It was a long haul to get to Megadeth’s Oct. 13 performance at Worcester’s DCU Center. The show began sharply at 6 p.m., with high-octane performances by the Butcher Babes, Metal Church, Suicidal Tendencies and Amon Amarth, and the iconic metal band didn’t hit the stage until 9:35. But from that moment on, it was a blistering 16-song set that lasted about an hour and 15 minutes, with the musicians barely stopping to breathe the entire time.

“We have a curfew,” said lead singer Dave Mustaine, in one of the night’s few pauses, “so there won’t be much talking.”

The crowd didn’t mind one bit. From the moment the band hit the stage with a fireball rendition of “Hangar 18,” followed with rapid-fire renditions of “Wake Up Dead,” “In My Darkest Hour” and “The Threat Is Real.”

There were more than a few empty seats, and the crowd felt a little thin — Megadeth is playing again Oct. 13 at Mohegan Sun, which might have split the audience — but the crowd that did show up was enthusiastic. A video pan of the front row showed leather-clad men fist pumping, and a girl with blue hair nearly in tears as she sang. The energy was intense and immensely convivial. There was a small amount of moshing on the floor, and a few incidents of crowd surfing, but even these radiated an unmistakable sense of joy.

For the most part, Megadeth’s show is built entirely on acceleration. The music is fast, loud and immensely technical. It’s bracing, but it also tends to give the entire show a singular texture which wasn’t often broken up, although guitarist Kiko Loureiro was given a few moments to create eerily delicate musical moments, including one island of Spanish guitar that was truly stunning.

But these were merely moments of respite, and while warmly appreciated, the audience was more than content to be along for a breakneck, barreling musical ride. Songs such as “Tornado of Souls,” “Conquer or Die!,” “Lying in State” and “Fatal Illusion” were best defined as blasts of unrelenting fury, guitar driven and propelling Mustaine’s strong, gravely vocals to stratospheric heights.

Nine songs in, however, the band hit its real stride with “Sweating Bullets,” wherein Mustaine coalesced the crowd into one fist-pumping unit, creating a visceral connection between the audience and the musicians. “Feeling paranoid,” the crowd sang in unison, “True enemy or false friend?/Anxiety's attacking me/And my air is getting thin.”

While there were video, smoke and light displays, and the occasional person in costume wandering onto the stage, they were all mostly garnish. The soul of Megadeth’s show lies in these flat-out rock ’n’ roll moments, stripped down and full of raw power. Indeed, as the band rocked forward into “A Tout Le Monde,” “Trust” and the recent “Post American World,” it was clear that musicianship was driving the show, not theatrics. Nowhere was this more evident than in Dirk Verbeuren’s ferocious drumwork, which was a torrent of energy from beginning to end, and in Megadeth veteran David Ellefson’s bass line, which lent the entire show substance and kept the music grounded. Megadeth’s music is a fine-tuned machine, and it’s clear that for all the illusion of chaos the band creates on stage, it all needs to work with machine-like efficiency, or it all breaks down.

And there was no breakdown here: The band raced to the finish line with “Dystopia,” “Symphony of Destruction,” “Peace Sells” and finally “Holy Wars … The Punishment Due,” with ballistic force, until coming to an almost jarring conclusion. There was no encore, but while the crowd seemed hungry for more, there was also a general feeling of satisfaction. They had come to the DCU Center to see a legendary metal band in action, and Megadeth had delivered.

Email Victor D. Infante at Victor.Infante@Telegram.com and follow him on Twitter @ocvictor.