As the final notes of Rain die out, Trivium’s Matt Heafy raises both hands towards the rafters in twin devil horns, his tongue all the way out. In most contexts, watching someone spend their 39th birthday doing the same things they did when they were 19 would be a profound bummer, but the opening night of the Florida metallers’ co-headline tour with Welsh band Bullet for My Valentine isn’t one of them.
During back-to-back sets the bands engage in a spirited game of one-upmanship, trading riff after riff and scream after scream during a 20th-anniversary celebration of the records that set them on the road to stardom. Released within months of one another in 2005, Bullet’s The Poison and Trivium’s Ascendancy offered a reset at the end of nu-metal’s reign, fusing thrash, melodeath and galloping NWOBHM while serving up radio-ready hooks that made them crucial gateway texts for a generation of metal-curious kids.
