Metallica at The Prudential Center (01/31/09)

Photos: Jon Klemm

Metallica‘s Death Magnetic was supposed to be the band’s return to its thrash glory days; it turned out to be much better than that, to my ear, a fusion of the precise, staccato riffing of yore with the heavy, bluesy groove of the ’90s albums. Saturday night’s live set, the first of two shows closing out the band’s North American tour, was a slightly more assertive demonstration of that old-is-new philosophy, featuring two or three songs from each of the first five albums, six from the new one, and nothing from Load, ReLoad or St. Anger. Frontman James Hetfield made the connection explicit, saying from the stage, “You know what goes really well with the new stuff? The old stuff.” And he was right. The band barreled through songs old and new, tweaking older arrangements from time to time to bring them in line with who they were now, as players. The intricate “And Justice For All,” fueled by Robert Trujillo‘s massive bottom end and Lars Ulrich‘s loose drumming, became much more fluid than on record, with Hetfield and Kirk Hammett‘s guitars circling each other warily, like boxers. [blogs.villagevoice.com]

More of Jon’s great Metallica pictures after the jump.