The Number of the Beast: The Battle of San Bernardino with Iron Maiden, Megadeth, Anthrax, and Testament @ San Manuel Amphitheater, 9/13/13

My piece for GRAMMY.com can be found here.

A few more things:

-This was ‘musical adventure’ number 666 for me…on Friday the 13th.
-3 hours to get there and 3 hours to get back (including 1 hour stuck in the parking lot) = I’m never going out there by myself again.
-Walking through the parking lots, I spied on the tailgaters…and, unfortunately, could not envision this scene being anything near as interesting as Heavy Metal Parking Lot.
-Going into the venue through security: the male lines were about 40 deep, the female lines: no wait!
-It kinda blew my mind that out of the entire place, I knew several people sitting close to me…which helped because I really did not want to go to this show by myself but inevitably had to.
-Anyone sitting in Orch 1 or 2 will forever remember the guy in white shorts jamming out in the aisle. That guy had some passion and moves…and actually made me sad once the sun went down and I couldn’t watch him anymore.
-Multiple fires were set in the lawn…I don’t know why, but this made me feel like I was at an old school show…as long as I wasn’t out there.
-For this entire show, I had a distinct feeling I was watching it on TV. I think this was partially due to it feeling like a day from another time, something I’d always read about, but also because these aren’t “my” bands…I was watching them as an outsider. Yes, I know…my metal education had giant holes in it, making the bands I’m into make no sense: I make no apologies about this. That said, Iron Maiden blew away my already high expectations. Even for a casual fan, it was one of the best shows production-wise I’ve ever seen.
-The best part about this day was watching how excited people got about these bands. It’s awesome to see such passion about music that bleeds into lifestyle, and I could just see lifetime memories being created all around me.