Awesome. Just Awesome. Saw them at Nisson and I couldn't have asked for anything more. Nothing against the Priest fans but Dio could have stayed on all night.

Amazing show. Too short in my opinion. Like the other guy, I could have seen Sabbath play all night. Priest is great, don't get me wrong, but I went to see Sabbath.

Interestingly, I noticed that Ear in the Wall was removed from the set; probably due to the poor response that was reported at the first night's show. Rather, we got an encore of "Neon Knights". Good stuff. Though I would love liked to hear maybe a new track or something from the forthcoming album.

Wish they had a few more t-shirts. I did, however, buy one that says "Black Sabbath: The Rules of Hell" on the front and has the flying demon on the back.

Anyway, AWESOME show. Can't wait for the new record and tour to follow!

Ozzy Who?

As a longtime devout Sabbath and Priest fan, I was really psyched about this show. It didn't hurt that another old fave, Motorhead, were along for the ride as well. As this is a Sabbath site I'll restrict my comments to them, although both Motorhead and Priest were damn good.

The Sabs (er...Heaven and Hell) started off powerfully with "The Mob Rules" and were in fine form throughout the set alternating between the three classic LPs before ending it up with a killer extended "Heaven and Hell". At that point the audience was eating out of Ronnie's hand and screaming the words.

I was on Tony's side in the sixth row and have to say that I was literally blown away by the wall of sound. The combination of Geezer's bass and Vinny's drums pummeled my entire body. Tony ripped off blistering solos on several songs. Ronnie's voice was as commanding as ever. The whole band seemed to be having a lot of fun and it made the performance all the more enjoyable. The guy next to me saw them the night before and told me that they didn't come back for an encore, but they did for us and we were lucky to be treated to a kick ass version of "Neon Knights". I told the same guy that Priest is gonna have a hard time topping this and he said "There's no way that's gonna happen" and then he left.

I think the fact that they were opening for Priest and were not the headliners really fired the band up and they showed it, playing with much passion and intensity. All in all, an awesome display of the power of real heavy metal done right by the pillars of the genre.

I took the three hour trip to Bristow last night for the Masters of Metal show. I saw Black Sabbath (er, Heaven and Hell) earlier this year and was really looking forward to the show. So as not to ruin the surprise, I avoided the setlist from the day before that someone had posted here. T^hat being said, the setlist wasn't even then much of a surpise:

-E5150
-The Mob Rules
-Children of the Sea
-I
-Sign of the Southern Cross
-Vinnie Appice solo
-Time Machine
-Falling Off the Edge of the World
-Die Young
-Heaven and Hell
-Neon Knights

Great show, Tony, Ronnie, Geezer and Vinnie never fail to deliver. But I just wish they could've played a few more surprises, and stayed longer. I also wish the sound would've been a lot better. Frankly, the sounds was crap for most of the show, and only Priest seemed to have the good sound. Testement, Motorhead and H&H sounded like they had the cheap equipment out usually afforded for the lesser opening bands.

But still, they are who they are, and are just plain awesome to see.

It may be more on a personal level, then musical or technical but this was by far the best show I’ve ever been to! I thought nothing would top seeing Dio and Cooper together but this show …. This show was ultimate!

Testament - I really didn’t know a lot of their stuff going in but I liked it, may have to go buy some. Chuck Billy has a great stage presence and plays one hell of a mean microphone! LOL Alex was awesome as was the rest of the band.

Motorhead - Fun band, never a favorite of mine but not a dislike either, knew about half the songs. Lemmy was well Lemmy. He knows what people expect of him and he gives it to them. It was a good set, musically it was tight, energy was high, no major screw ups. Seems like they’ve kind of let it get routine for them though, didn’t seem like it was fun for them. I love to see a band enjoying being up there and I just didn’t get that from them. It was good but didn’t make me want to rush out and buy new stuff from them.

H&H, I can't even put into words. I saw them last year and thought they'd never top it, I was wrong. Die Young was Kick ass!!! Talk about energy!! Wow! All the guys seemed to be enjoying, grinning and joking with each other and such. I was a bit sad to not hear Ear In The Wall but glad Neon Knights is back in. My favorite in concert I think is “I” I like watching Ronnie run around the stage while he’s singing it. RJD was personable as always, a lot of interaction and eye contact, many thanks to everyone and you can just tell being up there is the world to him. Vinnie looked good, sounded good, I think his drumset is scaled back from last year but still awesome. His solo still kicks although I always feel sorry for drummers, they have to keep going while everyone else gets a break, it’s gotta be tough and most are under appreciated. Geezer & Iommi, legends, I heard some people say Iommis guitar sounded bad especially at the beginning. I and my friends didn’t hear it or maybe we just aren’t musically talented enough to recognize it but it all sounded great to us.

All the things I bitched about in my own mind before going, I found myself enjoying. You know the same things everyone else complains about. Same (almost) setlist as last year. Drum Solo, Iommi solo, H&H extended to 15 min. I felt like others some of that should be cut to put in a couple more songs, but I really enjoyed them and wouldn't cut them out now. They just need to go out by themselves no opener or nothing and do a bunch of 3hr shows!! It was a great experience for me, almost spiritual, I was one with Ronnie and with the music and nothing else existed. (I was also clean & sober for anyone wondering)

Maybe its because Dio is the ultimate for me but I thought JP lacked something. Actually let me take that back. Rob lacked something. I’m a pretty big JP fan so don't think I'm dissing them or anything, just seemed like it was about halfway through the set or more before Rob got into it. He was technically fine from the start, just seemed like his mindset was wrong at first. And what’s with all this hunching over, looking at the ground and rarely opening his eyes? Looked like he was hurting? He had great interaction with the crowd at the end but in the beginning he didn’t. Luckily KK & Glenn did a lot of interaction and carried it til the rest of Rob got there. Not a bad set by any means just not as high energy as I've experienced Rob before.

I got a few pics up at www.myspace.com/crod66 and will get vids up soon, gonna work on editing them together tonight at work.

Only bad thing is, it's kinda like eating prime rib on monday and having to eat raman noodles for months after, nothing else will compare. I have 3 more concerts this summer and I almost feel like tossing my tickets.

SETLIST
E5150
The Mob Rules
Children Of The Sea
I
The Sign of the Southern Cross
Drum Solo
Time Machine
Falling Off The Edge Of The World
Die Young
Heaven And Hell
------Encore------
Neon Knights

The Metal Masters Tour 2008 is the greatest show I have ever been to. All the bands were great especially, of course, Black Sabbath.

Since Sabbath wasn't the headliner, the show started while it was still light out so 3/4 of the audience didn't know the show was starting when E5150 was queued up. I was very pleased that they started off the show with Mob Rules instead of After All (The Dead) like last year, After All is a great song but is much too slow to be an opener. It sounded to me that for the first 30 seconds of the show Tony was way too low but this was fixed halfway through Mob Rules. After this point everything sounded amazing. The band was in top form. The highlights include the addition of Time Machine to the setlist and the new extended solo on Heaven and Hell (I'm fairly sure I've never heard it in any of the live recordings).

The set looked awesome. It included two gargoyles perched atop trees with red light-up eyes which spewed smoke. In front of the cabs were chained fences decorated with claws grasping crystal balls.

Overall the show was great. I saw the Ozzy version of Sabbath in 2005 at Ozzfest and this topped it hands down. Looking forward anxiously to the new album and tour.

Setlist
-E5150
-The Mob Rules
-Children Of The Sea
-I
-Sign Of The Southern Cross
-Vinnie Appice Drum Solo
-Time Machine
-Falling Of The Edge Of The World
-Die Young
-Heaven And Hell
-Neon Knights

7 August Nissan Pavillion Bristow,VA Great show from the start! Saw H&H last year in Cleveland; this was my first time seeing the other bands. Must agree with one other post about the sound. Vinnie's drums and Geezer's bass sounded muffled. Definitely a BIG difference to Priest's sound. Also agree with the Rob Halford comments from others posts; he didn't seem into the show, and the bending over and staring at the floor was distracting. Not a bad set, but not great either. For H&H I would have liked to see some different songs from last year. Wishing Well, Walk Away- would have traded drum solo for either of those. But a short set, so they have to appeal to the masses and not individuals. Definitely looking forward to new cd and tour.

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