So recently I was able to go see a show that ticked off two of my "must-see" bands off my list: Megadeth and Meshuggah. When it was announced that they were on tour together, and coming to my town, and that there was a Groupon to get tickets for $20, I literally bought the tickets, and created Google reminders for a month before, a week before, a day before, the morning of, and an hour before the concert.
I was a little excited.
So here's a brief write up of the show.
Yup, these guys are definitely metal.
While I don't mind djent (look it up), Tesseract was boring in the typically djenty way, doing a poor imitation of metalcore with Meshuggah's guitar tone, and lacking severely in the fusion. The clean vocals lacked the catchiness of Killswitch Engage, and the heavy sections were frequently boring. They did have some super cool breakdowns, though. Oh, and it started to rain immediately into their set, although I can't fault them for that.
Can I?
All metal bands must inevitably come to grips with the fact that they will never be as consistently awesome as Meshuggah. Other metal bands may have made better individual records than any of Meshuggah's best, but I can think of none that has consistently put out better material in a 20 year stretch than Meshuggah's stretch from Destroy Erase Improve to Koloss. My expectations were high, and Meshuggah exceeded them in most ways. Their setlist was phenomenal, and impossibly technical. I listened to I on the way to the show, thinking "there's no way they attempt this polyrhythmic impossibility live." And they totally did it (cutting out the first part of the track to account for the lack of time in an hour set). They also played some of my favorites, from Bleed to closer and one of my favorite tracks of all-time Demiurge. I would have absolutely loved to hear the progenitor of djent, Future Breed Machine, but they packed about as much greatness as could be expected into their non-headline status set, while also plugging their newest stuff, a necessity that the casual fan just doesn't typically understand. The fact that my neck still hurts from rocking out to Demiurge and Bleed after about a week shows just how hard these guys rock. I was a bit disappointed in the crowd, as there simply weren't very many Meshuggah fans there. I'd estimate the crowd was about 90% there for Megadeth, 5% for Meshuggah, and 5% for the rest. So I was really expecting some crazy moshes and the crowd to be more into it, especially during "that" section in Demiurge (begins around 2:25). But that's hardly Meshuggah's fault, and their music is definitely not for everyone.
Megadeth is one of my favorite bands, and certainly my favorite of the Big 4 (Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, and Slayer). Rust in Peace is the best thrash album ever, and one of my top 10 metal albums of all time (another post for another day). And Peace Sells...But Who's Buying? is one of the best records of all time as well (as well as having one of the best eponymous tracks ever). But Megadeth is a bit over the hill. Dave Mustaine has always struggled with being a step behind Metallica publicly, given his personal history with the band. He's a fantastic guitar player, great song writer, and a singer (ha!). As Metallica has faded into obscurity in recent years, it's felt like Megadeth no longer had that chip on their shoulder. As Dave increasingly drifted into weird right-wing conspiracy, and has run out of songwriting ideas, my excitement for each subsequent release has waned (United Abominations was the last one I was genuinely excited for, and I didn't enjoy it much).
So my excitement heading to the show was tempered. They've had a lot of turnover in the band in recent years. The newest records have been fine, but nothing spectacular. And Dave is just getting old, as is long-time and newly rewelcomed to the fold bassist David Ellefson. So I was preparing to enjoy some staples (Sweating Bullets, Symphony of Destruction, Peace Sells), for them to dodge the more technical parts of their discography (Hangar 18, Holy Wars...The Punishment Due, Wake up Dead), and generally enjoy the environment of being surrounded by thousands of fellow Megadeth fans.
Megadeth absolutely blew my expectations out of the water. Their set list was fantastic and varied. They played across all eras of the band, from the Poland, Friedman, Broderick, and Loureiro eras. They played everything from the casual standards mentioned earlier to the technical wizardry of Hangar 18 and Holy Wars. They played my personal favorite ballad, Trust. Loureiro was excellent on lead guitars, technically nailing all of the Poland and Friedman material, while almost getting to Friedman's remarkable ability to insert his personality into his phrasings and tone. Ellefson sounded fantastic, as did newcoming drummer Dirk Verbeuren. Mustaine not only played well, but he also took on a ton of the soloing, including extremely challenging sections of opener Hangar 18. The band played through technical failure with grace and perseverance, as Mustaine's guitars failed on numerous occasions. Dave's vocals were about what you'd expect for a 55 year old man who's spent 35 years of his life screaming at audiences with very little vocal talent, but Megadeth was never built on great vocals. And the catchy choruses that Mustaine has a tendency of writing were completely carried by the audience, who sang along wholeheartedly during Trust, Peace Sells, and Holy Wars. Dave was a consummate professional throughout, and the band appeared to really enjoy the crowd and playing together. Dave's final line was superb. "Thank you. You have been great. We have been Megadeth."
Altogether, it was a fantastic show with an up and coming band in Lillake, and two veterans of the metal scene in Meshuggah and Megadeth operating at very high levels. If either come nearby again, they can have my money again.
-TRO
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