Concert review: Metallica digs up the thrash again

The group therapy sessions are over. The "new" bassist has long since been broken in. The battles over downloaded music have given way to a fan-friendly site offering countless live tracks. And the worst album of its nearly 30-year career has been swept under the rug.

Like President Obama going out on an international diplomacy trip, Metallica's first tour stop in the Twin Cities in five years seemed to be all about kissing and making up. Which of course meant it was a brutal, ugly, deafening concert.

The roof-bulging crowd of 20,000 fans Tuesday at Target Center were clearly happy thrashers once again, especially since metal's biggest band played many of its earliest classics and nothing off 2003's flatulent "St. Anger" album.

"I hope you like the old stuff," short-haired, pointy-bearded frontman James Hetfield said (unnecessarily) as the band kicked into 1984's "Ride the Lightning."

Hetfield and his three 40-something bandmates all seemed excited by the two-hour-plus show, probably because they also got to play loads of new material without losing the crowd's rabid attention.

They opened with the two songs that also kick off their latest, return-to-form album "Death Magnetic," and slipped in four more as solid proof of the disc's classic formula. It sure helps shows when new tracks are as visceral and venomous as the mid-show highlights "Cyanide" and "All Nightmare Long," the latter a showcase for Kirk Hammett's frenzied guitar work.

Actually, Metallica never faltered in concert even while promoting "St. Anger" at Xcel Energy Center in 2004, nor while working around the Metrodome's Teflon-coated acoustics in 2003 (a venue the band played three times, more than any other act). But Tuesday's show was better than its two predecessors.

Performed on a somewhat comically massive in-the-round stage with coffin-shaped lighting rigs overhead, the breathlessly paced set was more in-your-face than most arena shows. The flames that shot up during "One," in fact, were a little too in-your-face. Anyone for an eyebrow-loss class-action suit?

The extra fiery set list made slower-simmering fare such as "Nothing Else Matters" and "Sad But True" sound like potty/cigarette-break numbers despite being big hits. As usual, though, nothing hit harder than "Master of Puppets" and the encore "Seek & Destroy."

As if to raise the thrash flag -- and maybe the stakes on whether or not Metallica still has it -- middle-slot opening band Lamb of God absolutely throttled the crowd with its guttural, bombastic death-metal. The Virginia quintet breathed new life into classic thrash sounds in songs such as "Redneck" and "Dead Seeds," the latter of which was dedicated to local metal band Disembodied.

Such good vibes for such a wicked, bruising show.

See Metallica's set list at www.startribune.com/artcetera. Chris Riemenschneider • 612-673-4658