When Metallica announced that they’d be playing in Zurich at Letzigrund I knew I had to try and see them. They are just Legends which you have to see at least once. Last night with their Worldwired tour they started the openair concert season with a bang. 45 000 people were coming to see their favourite band and almost all of them showed up in the right merch!
When the ticket prices were announced I knew I had to try to pull a Guns ‘N Roses again. Luckily a friend of mine from a fellow blog called Bäckstage helped me out a lot and landed me a front of stage ticket! Which meant that I was super close to the stage and saw how Metallica interacted with their fans. Let me tell you I thought they were super cute. Not a word I thought I would use to describe Metallica haha But they really were. All of them were actually looking at us, talking and miming stuff. It was just really cool to see.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
Just after 8 Ennio Morricone’s “Ecstasy of Gold” started to ring around the Letzigrund and the huge screnes showed some scenes from the movie. The amosphere was already great with the 95% male voices singing to the score. The four guys – James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett and Robert Trujillo – stepped on stage to perform the title track “Hardwired” of their newest record. I was fascinated. Kirk and Robert walked around the whole stage and said hello to the front rows. But what struck me the most is that you could actually feel the music in your stomache! It’s like loud fireworks 😀 Because it was so loud your whole body experienced the music in a different way. I loved it!
“The Memory Remains”, “Disposable Heroes” and “The Thing that should not be” followed. Moshpits were formed and the guys in there were having a blast. What I love about these rock concerts is that the people are so friendly. Everyone is having a good time! Plus you actually have space to enjoy the gig. After the first few songs I realised that Metallica isn’t really my music. However you have to appreciate them as musicians! The way they play their instruments is just outstanding and hello James’ voice is incredible. Even the way he said Zurich was super sexy! hahaha The women who preferred to be at the Enrique Iglesias gig deffo missed out on this 😀
Metallica gives you heavy
“The Unforgiven” and “Not that we’re dead” was next. But I really enjoyed “Moth into Flame”. Metallica actually brought the fire out! They had a moving fire on stage and then some huge flames came out on top of it too. I wasn’t cold but it was still nice of them to warm us up a bit lol After this James addressed the audience:
Do you like your music heavy? – A big roar from the crowd
Do you like your music heavy now? – even louder roar
Metallica gives you heavy now!
And with that they played “Sad but True” and “No Leaf Clover”. Metallica wanted to honour some local music by a Swiss band called Celtic Frost. Kirk and Rob did their thing with “The Unsurper”, “ManUNkind” and “Orion”. I quite liked “Frantic” the guitar riffs were brill on that. I think it must be one of the less heavy ones haha
Both “Frantic” and “One” had amazing laser shows throughout the whole stadium. It was so fascinating to watch! I really loved the atmosphere. The lovely people having fun listening to great music with a brill show! If you want to see some highlight check out my IG account. But the atmosphere got even better when they played some older songs. The crowd sang along to “Master of Puppets” and the devil signs were up.
The end fireworks
For the next two songs “For whom the bell tolls” and “Creeping Death” Lars – the drummer – took place at the end of the snake pit stage so he could be a bit closer to the action as well. All four of them together performed the songs there and very fitting some light rain came down. To me it was just perfect and no-one around me was actually bothered by it haha
Another one of their hits “Seek & Destroy” followed and was met by a loud roar and the guys sang along. The two hours flew by and I didn’t even realise it but it was time for the guys to play the encore game.
With “Lords of Summer” Metallica came back and rocked Zurich in front of their LED screen showing the Swiss flag. I was actually wondering if the windows on the buildings around the stadium were vibrating! They must have been haha
And finally, the song I personally have been waiting for came. The long intro played beautifully by Kirk already gave me goosebumps. When James’ voice set it I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to witness this special moment. “Nothing Else Matters” – what a song! If it was up to me they could have repeated it straight away! But all good things must come to end and they finished their 2hrs and 30 mins set with “Enter Sandman” and huge fireworks. After the last chords were played Lars said that 35 years ago they played their first gig in Europe in Zurich at Volkshaus supporting Venom. So they were extremely grateful to the Metallica Family who keeps coming to shows and support them living their dream and with that they started to throw buckloads of guitar picks into the audience. Some were even specialised for the Zurich gig with the date and the Grossmünster backdropped by the Swiss flag in typical Metallica style.
Metallica rocked Zurich. It was fascinating to see the brilliant musicians in action including their impressive WorldWired show with laser, fire and fireworks. But what I liked most is how they treated their fans as family and how down-to-earth these legends were.
Oh my God!! Your article is great, I am so happy that you got to see them perform live, you seem to be a great fan. ☻ You got pretty lucky with the front of stage ticket. I can imagine how overwhelmed you were to see them so closely.
Aww thank you for your lovely comment. It really was amazing ?