Concert review: Megadeth shakes off the 'Rust'

Talk about shaking off the "Rust."

Megadeth dusted off 1990's "Rust in Peace" album Sunday night at a packed Chavez Theatre, part of a month-long club and small theater tour designed to help fill the void left by the January postponement of its "American Carnage" tour with Slayer and Testament.

The "Carnage" tour was supposed to come here to the Coliseum on Jan. 27, but "Carnage" criminally left El Paso off the itinerary when a new string of dates was announced for this summer.

Megadeth couldn't completely fill the void on its own, but came close Sunday, delighting the sell-out crowd of 2,122 (that's two over capacity; the two guys who stood next to me on the last row of the balcony said they slipped in backstage without tickets) with a fast and furious two-hour set.

By sandwiching the nine-song "Rust in Peace" album with a smattering of fan favorites like "In My Darkest Hour," "Symphony of Destruction" and "Peace Sells," Dave Mustaine and company managed to welcome back original bassist and co-founding member Dave Ellefson with minimal fanfare while giving hardcore fans a flashback treat at the expense of new album "Endgame," released last year, several months before Ellefson's Feb. 8 return.

It was obvious the knowledgeable crowd was happy to have the bassist back in the fold. Junior got the second-loudest cheers of the night. The loudest were reserved, of course, for fellow founding member Mustaine, the one constant in the band's turbulent 17-year history. He alluded to the band's long absence from an El Paso stage, promising late in the set to "make sure you remember us."

It was also pretty obvious that the crowd was happy to hear "RIP" played in its no-nonsense entirety, with new guitarist Chris Broderick ably recreating long-departed Marty Friedman's solos while adding some of his own piercing wail to the mix. What made this particularly enjoyable for hardcore fans was the chance to hear not only the familiar songs from this politically charged album, like "Hangar 18" "and "Holy Wars ... The Punishment Due" but never or rarely performed ones, including "Rust in Peace ... Polaris."

The familiar songs got the biggest ovations, of course, but what added to this rarefied experience was the vocal accompaniment of the crowd, which chanted back choruses, pumped its fists into the air and bubbled in obvious excitement at familiar intros or the blazing speed of Mustaine and Broderick's high-powered dual guitar work.

Like the headliners, middle act Testament got into the dust-off act, hauling out its 1987 debut album "Legacy" for a spin. An uneven sound mix made it hard to make out Chuck Billy's distinctive vocals early in their hour-long set, but the sound got better and the band got into its own thrash metal groove on as the set progressed. "C.O.T.L.O.D. (Curse of the Legions of Death)" and "Do or Die," which Billy dedicated "to the troops," were especially explosive.

Fellow Bay Area early thrashers Exodus opened with a solid but mostly uneventful 30-minute set of its own.

The last-minute move from Club 101, where about 1,700 were expected to attend, to the Chavez, which quickly sold out all 400 tickets released Thursday, may have been a major pain in the ass for all involved behind the scenes. But for fans of the thrashy, trashy, politically minded speed medal that blew out of California two decades ago, it was a rare chance to hear their well-oiled band in such an intimate setting.

Comments

[Enrique]

The show was great. Hats off to the staff at the Chavez theater. They really did a great job of handling the last minute venue change. Nice work folks.

[BenG]

The show may have been great but the inexperience of the venue made the waiting fans irate. What wasn't reviewed was the line of fans standing for five hours. This then split into two lines and later three. Communication on where hard ticket holders were to line up and will-call(ticketbully) holders was mixed up. After ticketbully tickets were received fans had to get into another line. As a member of the Megadeth fan club I had front of line priority and witnessed a mess. Doors opened and fans were checked, presented there tickets then were told that they were not taking tickets yet. Fans were then pushed back outside. The venue coordinator and his staff(security,maintenance) had no communication with ticket takers, Event security(neon shirts) as well as band management. It was insane. After Exodus played I peaked outside and it was still a mess. The band and venue may have been paid but I believe the fans got screwed.