After all the dizzying excitement of last summer when 'The Big Four of Thrash' toured together for the first time since... well, never, they are back to do it all again to the delight of the metal world.
They didn't do it back in the day don'tcha know.
'Why not?' you say.
Well because Metallica thought Dave Mustaine was a dick, Kerry King (balding, axe wielding Slayer meat slab) thought he was a bitch, Mustaine in turn hated everyone and everything, including his band and excluding Heroin, and well no one really thought a great deal about Anthrax in the grander scheme of things - I mean sure their trainers were nice and white, they did that song with that rapper and their frontman wore an Indian head-dress on stage, but when it came to slugging it out unit for unit in record sales and quality songs it came down to favourites and they for me (sadly) lagged behind the brutality of Slayer, the er speed of Megadeath and the forward pressing Metallica.
So last year, in a bid to royally shaft all other festivals in Europe, Sonisphere put out 'The Big Four' for the first time - Metallica, King and Mustaine buried the hatchet in a vomit inducing bout of letting bygones be bygones and Scott Ian stopped tweeting about poker long enough to grab onto the coat tails and drag the twitching corpse of Anthrax along for their biggest payday since 'Bring The Noise'.
The glaring omission was of course the UK, Sonisphere boasting the only date for Iron Maiden, which by the way was two ball busting hours of greatness...
So this year and the festival race was on, Sonisphere bursting out of the blocks with Slipknot's first show without the late Paul Grey. In between the (frankly) pathetic online contradictory statements from Joey Jordison and Corey Taylor (which seems to herald any of the Iowan Nontet, er Octet's activities these days) it seemed like a reasonable stab, if not one that went down like a cup of cold vomit in my household.
Download countered with the reunited, looking for a payday, System Of A Down. Daron Malakian must have stopped shovelling the drugs Scarface style long enough to realise his bank account was edging towards zero considering Scars On Broadway went down like a cup of cold vomit across the world, yet alone in my household and Serj Tankian is too nice a guy to ignore the pleas of the rest who were eyeing the back of the dole queue with increasing alarm...
They followed with the ever predictable Linkin Park for the 8,796th time and the surprise of Rob Zombie, whose first tour in 8 years sold out faster than Glastonbury and gave new meaning to the words Ebay and Rocking Horse Shit.
Download looked to be taking it back, especially as Sonisphere revealed it's second headliner to be the less than impressive Biffy 'Indie Band' Clyro to universal outcry which managed to lessen the years other tragedy, the fact that Avenged Sevenfold had found a drummer to tour with them and were taking their brand of bullshit to my spiritual home, then BAM! - Out of the blue Sonisphere announced the 'Big Four' and metalheads old and new creamed themselves at the prospect of something that could never have happened 'back in the day'.
It is however, in my not so humble opinion an odd to time to try this.
Metallica - as fond of them as I am, they stopped being a thrash band somewhere around 1990, since then has followed the Universe-shagging 'Black' album, blues, haircuts, cocaine, country, Napster, sackings, therapists, St Anger and 'Comeback' thrash album that is about as thrash (realistically) as, well words fail me at this point, but you know deep down in your heart that if you put 'Kill Em All' through 'Justice...' on and then listen to 'Death Magnetic' it's not thrash, no matter how much the audio clipping makes a mess of the sound when you turn it up.
As for the live show, it's great. Lars will try not to fall off his stool or keep his mouth shut, James will sing everything in a Country stylee, Hammet will get his own solos wrong and the new guy is FAMILY don'tcha know... just like Eastenders.
Slayer - fair enough, the only band on the bill to consistently remain thrash. They are still going strong, well Tom Araya is broken, Kerry King contradicts himself with every passing year, Jeff Hanemann is seemingly fading into the background and Dave Lombardo barely drinks these days; none of which seems to matter with a rabid fan base that keeps pretending that they haven't (successfully or not) made the same album again and again since 'Seasons In The Abyss' as long as they get to hear 'South of Heaven', 'Reign In Blood', 'Angel of Death' and 'Dead Skin Mask' live.
I know I do.
Megadeth - I loved them as a kid. For one glorious summer they were my band of choice over Metallica and Iron Maiden. I listened to 'Rust In Piece' all through the holidays and could even make out the words behind his nasal whining... then they, like Metallica, they went all commercial. 'Countdown To Extinction' was good,'Youthanesia' passable all the way downhill until 'Crush Em'. I had already bailed somewhere between buying 'Cryptic Writings' and getting home and listening to it.
Then Dave found God, quit drugs and started whining about everything else, embarrassed himself in 'Some Kind Of Monster' (although everyone did to be fair...) and eventually started making thrash albums again. To give him his credit, they are thrash albums, boring ones maybe and his Sylvester the Cat vocals fight with endless solos, but none of it will compare to the static stage show that will wow approximately no-one... then again maybe I'm just bitter because I have seen them three times and he has failed to play 'Peace Sells' and 'In My Darkest Hour' in the same set...
Anthrax - Now I actually feel sorry for dedicated fans of Anthrax... their lot has been hard over the years. They seem to be split into two camps Belladonna verses Bush. The old school will tell you Joey is their boy because he is on all the classics; the John fans will tell you Bush is their boy because he can sing.
I kind of straddle the ages on this one. I grew up with the old school but never felt passionate about them, I heard 'Sound Of White Noise' and suddenly they were a great band. Problem is no-one bought the records in the same quantity and the last couple of years have been a revolving door of vocalists - Belladonna back, Belladonna out; Bush in, Bush out; Dan Nielson in and out for allegedly shitting on the chest of the guitarist who isn't Scott Ian and making a pass at the poker players wife... so Bush back, no wait, Belladonna Zzzzzzzzzzz.
Fact is they were barely a thrash band in the eighties, certainly not in the nineties and given they have been making a new album nearly as long as it took Axl Rose who the fuck knows what they sound like anymore...
The new Anthrax album with old material and new vocals (or new songs and an old vocalist) is expected some when. Don't hold your breath... as a live act I have seen them twice with the old corpse and can say, hand on heart (and not for the first time), I wanted Bush.
Yeah, that was cheap wasn't it...?
So there we have it - cynical cash grab or giving the fans what they want?
The Big Four of Thrash featuring one thrash band...
It could be a great day out but having seen all four bands numerous times, you'd have to hope the experience is greater than the sum of it's parts.
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