.How Metallica Made a Mark on South San Jose History

Inspired by The Art of Pilgrimage and The Ruins of Paris, I heard Metallica at Blossom Hill and Santa Teresa.

These days, at the northeast corner of said intersection, one finds what resembles a dying BevMo! store and few other similarly doomed outfits, along with a huge, perpetually empty parking lot. The city has posted the landlord’s plan to replace the property with housing.

Despite it all, I basked in the history.

In 1996, the BevMo! was Tower Records, where Metallica famously played a surprise concert that jammed traffic for miles in each direction. The Ohlone/Chynoweth Light Rail Station was actually used by more than five people at a time, if you can believe that.

Nearly 30 years later, fans all over the world have seen footage of that gig. Millions have talked about it. By any metric, the event put suburban San Jose on the map.

I wasn’t even present that day, but any time I navigate the strip-mall hellscape of Blossom Hill and Santa Teresa, I hear Metallica, especially “Whiplash,” a tune I know they played that day. I even had the 12-inch single, a European import, back in the ’80s. I bought it at the Campbell Tower Records.

In his legendary book The Art of Pilgrimage, a classic on how to make travel meaningful again, author Phil Cousineau provided enough quotes to drive hundreds of Metro columns.

“The practice of soulful travel is to discover the overlapping point between history and everyday life, the way to find the essence of every place, every day,” he wrote. “Curiosity about the extraordinary in the ordinary moves the heart of the traveler intent on seeing behind the veil of tourism.”

No tourist would ever possibly come to this neighborhood, unless he took the wrong exit on the freeway. The intersection looks like every indistinguishable California strip mall from Sylmar to San Leandro. There are no pedestrians for miles.

The only interesting aspects are the ruins. The torched Home Depot across from Oakridge is now completely gone, providing a wondrous view of Mt. Umunhum, if you stand in the sun-baked parking lot, like I just did.

Those foothills are amazing. I often take them for granted. You notice them better while on foot.

The Art of Pilgrimage referenced many other books, including The Ruins of Paris, a poetic masterpiece by the wandering French essayist Jacques Réda, a book that “echoes with the footsteps and the words of a wanderer by turns gloomy, curious, troubled, elated, angry, tender and confused (and sometimes all these things at once).” Through the suburbs of Paris and beyond, the book is “a journey that moves to the rhythm of walking, of trains, to the hopeful tempo of upbeat jazz.”

Since there wasn’t a wandering San Jose essayist, I took it upon myself 20 years ago to start doing it. In this case, I don’t hear jazz. I hear OG thrash metal circa 1986 because many of us drank all over this neighborhood as teenagers, in parking lots, various parks, or those foothills, often blasting Metallica when Cliff Burton was still in the band.

As boring and hideous as the intersection of Blossom Hill and Santa Teresa is now, wandering around made me appreciate the history much more. I still love those foothills. Seriously.

So what’s next?

You can probably telegraph where I’m going with this.

In terms of pilgrimage, any grown-up city would understand the necessity of a statue memorializing the infamous Metallica show. Maybe in the parking lot or on the sidewalk, somehow. Metalheads far and wide would come visit. It would get international press for San Jose, certainly more press than for whatever crud Google is building, or not building.

Statues of rock stars exist throughout the world. Fans make pilgrimages and then blast Instagram selfies all over the planet.

Think of future generations. Imagine if local kids grew up nearby, and instead of concluding their own city is a suburban hellscape from which they aspire to leave and never return, imagine if they realized amazing stuff actually happened here. Just imagine.

Kids are the future. Build a Metallica statue at Blossom Hill and Santa Teresa. There’s absolutely nothing else to look at. Do it for the kids. Now.