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Metallica rocks
Istanbul in massive gig
Some 40,000 diehard Metallica fans sang along with the heavy metal group
in İstanbul on Sunday night, accompanying the band members, who were
singing live onstage in Metallica's third stadium gig in Turkey in 15
years.
Thousands of fans, from every corner of Turkey and nearly all wearing
black T-shirts, packed Ali Sami Yen Stadium for the concert, which was
jointly organized by event management companies Purple Concerts and EPD.
A specially built 800-square-meter stage, which organizers said was the
largest ever built in Turkey for such an event, was erected for the
concert at Ali Sami Yen in Mecidiyeköy, where fans began forming lines
Saturday night -- nearly 24 hours ahead of the concert.
Turkish heavy metal band Pentagram took to the stage as one of the
opening acts at the concert. Metallica, made up of guitarist-vocalist
James Hetfield, drummer Lars Ulrich, lead guitarist Kirk Hammett and
bassist Robert Trujillo, appeared at 9:40, with frontman Hetfield
saluting the audience. Although some fans argued that the band is
getting older and is no longer in good form, Metallica still managed to
draw loud cheers from the audience, which even included a fan who came
all the way from Iran to watch his favorite band perform live, according
to the Sabah daily.
This was the band's first outing in Turkey with Trujillo, who joined the
band in 2001, replacing Jason Newsted. In 1993, 48,000 people watched
Metallica's first-ever İstanbul concert. The band rocked the city for a
second time in 1999 in a concert which drew 46,500 fans, according to
the Anatolia news agency.
Formed in Los Angeles in 1981, the four-member band is one of the most
commercially successful and influential heavy metal acts. With more than
120 million records sold worldwide, the band has won seven Grammy Awards
and has had four albums peak at number one on the Billboard 200 chart.
The band has recently finished recording their upcoming ninth studio
album, "Death Magnetic," slated for release in September.
Source:
todayszaman |
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