The Californian band was the most outstanding performance in the return of the festival after two years of absence
Good part of the 70,000 attendees of the first day of Mad Cool have received tonight the discharge of energy and forcefulness of Metallicathe main concert of a night in which the return of the Madrid festival after two years was celebrated stoppage due to the pandemic.
Normality has been the dominant note on a day with full capacity, despite the stormy weather threats that hovered over the venue a few hours before the opening at 5:00 p.m. on Wednesday. Finally, the discharge of energy and rock came hours later with the Californian metal group, who appeared with a slight delay at 9:45 p.m. before an audience of heterogeneous ages (there was no lack of metal hacks from their children or nephews), many heavy t-shirts and less hair. A powerful two-hour concert which has been the highlight among the 29 groups that have performed on one of the seven stages of the fifth edition of the festival that will take place until next Sunday.
Probably a good part of the attendees had already been born when the vocalist/guitarist James Hetfield and the drummer Lars Ulrich, formed Metallica in 1981 in Los Angeles, with just 18 years (now they are 61). Accompanied now by Robert Trujillo (bass) and Kirk Lee Hammett (guitar), they have started their show with ‘Whiplash’, from their 1983 debut album ‘Kill ’em All’, one of their most forceful and fast-paced songs .
The fast tempos, the instrumentals and the forceful and aggressive musicality for which the band became known worldwide have presided over the concert, focused above all on the first albums of these founders of thrash metal, with hymns like ‘Seek and destroy’ or the ballad, very chanted, ‘Nothing else matters’. Seasoned especially at the end with flares and fireworks, the show opened with images and music from ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly’, by Sergio Leone, and practically closed with sequences of ‘Johnny took his rifle’, as prelude to his anti-war song ‘One’, inspired by the story of the soldier who loses his limbs, sight and hearing in war. The concert has closed with the mythical ‘Master of Puppets’ and with Hetfield thanking the company of “the great Metallica family” and welcoming the new members (around half of the attendees according to the calculation he has made there himself the singer asking the novices to raise their hands).
After the discharge of energy and professionalism of the experienced rockers, has taken over Twenty One Pilotsother names featured by the organization on today’s poster, and Chvrches. Hours earlier, the British Placebo they have mainly tackled songs from the album released this year ‘Never Let Me Go’, such as ‘Beautiful James’. His glam alternative rock sound and Brian Molko’s characteristic nasal voice has also been heard on ‘Too many friends’, from the 2014 album ‘Loud Like Love’. On the first day the hypnotic songs of villagers, several times nominated for the Mercury Prize for the best album by Anglo-Saxon critics; the British Wolf Alicegreat hope of contemporary rock with only three albums, and Yves Tumorthe American champion of experimental music.
This Thursday the main stages will be filled with alternative rock from Imagine Dragons and The Killers and the metal band deftonesamong others.