Teemu Mäntysaari made his first appearance with Megadeth last night (September 6) and fan footage of the show has now appeared online.
The band were performing at the Revel Entertainment Center in Albuquerque, NM. The show was the first in a run of fall dates as part of their ongoing Crush The World tour. It was also the band’s first show without regular guitarist Loureiro, who has had to sit out the run due to family reasons.
Megadeth fans will know that the band have a penchant for opening proceedings with Hangar 18 – a tradition maintained both in tribute to the departed Vinnie Paul (who first suggested it) and because its long instrumental opening is handy for gauging the sound levels.
On the downside, the track is famed for the fact it’s loaded with solo sections, so it’s fair to say that Mäntysaari had something of a baptism of fire facing him. However, if the Finnish metaller was nervous, he hid it damn well.
Fan footage shows Mäntysaari doesn’t miss a beat on Hangar 18’s multiple lead sections. That said, he sounds equally sharp on just about everything else the set throws at him – whether it’s the melodic À Tout le Monde, or the challenging closers and Marty Friedman-era highpoints, like Tornado of Souls or Symphony of Destruction.
Mäntysaari and Loureiro have something in common as guitarists, both being based in Finland and having a shared power metal/neoclassical lineage. It’s clearly left the former in good stead for the gig.
We’re still unsure just how long Mäntysaari had to prep for his first show, but given the news he would be standing in for Loureiro was only shared 24 hours before the show, we can assume it was not long.
He’ll still have to go some to cover as much stage as Loureiro does in a typical show (the Brazilian guitarist works hard up there), but there’s no doubt that Kiko has found a killer stand-in.
We look forward to seeing more clips as they land, but for now you can watch most of the show on the video above and then learn more about Kiko Loureiro’s Megadeth stand-in Teemu Mäntysaari.
