Ok, so the title is a little misleading as it wasn't that long but it worked with what I was trying to do! Here is yet another long arsed, overexcited review (especially at the end of Manchester - you'll see why!) of the two shows I saw during the week. Enjoy! 
Nottingham - Trent FM Arena, 25th February 2009
After seeing the Death Magnetic launch party in London in September of last year, I was so ready to finally see Metallica on their own arena tour in the UK. Andy had very kindly offered to let me crash at his for the gigs and that was very much appreciated as I am always skint! Travelled down to Birmingham to meet him on the 24th. Got the train from Edinburgh to Birmingham for the costly sum of £3!!! I can barely get to the next town on the bus for that! Had to wait for about 10mins at the station for him before heading back to his. We went out for dinner and then went back to his and got our arses royally kicked at Street Fighter IV on the Xbox ("Abel is solid!" Haha!). We also watched Machine Head's secret "Ten Ton Hammer" show until the dvd started sticking so we moved onto one of Metallica's shows at Earl's Court in 2003. Kat had been filming Metallica's rehearsal show in Nottingham that night and phoned for a chat afterwards. Much to Andy's joy we spent much time discussing James' arse as well which I'm sure he was thrilled about listening too!! Haha!
The next day we just hung out in the flat watching Scuzz (who only have about 5 videos on their playlist it seems!) before getting ready to drive to Nottingham. The choice of music was, of course, a bit of Death Magnetic with us both in fine voice, especially during The Judas Kiss. When we got to Nottingham, we parked the car up and headed to the Pit & Pendulum to meet up with everyone. Kat, Su & Neil were sitting at a table as we went in so we sat and chatted to them. Then Rattle returned from the bar and joined us. I have never seen him so nervous as he had won a meet and greet for this show. Gav showed up not long after him and we sat and chatted for a little bit before heading off to the arena. Kat was working for this show so we hung around with her as she was trying to gather together the meet and greet winners, whilst we tried to calm Rattle down - by taking the piss out of him! Haha! I was starving so went into the cafe to get something to eat. The only thing there I fancied was a doughnut which Su was laughing about cos of the "searching for doughnuts" bit in Some Kind Of Monster as it always reminds her of me! After a while, they all went backstage and we just stood around waiting before the gates opened. Eventually they did but we were waiting for Dave and Hairy Muffin to arrive and I had a ticket for one of them so we had to wait. Anne and Ryan also joined us. I think me and Ryan need to speak about what we're wearing before going out cos we both had Master Of Puppets shirts on and the exact same Justice hoodie! We should have got a photo of that now I think about it. Finally Dave and Muffin turn up and we headed down into the arena.
We caught the last few songs of The Sword and to be honest, I thought they were very boring. Plus the sound was really bad and I could hardly make out the vocals at all. I wasn't bothered about seeing them really, I was more excited about the other support band - Machine Head!!!!!! The intro to Clenching The Fists Of Dissent has such a great build up, I absolutely love it! The sound was very poor for them tho which I was disappointed about. Robb was speaking in between songs but I could barely make out what he was saying, if at all. One thing I did make out was something about British metal and then asking the crowd to sing along if they knew the song - that's when I knew we were going to get Hallowed Be Thy Name. They do such a great cover of that song in my opinion and everyone was clapping and singing along. I was just waiting for Robb to go "Scream for me Nottingham!" That would have been hilarious! It was the first time I'd heard them do Beautiful Mourning too but the sound was just terrible - I could barely hear his vocals in the chorus cos he was so quiet.
The only thing that disappoints me about seeing Metallica live now is that they don't play It's A Long Way To The Top by AC/DC before Ecstasy anymore. Hearing that always used to get me so excited (ok, even more excited!) and I wish they would bring it back. It would be like not hearing UFO's Doctor, Doctor before seeing Maiden. Anyway, the magic moment arrives and the lights dim and The Ecstasy Of Gold starts playing with the audience in full voice and the excitement building up even more. A heartbeat resounds around the arena and That Was Just Your Life's intro starts playing. The band run on stage and kick into the song - complete with the coolest laser show I have ever seen in my life!!! The lights are attached to these huge coffin shaped rigs which shoot out lasers and move and twist as the show goes on. As this was the first show of the UK tour and the fact that Metallica has played here loads over the last three years, we were hoping for some surprises in the set. We certainly got that in the shape of The Four Horsemen and the very unexpected Leper Messiah, which I hadn't heard since the 2006 Master Of Puppets anniversary shows.
Gunfire and flames shooting from the stage meant that One was coming up next. Rattle wasn't with us at that point, thank god, but Andy took his place by telling me how wrong I was (a bit of an in-joke for those who don't know!). They had really cool coloured flames shooting out from the tops of the amps during the "Darkness, imprisoning me/Landmine, has taken my sight" bits. After Broken, Beat & Scarred, James was asking the audience if they should play a song that they've never played live before. Of course the audience roared their approval. Then they started playing The Judas Kiss! That song is brilliant and the chorus is SO catchy! One of the best bits of the song for me is between the solos when James goes "Judas lives, recite this vow! I've become your new god now!!". We were all roaring that at that top of our voices. Even tho it's a song that I rarely listen to anymore, I really enjoyed Sad But True. It's just one of those songs which has been played to death and I get a little bored of it sometimes but I loved it that night.
No Leaf Clover followed and was amazing once again. As we'd had four songs already from Death Magnetic, I was wondering if we were going to get All Nightmare Long or not. I was hoping they'd drop Cyanide and have both Judas and Nightmare in there. As I was pondering this, the awesome intro of Nightmare kicked in!! I love that song so much! Andy was changing the lyrics again from "Luck runs out" to "Hair falls out" especially for Kirk and his unfortunate hair loss! Haha! More suprises followed with the heavy as fuck Fight Fire With Fire! Another one that I just did not expect in there! Nice to get Nothing Else Matters after that one to give the throat and neck a bit of a rest!! Haha!!
As they came back onstage for the encores, they started jamming on Suicide & Redemption which sounded pretty kick ass. Me and Andy had been going on and on and on about hearing Breadfan since the 2007 tour so when James went up to the mic and screamed "BREADFAN!!!!!", me and him just lost it!! We started jumping up and down, yelling and hugging each other and I'm pretty sure the people behind us thought we were mental! I was SO happy to finally hear that song as it's one of my favourite covers they've done. After the song, Su turned to me and goes "Where's Fluffy??" which took me a second or two to click onto what she meant! Haha!! (for those who don't know, on the album a voice goes "Mommy? Where's Fluffy?" after Breadfan.) Lars had just continued playing after the song and I recognised the drum beat but it wasn't until the guitars kicked in that I recognised the song - it was HELPLESS!!! I just looked at Andy with an "oh my god!" expression on my face cos that was really, REALLY unexpected!!! As always Seek & Destroy ended the show and we all gave it the last little bit of energy we had. Dave and Muffin managed to get a couple of beach balls again, which Muffin ended up wearing like a kilt after he'd deflated it! Haha! Nearly injured Andy again by almost crushing his fingers standing on a pick. I wasn't going to fight him for it since I apparently elbowed him in the balls the last time we both went for a pick! Haha! So it was only fair he got that one.
After the show, we met up with Kat again who handed us some picks and a setlist. She was telling us all the backstage gossip as well. My favourite stories from that being her walking into Machine Head's dressing room only to find Robb Flynn starkers and also laughing with Phil Demmel (Machine Head guitarist) about him using the ladies toilets by mistake!! Haha!! We went and got some much needed grub before me, Andy and Kat headed back to the flat. Me and Kat sat up until nearly 4am chatting and it was great to catch up.
Nottingham Setlist
That Was Just Your Life
The End Of The Line
The Four Horsemen
Leper Messiah
One
Broken, Beat & Scarred
The Judas Kiss
Sad But True
No Leaf Clover
All Nightmare Long
The Day That Never Comes
Master Of Puppets
Fight Fire With Fire
Nothing Else Matters
Enter Sandman
- - - - - - - -
Breadfan
Helpless
Seek & Destroy
And some pics...
Outside the arena
Us waiting for Machine Head
Lasers for That Was Just Your Life
The coffin rigs (and no we were not that far away, it just looks it!)
Flames during One
God! 8)
Rob
Just about to announce Breadfan!!
Fun and games during Seek & Destroy
Nottingham - Trent FM Arena, 25th February 2009
After seeing the Death Magnetic launch party in London in September of last year, I was so ready to finally see Metallica on their own arena tour in the UK. Andy had very kindly offered to let me crash at his for the gigs and that was very much appreciated as I am always skint! Travelled down to Birmingham to meet him on the 24th. Got the train from Edinburgh to Birmingham for the costly sum of £3!!! I can barely get to the next town on the bus for that! Had to wait for about 10mins at the station for him before heading back to his. We went out for dinner and then went back to his and got our arses royally kicked at Street Fighter IV on the Xbox ("Abel is solid!" Haha!). We also watched Machine Head's secret "Ten Ton Hammer" show until the dvd started sticking so we moved onto one of Metallica's shows at Earl's Court in 2003. Kat had been filming Metallica's rehearsal show in Nottingham that night and phoned for a chat afterwards. Much to Andy's joy we spent much time discussing James' arse as well which I'm sure he was thrilled about listening too!! Haha!
The next day we just hung out in the flat watching Scuzz (who only have about 5 videos on their playlist it seems!) before getting ready to drive to Nottingham. The choice of music was, of course, a bit of Death Magnetic with us both in fine voice, especially during The Judas Kiss. When we got to Nottingham, we parked the car up and headed to the Pit & Pendulum to meet up with everyone. Kat, Su & Neil were sitting at a table as we went in so we sat and chatted to them. Then Rattle returned from the bar and joined us. I have never seen him so nervous as he had won a meet and greet for this show. Gav showed up not long after him and we sat and chatted for a little bit before heading off to the arena. Kat was working for this show so we hung around with her as she was trying to gather together the meet and greet winners, whilst we tried to calm Rattle down - by taking the piss out of him! Haha! I was starving so went into the cafe to get something to eat. The only thing there I fancied was a doughnut which Su was laughing about cos of the "searching for doughnuts" bit in Some Kind Of Monster as it always reminds her of me! After a while, they all went backstage and we just stood around waiting before the gates opened. Eventually they did but we were waiting for Dave and Hairy Muffin to arrive and I had a ticket for one of them so we had to wait. Anne and Ryan also joined us. I think me and Ryan need to speak about what we're wearing before going out cos we both had Master Of Puppets shirts on and the exact same Justice hoodie! We should have got a photo of that now I think about it. Finally Dave and Muffin turn up and we headed down into the arena.
We caught the last few songs of The Sword and to be honest, I thought they were very boring. Plus the sound was really bad and I could hardly make out the vocals at all. I wasn't bothered about seeing them really, I was more excited about the other support band - Machine Head!!!!!! The intro to Clenching The Fists Of Dissent has such a great build up, I absolutely love it! The sound was very poor for them tho which I was disappointed about. Robb was speaking in between songs but I could barely make out what he was saying, if at all. One thing I did make out was something about British metal and then asking the crowd to sing along if they knew the song - that's when I knew we were going to get Hallowed Be Thy Name. They do such a great cover of that song in my opinion and everyone was clapping and singing along. I was just waiting for Robb to go "Scream for me Nottingham!" That would have been hilarious! It was the first time I'd heard them do Beautiful Mourning too but the sound was just terrible - I could barely hear his vocals in the chorus cos he was so quiet.
The only thing that disappoints me about seeing Metallica live now is that they don't play It's A Long Way To The Top by AC/DC before Ecstasy anymore. Hearing that always used to get me so excited (ok, even more excited!) and I wish they would bring it back. It would be like not hearing UFO's Doctor, Doctor before seeing Maiden. Anyway, the magic moment arrives and the lights dim and The Ecstasy Of Gold starts playing with the audience in full voice and the excitement building up even more. A heartbeat resounds around the arena and That Was Just Your Life's intro starts playing. The band run on stage and kick into the song - complete with the coolest laser show I have ever seen in my life!!! The lights are attached to these huge coffin shaped rigs which shoot out lasers and move and twist as the show goes on. As this was the first show of the UK tour and the fact that Metallica has played here loads over the last three years, we were hoping for some surprises in the set. We certainly got that in the shape of The Four Horsemen and the very unexpected Leper Messiah, which I hadn't heard since the 2006 Master Of Puppets anniversary shows.
Gunfire and flames shooting from the stage meant that One was coming up next. Rattle wasn't with us at that point, thank god, but Andy took his place by telling me how wrong I was (a bit of an in-joke for those who don't know!). They had really cool coloured flames shooting out from the tops of the amps during the "Darkness, imprisoning me/Landmine, has taken my sight" bits. After Broken, Beat & Scarred, James was asking the audience if they should play a song that they've never played live before. Of course the audience roared their approval. Then they started playing The Judas Kiss! That song is brilliant and the chorus is SO catchy! One of the best bits of the song for me is between the solos when James goes "Judas lives, recite this vow! I've become your new god now!!". We were all roaring that at that top of our voices. Even tho it's a song that I rarely listen to anymore, I really enjoyed Sad But True. It's just one of those songs which has been played to death and I get a little bored of it sometimes but I loved it that night.
No Leaf Clover followed and was amazing once again. As we'd had four songs already from Death Magnetic, I was wondering if we were going to get All Nightmare Long or not. I was hoping they'd drop Cyanide and have both Judas and Nightmare in there. As I was pondering this, the awesome intro of Nightmare kicked in!! I love that song so much! Andy was changing the lyrics again from "Luck runs out" to "Hair falls out" especially for Kirk and his unfortunate hair loss! Haha! More suprises followed with the heavy as fuck Fight Fire With Fire! Another one that I just did not expect in there! Nice to get Nothing Else Matters after that one to give the throat and neck a bit of a rest!! Haha!!
As they came back onstage for the encores, they started jamming on Suicide & Redemption which sounded pretty kick ass. Me and Andy had been going on and on and on about hearing Breadfan since the 2007 tour so when James went up to the mic and screamed "BREADFAN!!!!!", me and him just lost it!! We started jumping up and down, yelling and hugging each other and I'm pretty sure the people behind us thought we were mental! I was SO happy to finally hear that song as it's one of my favourite covers they've done. After the song, Su turned to me and goes "Where's Fluffy??" which took me a second or two to click onto what she meant! Haha!! (for those who don't know, on the album a voice goes "Mommy? Where's Fluffy?" after Breadfan.) Lars had just continued playing after the song and I recognised the drum beat but it wasn't until the guitars kicked in that I recognised the song - it was HELPLESS!!! I just looked at Andy with an "oh my god!" expression on my face cos that was really, REALLY unexpected!!! As always Seek & Destroy ended the show and we all gave it the last little bit of energy we had. Dave and Muffin managed to get a couple of beach balls again, which Muffin ended up wearing like a kilt after he'd deflated it! Haha! Nearly injured Andy again by almost crushing his fingers standing on a pick. I wasn't going to fight him for it since I apparently elbowed him in the balls the last time we both went for a pick! Haha! So it was only fair he got that one.
After the show, we met up with Kat again who handed us some picks and a setlist. She was telling us all the backstage gossip as well. My favourite stories from that being her walking into Machine Head's dressing room only to find Robb Flynn starkers and also laughing with Phil Demmel (Machine Head guitarist) about him using the ladies toilets by mistake!! Haha!! We went and got some much needed grub before me, Andy and Kat headed back to the flat. Me and Kat sat up until nearly 4am chatting and it was great to catch up.
Nottingham Setlist
That Was Just Your Life
The End Of The Line
The Four Horsemen
Leper Messiah
One
Broken, Beat & Scarred
The Judas Kiss
Sad But True
No Leaf Clover
All Nightmare Long
The Day That Never Comes
Master Of Puppets
Fight Fire With Fire
Nothing Else Matters
Enter Sandman
- - - - - - - -
Breadfan
Helpless
Seek & Destroy
And some pics...
Outside the arena
Us waiting for Machine Head
Lasers for That Was Just Your Life
The coffin rigs (and no we were not that far away, it just looks it!)
Flames during One
God! 8)
Rob
Just about to announce Breadfan!!
Fun and games during Seek & Destroy
Stay tuned for part two next month when I hit Birmingham, Glasgow and London!!
Cheers!
Maybe I need to get off these allergy pills! Hahaha!!! 
