This stream started much like the predecessor from two nights prior but this time it was Tom Morello’s voice instead of Jason Momoa’s doing the introduction. Metallica’s previous set started with their oldest material and ascended through the catalog but tonight was the opposite as they started with selections from the newest album and descended in order until we ended up at Kill Em’ All. I thought they would surely play “For Whom the Bell Tolls” and I predictably did not get “The Four Horsemen” but “Am I Evil?,” “Bleeding Me” and ”Harvester of Sorrow” more than made up for this. Another rocking set with great energy from these living legends.
SETLIST: Hardwired, The End of the Line, Dirty Window, I Disappear, Am I Evil?, The Memory Remains, Fuel, Bleeding Me, Wasting My Hate, The Unforgiven, Enter Sandman, Harvester of Sorrow, Master of Puppets, Fade to Black, Whiplash, Seek & Destroy
For many reasons that we do not need to get into here I missed seeing Metallica’s two headlining sets at Aftershock in October. Then I almost purchased the pay-per-view Triller Fight Club event in November just for the Metallica livestream portion but decided against it because I ended up having something else going that night. As such it was a more than welcome sight to see that Metallica would be broadcasting both of their weekend performances from San Francisco to celebrate 40 years together. Even better is the fact that these livestreams would be free since I already subscribe to Amazon Prime!
A video of AC/DC’s “It’s A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘N’ Roll)” quickly morphed into a Metallica video montage before the band ripped through “Hit the Lights.” After this the band spanned their entire discography for this 16 song set and the band was firing on all cylinders throughout. “Orion” was a highlight for me as I had not ever seen this played live. “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “Master of Puppets” and “Enter Sandman” were notably missing from this set so these will certainly be played during Part II on Sunday but what else will they play?
SETLIST: Hit the Lights, Creeping Death, Trapped Under Ice, Welcome Home (Sanitarium), Orion, The Shortest Straw, One, Sad But True, Nothing Else Matters, King Nothing, Fixxxer, Breadfan, No Leaf Clover, Frantic, The Day That Never Comes, Spit Out the Bone
The memories I have of this show are just as much about the trip as they are the show itself as this was my first time ever visiting San Francisco. I already had a reason to visit because my sister had recently moved to the Bay Area, but once Rage Against the Machine announced they would be reuniting from a seven-year hiatus to only play this show and a handful of others the trip became a double win.
Bob drove Marvin and I from San Diego through night to avoid traffic and we eventually arrived sometime Friday morning. My sister let us into her place and we immediately crashed for several hours. Once we got up we made our way into the city proper for some shenanigans with my sister, her roommate Eve, Eve’s boyfriend Sam and Marvin’s friend Email who had joined up at my sister’s place during our “nap.”
Numerous drinks later + two more ladies + one more dude and somehow my three friends got separated from the group and were not reachable by phone. One strip club, one limo ride, one street fire alarm box pulled (I thought it was a joke) and one chance meeting with Flavor Flav and we found ourselves at a party he told us about in one of the craziest houses I have ever been in. It was a multi-level house that was set up like a club with each room being a different theme. The room where literally everything in it was white and fuzzy is the one I remember the most. Long story short the house was so big that after several more drinks I became convinced that everyone had left me there because I could not find anyone I knew. After finding out the hard way that BART shut down at midnight I ended up taking a $75 taxi back to my sister’s place and making a makeshift bed on her front porch with the boxes she had recently unpacked but not yet disposed of.
The next morning I spoke to my lost friends who had somehow made their way down by the airport and got a hotel room for the night. Once they finally made it back to my sister’s after a long hung-over BART ride they cleaned up and we were out the door again for a little pre-funking closer to where we would end up for the concert, McCovey Cove Parking Lot next to AT&T Park where the San Francisco Giants play.
Rock the Bells was originally an annual hip-hop festival only held in Southern California but had spread to other cities since the inception in 2004. The event started at noon but we essentially treated the show as a Rage Against the Machine concert with lots of hip-hop opening acts. We finally went into the show just as Wu-Tang Clan hit the stage. There were a lot of hands in the air waving from side to side, a lot of herb being smoked and like Slipknot, a lot of dudes onstage. They were entertaining but I was there to see Rage.
The only other time I had seen Rage was when I saw them at the Gorge almost exactly 10 years before this show so I was pretty excited to see them again. Since that show Rage had put out The Battle of Los Angeles and Renegades. From the first note of “Testify” to the last note of “Killing in the Name” Rage was every bit as fierce and relevant as they were when they first hit the scene. They flat out crushed it. We had a decent view of the stage because being taller than six feet is definitely advantageous in these situations. The crowd was no comparison to the Gorge show where the entire audience was pogo-ing up and down but to be fair no show is quite like a Gorge show.
SETLIST: Testify, People of the Sun, Bombtrack, Know Your Enemy, Vietnow, Bullet in the Head, Renegades of Funk, Guerrilla Radio, Calm Like A Bomb, Sleep Now in the Fire, Bulls on Parade, Wake Up, Freedom, Township Rebellion, Killing in the Name
