Peter BurrowsOne Half of the Story
By the time Metallica took to the stage in the Aviva Stadium on Sunday evening, Dublin had already witnessed the first chapter of their visit two nights earlier. Friday’s show formed part of their ambitious “No Repeat Weekend”, a concept designed to ensure each night delivered a completely different setlist. That detail, easy to overlook when booking, came back into sharp focus on Sunday. What had seemed like two chances to see Metallica turned out to be two halves of a larger whole. I couldn’t shake the sense that I had only experienced part of the story.
That realisation lingered throughout the night. Sunday’s performance was powerful. But knowing that an entirely different selection of songs had been unleashed on Friday inevitably coloured the experience. With a catalogue as vast as Metallica, every omission felt amplified. Rather than leaving fully satisfied, there was a persistent wish that both nights had been part of the plan from the start.
Building the Atmosphere
The evening began with Gojira, who did an excellent job of warming up a crowd that had arrived primarily for the headliners. Their precision and intensity gradually drew people in, shifting the atmosphere from anticipation to engagement.
It was Metallica themselves who briefly stepped into unexpected territory early on, with a cover of “Dirty Old Town”. It was a bold nod to the Dublin crowd, though it didn’t quite land with full conviction. The sentiment was appreciated, but the execution felt slightly tentative rather than fully embedded. They more than redeemed themselves later with “Whiskey in the Jar”, a track they have long since made their own, which drew one of the loudest and most unified responses of the night.
The weather helped shape the atmosphere too. Dublin was treated to a rare balmy summer evening, the kind that makes a stadium show feel almost relaxed in its early stages before gradually tightening into something more electric as darkness fell.
An Arena Built for Metallica
The staging inside the Aviva was particularly striking. Metallica’s in-the-round setup placed the stage at the centre of the stadium, ensuring no section of the crowd was left at a disadvantage. Drum kits appeared and disappeared at different corners of the structure, allowing Lars Ulrich to rotate around the stage and bringing each side of the arena into closer contact with the performance. The standing crowd encircling the stage added to the sense of immersion, with the band never feeling distant.
Surrounding screens and industrial-style structures gave the production a slightly steampunk, almost gladiatorial aesthetic. Combined with fire bursts and coordinated pyrotechnics, it often felt less like a concert and more like stepping into an arena where spectacle and sound carried equal weight.
A Band Still at Full Power
What stood out most, though, was the energy of the band themselves. James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett and Robert Trujillo played with a vitality that belied their decades on stage. There was no sense of routine or nostalgia; instead, there was urgency and intent. Hetfield commanded the space with ease, Hammett’s solos cut cleanly through the stadium air, and Trujillo’s presence added constant momentum.
The crowd matched them step for step. Every chorus was returned in full voice, every riff met with recognition and release. It was a collective performance as much as a band-led one, the kind of exchange that only happens in stadium shows of this scale.
And of course, no night like this would be complete without the closing moment. As the opening of “Enter Sandman” rang out, the entire stadium rose with it. Whatever thoughts remained about Friday’s setlist disappeared in that instant, replaced by a single shared noise echoing across Dublin.
A Weekend Worth Experiencing in Full
There is still a slight regret about only seeing one half of the weekend. But even in isolation, Sunday night stood as a reminder of why Metallica remain one of the defining live acts of their generation. A powerful production, a fiercely engaged crowd, and a band still playing with conviction more than four decades into their career.
Not a gig to be missed.
