever be a niche like Jazz. There are surely some fantastic Jazz gigs out there, but none played in stadiums. But alas, when I am a grumpy middle aged man, I am just going to have to accept decent but not great metal bands playing my local half filled arena. And reminisce about the giant metal gigs of a heavier age.