Sunny Poland Rocks with Metal’s Big Four
History was made on a sunny Polish day as 120,000 metalheads invaded a massive airfield in Warsaw to witness the ‘Big Four’ play together for the first time. After 30 years competing to be the biggest name in metal, finally Metallica, Slayer, Megadeth and Anthrax could put their differences (and to a lesser degree their egos) aside and accept their position in the Big Four.
With Mastodon sadly pulling out due to illness and with no replacement, it was up to local white-and-black face-painted scaries Behemoth to kick things off. Their new album had spent weeks at number one in Poland – a victory for any metal band – and it showed. The locals were going berserk.
A Red Bull helicopter was doing backflips, twists and other tricks above. The monolithic black mass below must have been a sight to behold. There were grandparents right down to small children in the crowd, as well as many Brits who had made the journey because they got a free ticket to Poland when they bought tickets to the UK version of Sonisphere. Even so, the crowd smelt like Polish sausage burps, sweat and beer, and despite looking ominous with Eastern European skinheads, spikes, piercings, tattoos and black leather everywhere, the atmosphere was very positive – everyone was obviously overwhelmed to be seeing four metal gods sharing the same stage in one day.
Anthrax obviously had a point to prove in being anointed ‘number four’. Fronted by original singer Joey Belladonna meant Anthrax mostly played pre-‘90s classics like Be All, End All, Caught In A Mosh, Among The Living, N.F.L, I Am The Law and Antisocial. But “new song” Only from 1993’s Sound Of White Noise was the highlight. Guitarist Scott Ian’s ever-smiling bald noggin and massive goatee didn’t stop banging all set. Their intensity surprised many who were there primarily to see Metallica.
‘Number three’ – that’d be Megadeth. Dave Mustaine’s well-documented bitterness from firstly being kicked out of Metallica in the early days and then being in their shadow ever since must have been swallowed – if only for a day. Megadeth supporting Metallica is almost unimaginable considering the amount of venom that has been spat between them over the years, and the fiery red-headed frontman acknowledged this momentous occasion from the stage and paid tribute to all the fans that had supported the genre for so long. Together with recently repatriated co-founder Dave Ellefson on bass they played album Rust In Peace (1990) almost in its entirety, starting off with Holy Wars and Hangar 18 before finishing with Symphony Of Destruction and Peace Sells.
The chants of ‘Slayer’ in Polish sounded like ‘SLAY-IN’ and the crowd were forming circle pits and losing their minds before Slayer even came onstage. So when Slayer started off with World Painted Blood the place exploded. Slayer are truly a physically and aurally imposing force. Guitarist Kerry King’s massive tattooed head and neck match nicely with his wristband of countless shiny metal spikes and equally spiky guitar. King constantly traded solos with Jeff Hanneman, while drummer Dave Lombardo was simply a powerhouse. Lead singer/bassist Tom Araya´s goatee might be going a bit grey, but his voice was as brutal as ever as Angel Of Death, Mandatory Suicide, South Of Heaven and unruly closer Raining Blood rang out over Warsaw. The crowd was heaving and exhausted, and there was still two hours of Metallica to come…
As the sun went down, the moon rose up perfectly behind stage. The crush before Metallica was almost unbearable as 120,000 people tried to get as close as they could to the ‘number one’ metal band of all time. The cemetery scene from film The Good, The Bad And The Ugly gave some distraction from the squeeze, and there were constant Metall-ICA chants; again in Polish style. The roar that greeted the start of Creeping Death was deafening. Goosebumps. Like all those before him, singer James Hetfield gave thanks to Poland and said how blessed they felt to be able to play such a big, historical gig. “I can’t see the end of you,” he said, peering into the distance.
Over the two hours they played a mix of all their albums – from old material like Welcome Home (Sanitarium), Master Of Puppets, For Whom The Bell Tolls and Four Horseman through to their most recent songs from Death Magnetic such as All Nightmare Long, Cyanide and That Was Just Your Life. Of course it was their hits like One (with chopper sounds, machine gun fire and pyrotechnics), Nothing Else Matters (where Hetfield played acoustic and held up the microphone to let the crowd sing) and Enter Sandman that had everyone moving in unison. For those more concerned with moshing, the stand out tracks were Fuel, Blackened and final songs Hit The Lights and Seek And Destroy.
They also played their heavy cover of Queen song Stone Cold Crazy. Hetfield said Queen were one of the bands that inspired them to play music. All band members said their thanks at the end of the show, and Hetfield said “Fuck off, we’re not finished!” when the house announcements came on…. But they were. Yet, no-one could complain. History had been witnessed in Warsaw and the ‘Big Four’ just got a whole lot bigger. One to tell the grandkids about.
