For the ever loving life of me I have never been able to figure out why Metallica is so much more popular than Megadeth. Wait scratch that; I do know why. It’s because the mainstream, as opposed to real metal fans, would rather listen to uninspired pap than the well thought out messages of political forethought that Megadeth has been putting forth for the majority of their career.

That, in itself, is a sad reflection of the country if you ask me. Considering I saw several people wearing bootleg t-shirts proclaiming “Dave Mustaine for President” I don’t think I’m the only one who holds that opinion. The world needs a band like Megadeth now more than ever and thank god they are rising to the challenge.

Still public tastes and opinion have never stopped Dave Mustaine from continuously forging ahead with some of the best politically motivated musical tirades and guitar playing in the business. Mustaine and his band newly revamped band proved this in spades during their set on April 29th at the Broomfield Event center.

Megadeth wasted no time in ripping through some of their best tunes during their opening set for Heaven and Hell. For those of you that haven't been reading your metal news Heaven and Hell is basically the Ronnie James Dio era Black Sabbath minus the name and drummer Bill Ward.

Megadeth set things in motion with the song “Sleepwalker” from the forthcoming album United Abominations the band wasted no time in throwing out as many gems as possible in their all too short set. They played predictable but enjoyable standards like “Wake Up Dead” and “Peace Sells…But Who’s Buying” mixed with inspired versions lesser known tunes like “Eye of The Tornado” and “Take No Prisoners” that had the crowd moshing and head-banging with a delight

The band also treated fans to “Hanger 18” and an encore of “Holy Wars…The Punishment Due,” effectively culling a large portion of the band's set from the excellent Rust in Peace album. Mustaine and company also performed blistering versions of their latest single “Washington is Next” and the fittingly accusatory tune “Kick the Chair,” from the band's last album The System Has Failed.

The only disappointment of Megadeth’s set was that the band didn’t draw any songs from So Far, So Good…So What! an album that perfectly compliments Mustaine’s current mindset and instead chose to play “Symphony of Destruction” instead of something more fitting like “In My Darkest Hour” or “Hook in Mouth.”

In the end, Megadeth delivered on of the best shows I’ve seen them do in years and, even though Heaven and Hell were the headliners, Megadeth were without question the high point of the evening. Here’s hoping the band comes back through town soon with the same energy and a headlining show.