Metallica Close Out Orion with Black Album In-Full and More
The almighty Metallica came back with a vengeance for their epic encore at Orion Music + More Festival. The band stood and delivered another crushing set. In addition to playing 1991’s Metallica (The Black Album) in it’s entirety, the guys also re-played some classics from Night 1 (“Master of Puppets,” “One,” “Hit The Lights,” etc.) and threw in some different ones, playing “Fuel” and “Shortest Straw,” and the ultra-powerful “Blackened.”
The band was in rare form all weekend, running around and introducing different band’s on the side stages, as well as hosting culture events at the festival. Drummer Lars Ulrich was very instrumental in the Hit The Lights Films, and lead guitarist Kirk Hammett and bassist Robert Trujillo found time to catch some AC waves with some ‘Tallica surfers. The guys really seemed to be having fun with this festival; THEIR festival.
Metallica are still enjoying the year-long celebration of their 30th anniversary as a band, and they sound as good as ever. They band was certainly on point this weekend. They played songs they haven’t played in years or in the U.S., and “Escape” which has NEVER been played live. It sounded like the band had been playing them all along. Frontman James Hetfield‘s riffs were heavy and tight, and his vocals sounded better than ever. Hammett was on another planet, shredding the crowd’s eardrums to pieces with one ripping solo after the other. Trujillo made his presence known on bass-driven tracks like “For Whom The Bell Tolls,” “My Friend of Misery,” and “The God That Failed.” And Lars, well…Lars was Lars. Pummeling his double bass, throwing beer into the crowd, and maintaining his place in the ranks of rock’s top drummers of all time.
The rest of Day 2 was more of a Metallica-style day, with performances from thrashers and death metallers like The Black Dahlia Murder, Thy Will Be Done, Charred Walls of The Damned, and Sepultura. Country rocker Eric Church came in and mixed things up on the main stage. More highlights of the day included a hauntingly good performance by Swedish metal band Ghost, for their only U.S. show this summer. Volbeat were personally introduced by James Hetfield, and gave an outstanding performance as always. Finally, the new school set the stage for the godfathers, as Avenged Sevenfold played a blistering hour-and-fifteen minute set before Metallica took the stage to close the weekend. The first installment of Orion Music + More Festival is in the books. Only time will tell if it will be an annual tradition, plus more locations throughout the country. Metallica will be heading into the studio soon to begin recording their next studio album, the follow-up to 2008’s Death Magnetic. – by Matt Bishop (Photo Courtesy of Cambria Harkey, Metallica, and Orion Music + More Festival)