Review and Setlist: Metallica delivers heavy-hitting Tampa show

TAMPA – Enter Metallica.
The reigning kings of thrash made their long-awaited return Friday, delivering a relentless sonic boom to a jam-packed Raymond James Stadium. The band, which had bypassed Tampa Bay during its last two Florida tours, treated about 70,000 acolytes to a blistering 2-hour and 5-minute, 16-song set.
You could have birthed a child now old enough to drive between the time that the band had last appeared here — 5,725 days ago. (But who's counting?)
The group is playing a two-show, 'no repeat weekend' with different sets and opening acts — unapologetically designed to lure hardcore followers to both nights. Friday's other performers were Limp Bizkit and Ice Nine Kills. Sunday's bill includes Pantera and Suicidal Tendencies.
Metallica has achieved enormous worldwide success built on sturdy musicianship and multilayered songs that connect with fiercely loyal fans. Power rock, speed metal, thrash or heavy metal. Call it what you will. Metallica still rules the genre.
The band's M72 world tour has been in full stride since the release of its 11th studio album '72 Seasons' two years ago — the latest in a line of intense, take-no-prisoners recordings, building on a mostly brilliant resume.
The group formed when 17-year-old drummer Lars Ulrich placed an ad looking for like-minded musicians in the fall of 1981. James Hetfield, who had just turned 18, showed up. He would become the singer, lyricist, and rhythm guitarist. Angry and rebellious, those two Southern California teens likely would have scoffed at the idea that they'd be doing this into their sixties. But here they are. Lucky for us.
The band Friday traversed 40 years of music with a mix of anthems and obscure tracks, starting with the volcanic 'Creeping Death' off their 1984 album 'Ride the Lightning.'
There is a rocket-fueled, galloping rhythm to signature Metallica music, forged by Hetfield's down-picking style and lead guitarist Kirk Hammett's searing solos. Newer songs like the title track from the last record and 'If Darkness Had a Son,' played early, cut loose like rollicking runaway trains.
The show featured some of Metallica's strongest work, including 'The Day That Never Comes' — a ballad that found Hetfield seated at the start, until the band charges like a hostile rhino. 'Love is a four-letter word,' Hetfield growls. It stood as one of many first-night highlights.
As for deep cuts, you can't get much deeper than the mesmerizing and melodic instrumental 'Orion' written primarily by transformational bassist Cliff Burton months before he died in a 1986 tour bus crash. Metallica only resumed playing it with the gifted Robert Trujillo, his bass slung so low at times it nearly scrapes the stage.
Hetfield seemed genuinely inspired by the size of the crowd, stopping at one point to say 'I can't believe how many people came here tonight to celebrate live music with your friends from Metallica.' Later he told those attending their first show that 'we've been waiting for you, and now you're here — members of the Metallica family of Tampa Bay.' Family is forever, he would note.
And that family lost its collective minds when Hammett launched into the gorgeous opening bars of 'Nothing Else Matters' from their top selling 1991 album 'Metallica.' It's as close to a real love song as anything in the hall of fame group's vast catalog, though it pulsed with energy.
Fans filled a 'snake pit' inside a massive circular stage. The configuration had pros and cons. It made for a more intimate experience for those who could afford to be in the thick of it. During most of the show, however, it felt as if the quartet stood in four different zip codes. Only seldomly, like during 'Orion,' would they all congregate near each other for the duration of a song.
The band closed with seething versions of 'Seek and Destroy' and 'Masters of Puppets' — essential playlist tracks for every Army tank operator who ever powered up an M1 Abrams.
There would be no encore, unless you count Sunday's full show as such.
Earlier in the evening, the pride of Jacksonville, Limp Bizkit, brought its own brand of fury during a high-energy — and fun — nine-song set led by frontman Fred Durst and masked guitarist Wes Borland. Durst, wearing a Japan national team Shohei Ohtani jersey, shouted out Clearwater resident Tom Cruise — a big-time Metallica fan who was apparently hanging out earlier backstage.
Limp Bizkit followed every serial killer's favorite band, Ice Nine Kills. The five-member Boston-based outfit (not counting the zombies and damsels in distress that wandered or danced across the stage) buzzed through House of Horrors performance art choreographed to its music, complete with splattered blood, severed heads, hatchets and other killing tools. By mid set, I wondered when they were going to melt down last Halloween's leftover candy corn and shoot it into our veins.
Here are the main downsides of the no repeat weekend: Floor tickets for a single show sold for up to $424 through Ticketmaster. A spot in the snake pit commanded $3,700 on the secondary market. Seats in Ray Jay's hinterlands, where sound quality can be a dice roll, approached $100. Even being bigger bodied came with financial consequences. Fans buying 2XL, 3XL or 4XL T-shirts had to fork over a $5 'upcharge' at the bustling merch stands.
If you managed to score decent seats to both concerts, great. (Tom Cruise could afford it!)
But what if you couldn't? Pick the Friday show and you ran the risk of never hearing the end of it from buddies who will see Metallica play 'Enter Sandman' 'One,' 'For Whom the Bell Tolls,' 'The Unforgiven,' and 'The Call of Ktulu' — all standard second-night offerings. It's the better setlist. Go Sunday only, and there's no 'Orion.'
I did a quick informal survey of fans milling around the concourse, and roughly 70% of the folks I talked to bought tickets for both nights. 'Smart marketing on their part,' one told me.
In between the no repeat concerts along this tour, Metallica is fitting in one-off shows in places like Syracuse, New York, and Blacksburg, Virginia. Those concertgoers reveled in a fully-loaded final six-song feast of 'Nothing Else Matters,' 'Sad but True,' 'One,' 'Seek & Destroy,' 'Masters of Puppets' and 'Enter Sandman.'
It's hard to complain when a band ends a muscular show with the potency and conviction of its riveting chosen songs. The band looked and sounded great. And it truly was a fantastic performance.
But it's easy to yearn for more Metallica, especially on behalf of those Friday-only fans who've been sleeping with one eye open and gripping their pillows tight — waiting all these years for the Sandman's return.
FRIDAY SETLIST
'Creeping Death'
'Harvester of Sorrow'
'Leper Messiah'
'King Nothing'
'72 Seasons'
'If Darkness Had a Son'
Kirk and Rob doodle ('Jalepeno Jam')
'The Day That Never Comes'
'Cyanide'
'Orion'
'Nothing Else Matters'
'Sad But True'
'Blackened'
'Fuel'
'Seek & Destroy'
'Master of Puppets'
ANTICIPATED SUNDAY SETLIST
These are the percentage chances that the following songs will be played based on an analysis of a full year's worth of M72 'no repeat' performances.
'Whiplash' (100%)
'For Whom the Bell Tolls' (100%)
'Ride the Lightning' (93%)
'Until It Sleeps' (53%)
'Lux Ӕterna' (93%)
'Screaming Suicide' (60%)
Kirk and Rob doodle (100%)
'Welcome Home (Sanitarium)' (47%)
'Wherever I May Roam' (80%)
'The Call of Ktulu' (100%)
'The Unforgiven' (100%)
'Inamorata' (73%)
'Fight Fire With Fire' (40%)
'Moth into Flame' (100%)
'One' (100%)
'Enter Sandman' (100%)

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