Metallica is not done with 2023 just yet; the heavy metal powerhouse will headline the first day at the Soundstorm Festival in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on December 14.
The band performed their first live show in a Middle Eastern country in 2011, the year they played Etihad Park in Abu Dhabi. They’ll be paying a visit to the region 12 years later, with the upcoming festival marking their debut gig in Saudi Arabia. They’ll also become the first major metal act to show up at a public event in the country.
We’re bringing hard rock to @MDLBeast's Soundstorm Festival for the first time in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on December 14, 2023! Festival and single-day tickets are available now at https://t.co/eOt8w7j4Pz. pic.twitter.com/Uu051bGHxu
— Metallica (@Metallica) November 27, 2023
MDLBEAST, a music, art & culture platform rooted in the Middle East, first launched in 2019. Next year’s edition of the event will also feature Soundstorm, Pharrell Williams, Chris Brown, H.E.R., the Black Eyed Peas, J Balvin, Anne-Marie, and DJs Tiesto and David Guetta. Both the three-day package and the single-day festival tickets are available now at mdlbeast.com.
“We’re not done with 2023 just yet, as an amazing opportunity has just come our way to perform at a major festival that we have never played in a part of the world we rarely get to visit,” Metallica said of the performance on Facebook. “We’re excited to announce that on Thursday, December 14, we’ll be the first hard rock band to ever play at @MDLBeast’s Soundstorm Festival in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.”
The first public metal concert in the kingdom’s history is believed to be performed by Saudi Arabia’s grindcore band Creative Waste in 2019, according to the hard rock news outlet Blabbermouth. Saudi melodic death metal band Immortal Pain, on the other hand, is considered the first group to play heavy metal at a large public event when the band appeared at Comic Con Arabia.
Thrash metal pioneers Metallica brought the M72 World Tour to several major cities across the globe in 2023, and will cover spans in both Europe and North America in 2024, too.
The band will kick off the 2024 edition of their M72 World Tour with European leg in May 2024, performing in Munich, Helsinki, Copenhagen, Warsaw, and Madrid through mid-July. The 2024 North American round will see them play in cities like Chicago, Minneapolis, Seattle and more in August and September.
Fans can score tickets for Metallica’s M72 World Tour by visiting MegaSeats (use code “TICKETNEWS” for 10% off), StubHub, or Ticket Club where members can receive a free membership with the code “TICKETNEWS.”
