out->print_metric(config, out->ctx, NULL, "%4.0f", "SMI#", smi_num);
 }
 
-static void generic_metric(struct perf_stat_config *config,
-                          const char *metric_expr,
-                          struct evsel **metric_events,
-                          char *name,
-                          const char *metric_name,
-                          const char *metric_unit,
-                          int runtime,
-                          int cpu,
-                          struct perf_stat_output_ctx *out,
-                          struct runtime_stat *st)
+static int prepare_metric(struct evsel **metric_events,
+                         struct expr_parse_ctx *pctx,
+                         int cpu,
+                         struct runtime_stat *st)
 {
-       print_metric_t print_metric = out->print_metric;
-       struct expr_parse_ctx pctx;
-       double ratio, scale;
-       int i;
-       void *ctxp = out->ctx;
+       double scale;
        char *n, *pn;
+       int i;
 
-       expr__ctx_init(&pctx);
+       expr__ctx_init(pctx);
        for (i = 0; metric_events[i]; i++) {
                struct saved_value *v;
                struct stats *stats;
 
                n = strdup(metric_events[i]->name);
                if (!n)
-                       return;
+                       return -ENOMEM;
                /*
                 * This display code with --no-merge adds [cpu] postfixes.
                 * These are not supported by the parser. Remove everything
                        *pn = 0;
 
                if (metric_total)
-                       expr__add_id(&pctx, n, metric_total);
+                       expr__add_id(pctx, n, metric_total);
                else
-                       expr__add_id(&pctx, n, avg_stats(stats)*scale);
+                       expr__add_id(pctx, n, avg_stats(stats)*scale);
        }
 
+       return i;
+}
+
+static void generic_metric(struct perf_stat_config *config,
+                          const char *metric_expr,
+                          struct evsel **metric_events,
+                          char *name,
+                          const char *metric_name,
+                          const char *metric_unit,
+                          int runtime,
+                          int cpu,
+                          struct perf_stat_output_ctx *out,
+                          struct runtime_stat *st)
+{
+       print_metric_t print_metric = out->print_metric;
+       struct expr_parse_ctx pctx;
+       double ratio, scale;
+       int i;
+       void *ctxp = out->ctx;
+
+       i = prepare_metric(metric_events, &pctx, cpu, st);
+       if (i < 0)
+               return;
+
        if (!metric_events[i]) {
                if (expr__parse(&ratio, &pctx, metric_expr, runtime) == 0) {
                        char *unit;