Metallica Tour Dates to Rival Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’

For more than a year now, Metallica have been trotting the globe, traveling from continent to continent, promoting their latest album, 'Death Magnetic.' And the band's still at it, playing a recent show in Colombia that, needless to say, didn't go so well. But they're gearing up for something huge, according to the band's manager, Peter Mensch, and it's going down in 2011.

"Let's just say that next year you will see a Metallica tour that will blow your mind," Mensch said in a recent interview. "They will only play in 10 cities, but it will be a huge undertaking. It will be Metallica's equivalent of 'The Wall.'"

Say what? For those unfamiliar with Pink Floyd's concert film, which was shot over the mere four shows performed, The New York Times called the tour "a milestone in rock history ... Never again will one be able to accept the technical clumsiness, distorted sound and meager visuals of most arena rock concerts as inevitable." The Times proclaimed that "the 'Wall' show will be the touchstone against which all future rock spectacles must be measured." So Mensch's statement is certainly a bold one.

Mensch spilled the beans during an interview about his managerial prowess. He said that part of his success has come from "coming up with ideas so that the live shows are interesting. Just shooting off dumb ideas and, by the way, between you and me, some of it is recycling stuff that people did 25 years ago but no one's smart enough to know that we recycled it. Saying something like: 'I have this idea for us to play an equivalent of 'The Wall.' So here's some ideas so we can get the professionals in so they can tell me if I'm crazy or not.' It's like plotting out a canvas so someone else can fill it in."