METALLICA
MONSTERS OF ROCK 1985
CASTLE DONINGTON (U.K.)
"Those of you who are throwing bottles, people down the front are getting hurt, so fuck off "

Fish, singer of Marillion
The 1985 show received the most pleasant weather of the decade, whereas other outdoor events held around the same time were deluged by rain, Donington, was , for once , blessed with constant sunshine . This did not of course ,… Moremean that people would stop throwing bottles of urine at other punters for no good reason , but at least there wasn't much mud ( unless of course it resulted from earth soaked by beer or piss ... or a combination of both ).

The music was once again a bit of a mix of styles , Bon Jovi were received with indifference , Marillion were that strange phenomena, like Genesis before them, a prog rock band who managed to appeal a hard rock audience and they were able to perform at festivals such as Donington and Reading with relative success, whilst one would have imagined they would have been bottled offstage in normal circumstances....

The newspaper advert on the right from early August indicates that some of the support acts had still to be finalised , including Metallica who would eventually headline in their own right, but at this point in time they were relatively unknown in the UK. Attendance is reported to be 80,000, the biggest crowd so far at the event.
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