The biggest metal band on the planet roll into Manchester

No matter how many times you hear the familiar sounds of Ennio Morricone’s “The Ecstasy of Gold” ringing out, there is just something about it that has the hairs on the back of your neck standing on end.

Tonight was no exception and, as the four members of Metallica walked up onto the stage and slammed into opener “Hardwired”, you knew this was going to be a special night.

Despite being much maligned for some of their more recent catalogue, there is one thing you can rely on with the metal quartet and that is the fact that, when Metallica hit their stride with classics like “For Whom The Bell Tolls” and “Creeping Death” there is simply no band that comes close to matching them. Touring the UK for the first time in what seems like forever, this was Metallica showing the pretenders how to put on a performance. Flawless from start to finish, Metallica put on a career-spanning set that had something for the new members of the Metallica family as well as the hardcore fanbase who have been following the band since the early days.

From neck-wreckers like the breakneck “Seek And Destroy” to the more hook-filled modern material like “Moth Into Flame”, a song preceded by a dedication to Amy Winehouse, there are few bands who possess such a solid back catalogue from which to plunder from as these metal giants do.

A break in the set saw twenty-thousand punters join Kirk Hammett and Robert Trujillo in a rendition of the unofficial anthem of Manchester “Don’t Look Back In Anger” while an obligatory “Do you want heavy Manchester?” from frontman James Hetfield, heralded another crushing airing of “Sad But True”. By this point in the night the band were heading into the classics as an epic “One” saw the plethora of video screens above the band flashing up a series of war images while a truly jaw-dropping “Master Of Puppets” brought this packed audience to its feet for a run through that sound as fresh and exciting as it did when it came out over twenty-five years ago.

Tonight the metal legends showed that, while they have divided opinion within the metal community right down the middle, twenty-thousand fans packing out the arena, like they have on every night of this tour, still can’t get enough of the biggest metal band on the planet.

See a full set of photos from the show here