10 Best Heavy Metal Live Bands Of 2018
2. Gojira
2018 will go down as the year Gojira made their long-awaited leap from niche extreme metal darlings to bona fide festival headliners. While 2017 saw the group continue to shine on their lengthy Magma world tour, supporting heroes like Metallica and Avenged Sevenfold, this year has probably been their greatest yet as a live band.
In August, glass ceilings were shattered as the Frenchmen headlined the 18,000-plus-capacity Bloodstock Festival, returning after totally annihilating as the special guest to Mastodon two years prior. As the main event of Bloodstock’s stacked Saturday (which was packed with similarly heavy experimentalists like Orphaned Land and SepticFlesh), Gojira could finally show off their unmitigated, no-holds-barred vision of what a quintessential headline performance should be. And it did not disappoint.
The set exploded to life with the death metal anthem “Only Pain” and, from there, the fury of these progressive overlords refused to dissipate. “Backbone” packed more brutal breakdowns than a Britney Spears biopic and “The Shooting Star” was able to show a more melancholic, stoner rock edge. “The Gift of Guilt” then made for a flooring conclusion, mixing its hammering grooves with the most remorseful melodies.
Combine all this with a spellbinding visual element created by the artwork draped behind them, and Gojira become a must-see for any metalhead.