The band that gave us breezy tunes like “Seek & Destroy” and “Creeping Death” and “Am I Evil” performed at Empower Field in Denver last weekend.
Guitarist James Hetfield and drummer Lars Ulrich formed Metallica in 1981, and the band quickly rose to become one of the prominent founders of thrash metal, alongside Megadeth, Anthrax and Slayer. Apparently, these bands play the kind of music that makes you want to donate blood.
Metallica promoted a blood drive, conducted last Monday and Tuesday by the Red Cross, that reportedly collected a record 240 units of blood from people who love thrash metal. A unit of blood is equivalent to approximately 1 pint, and a typical medical procedure requires about 3 units, according to the Red Cross. Assuming the surgeon doesn’t get heavy handed.
Metallica had previously promoted blood drives linked to concerts in 10 other cities, which brought in about 2,000 units combined.
Blood donations typically drop in the summer, as school-based drives end, and regular donors go on vacation. (If you are a regular donor, you probably deserve a vacation.) Unfortunately, the demand for blood increases at the same time, because accidental and violent injuries peak during the summer months. Partly, but not entirely due to the arrival of the summer rock concert season.
I’m interested in the timeline of these events. Apparently, the Red Cross blood drive for Metallica fans was held on Monday and Tuesday, and then the concerts were held on Friday and Saturday.
Did the Red Cross think blood transfusions would be required following the concerts?
I’ve never been to a thrash metal concert, but I understand that it’s typical for some of the audience to gather in a ‘mosh pit’ where the so-called ‘slam dancing’ consists of pushing, punching and slamming into one another.
And sometimes, ‘crowd surfing’.
Mosh pits originated in California — as did so many other horrible things. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, young men who had forgotten how to dance to music (too many bad drug trips?) but who still remembered how to push their way into a crowded subway train, brought those skills to punk rock concerts, and then to thrash metal concerts, and then to grunge concerts, and then to hip hop concerts, and eventually they were moshing even at concerts by The Cranberries.
As a side note, researchers from Cornell University studied the behavior of crowds in mosh pits by analyzing online videos, and found similarities with models of 2-D gases in equilibrium.
Like I mentioned, I’ve never been to a Metallica concert… or any thrash metal concert… nor have I ever donated blood. I believe I was the recipient of donated blood, however, back when I had my appendix removed, but I can’t say for sure, because I was asleep at the time.
Very few people are able to sleep through a Metallica concert.
I mean, can you imagine your date waking you up? “Jason, you just slept through the entire Metallica concert.”
“What? — Why didn’t you wake me up?”
“You seemed so peaceful.”
“You mean… I donated all that blood for nothing?”
Underrated writer Louis Cannon grew up in the vast American West, although his ex-wife, given the slightest opportunity, will deny that he ever grew up at all. You can read more stories on his Substack account.