TORONTO - It had to be the biggest, loudest, hardest, brightest, wildest and (to use the proper vernacular) most completely f---ed up “see ya later” in modern metal history.

And if it had been an outright “goodbye” instead, the Molson Amphitheatre might have been levelled last night.

On their final visit to Toronto before a self-imposed hiatus that’s expected to last at least a few years, System Of A Down closed out the marathon of metal that is Ozzfest in a way that had to be seen and heard to be fully appreciated. Even if it meant being both temporarily blind and deaf, which a good portion of last night’s capacity crowd will be today.

This Ozzy Osbourne-less stop on the tour did not suffer from the grandpappy of metal’s absence one iota. Even Ozzy might have had trouble following System Of A Down’s enthusiastically received (read: A massive, impromptu mosh pit breaking out on the mid-level concourse walkway) headlining set, which drew heavily from last year’s Mezmerize.

Blame that giant photo of SOAD’s Serj Tankian to the right, but there simply isn’t the space to touch on most of the acts that made up yesterday’s 71/2 hour buffet of molten sonic energy. To try to do so would do justice to none of them.

So, no disrespect to Norma Jean, Bleeding Through, Unearth, Atreyu, Lacuna Coil, Hatebreed or especially Avenged Sevenhold and their awesome giant, winged silver skull. You guys surely rock like the very foundation of the earth.

But the reality is the Amphitheatre didn’t get jammed all the way back to the back of the lawns until Chicago foursome Disturbed took the stage and unleashed more than an hour of aggressive yet melodic rib cage-rattling metal, from Guarded to the band’s cover of Genesis’ still-relevant Land of Confusion to, of course, Down With The Sickness. Uh-WAH-AH-AH-AH!

A bolder man might even say that Disturbed’s bald and barrel-chested frontman David Draiman injected more raw passion into the evening than System Of A Down’s Tankian did. Truly, one of the highlights of the night was Draiman’s near-religious rant against bands who, in his eyes, dilute the purity of genuine hard metal. It’s probably safe to say he doesn’t have any posters of The Killers on his bedroom wall.

Still, there was no eclipsing the totality of System Of A Down’s performance, from the hypnotizing lights aimed at the crowd to the creative rearrangement of familiar hits (Violent Pornography started out sounding suspiciously like a power ballad) to the fans’ rabid and rapturous response.

Enjoy your time off, gentlemen. And if you think “so long” was insane, wait until you see “welcome back.”