July 12 marks the 20th anniversary of Metallica’s Summer Sanitarium Tour invading Veterans Stadium in South Philadelphia.
The lineup was INSANE, featuring Mudvayne, touring in support of their sophomore album The End of All Things to Come. The Deftones toured in support of their self-titled fourth studio album.
Linkin Park also played just months after the release of their sophomore album Meteora.
Limp Bizkit was also on the bill, still riding high from their Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water in 2000. We were still a few months away from the release of Results May Vary.
Of course, the headliner, the mighty Metallica, had just released their polarizing eighth studio album St. Anger a month earlier.
From the Snake Pit at the Orion Music & More Festival in Atlantic City, NJ
The bill featured bands of high magnitude on legendary album cycles with historic Veterans Stadium as the backdrop. It made for one unforgettable night in South Philly for the 60,000+ fans in attendance.
The Summer Sanitarium Tour was a music event conceived by the mighty Metallica, named after their Master of Puppets song “Welcome Home (Sanitarium).” 2003 saw the second edition of the Summer Sanitarium Tour, following the first in 2000.
MTV and Mars Music sponsored the tour with promotion from SFX Concerts.
Summer Sanitarium Tour
The tour kicked off on July 4, 2003, in Pontiac, Michigan, and ended on August 10, 2003, in San Francisco, California. It consisted of 20 stadium shows across the United States and Canada.
This was also the first full tour to feature Robert Trujillo as a replacement for Jason Newstead, who left the band in January 2001.
The Summer Sanitarium Tour was one of the most anticipated tours of 2003. It grossed close to $50 million and drew over a million fans.
The tour was a critical and commercial success. It also helped to solidify Metallica’s status as one of the biggest and most popular metal bands in the world.
Metallica on M72 World Tour
Metallica is set to kick-off the North American portion of their M72 World Tour on August 4 and 6, 2023 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, NJ.
They will be hitting only six cities on this current run of shows in North America, with a second European and North American leg of the tour set to resume in 2024.
Metallica is advertising these shows as “No Repeat Weekends,” featuring two different sets and two different opening acts each night.
The MetLife Stadium shows will be the ones closest to the Philadelphia area throughout the duration of the massive two-year tour.
Pantera, MammothWVH, Ice Nine Kills & Five Finger Death Punch will also perform.
You can get your tickets to the M72 World Tour here.