Download Festival - Friday
13 June 2008
Donington Park
Background
With no photopass, the initial plan was to simply enjoy the day out at Download. However, since the photos on my compact camera came out better than expected, we’re presenting a report on our experience. Hence a little different to our usual reviews.
The Download bill this year had received a fair amount of criticism and reviewing it against this year’s Reading/Leeds festivals, it appears that they are getting ever closer together. Partly as a result of the bands, we took the decision to just attend the Friday which had a more metal edge to it.
The Hotel
Since we were only staying the day we’d booked a hotel for the night and on arriving to check in we decided some caffeine was needed before heading up to the festival site. Queuing for our coffee, who should appear behind us but Mikkey Dee of Motörhead. With Johan & Mikkey both Swedish, a conversation started in their native tongue and Mikkey took up a table next to us, advising us that the hotel bar was 24 hours and to be sure to come after the show. As we were about to leave, Ace Frehley’s tour manager walked in, telling Mikkey Ace was asleep on the bus outside. As we waited for our cab, the bus was right by the pick up point, but despite our hopes Ace didn’t awake.
The Festival
Since the first Monsters Of Rock in 1980, Donington has hosted the main stage within the centre of the race track. However this year, due to the creation of a motocross course, the Download site had been moved beyond the race track. On arrival at the site it was a fair old walk from the taxi drop off point to the back of the queue for day tickets. Passing where we would usually head in the opposite direction to the campsite, it was apparent that the campers would be in for a long trek every time they went back to their tents.
Having experienced not having to really queue for anything the previous weekend at Sweden Rock, it was disheartening, even though we’d arrived in good time, to see the queue stretching out in front of us. There seemed to be a confusion whether RIP campers were meant to be in this queue and it wasn’t until we got near to the front that a steward final split up the queue to make full use of the available entrances. Certainly something that needs to be improved next year.
Having fancied checking out Black Tide it was annoying to occasionally catch songs from their Light From Above album on the breeze as we stood in the queue. The time between gates opening to first band coming on should have been sufficient if the organisers had their act together.
The main stage was now located on quite a steep slope, which did aid viewing, though the space was quite compact compared to the previous layout. When we finally got there, Black Tide were wrapping up their set with a cover of Iron Maiden’s Prowler.
Black Tide set list:
Shockwave / Show Me The Way / Hit The Lights / Warriors Of Time / Light From Above / Prowler
Bumping into friends in Kiss make-up, we were told to make our way to the top of the hill to get our faces painted. On arrival, a huge queue stretched away from the painting stations, so we were going to give it a miss in favour of watching bands. We were then informed by a steward that if we had Peter Criss’ cat make-up we could jump the queue. Within about ten minutes Johan and I were being painted, but glancing across I noticed Johan getting Demon make-up. Checking with the make-up artist, we were indeed getting Gene Simmons’s make up.
It was then a short walk across to a car park which was hosting the second stage. The walk took a little longer than expected due to being constantly stopped by people asking about the make-up and taking photos. At this early point, there were not too many of us in make-up about.
I’d always hated the old second stage located in a tent at Download, which for the larger bands did not permit enough room for the numbers wanting to see them. I found the outside stage preferable, though wouldn’t have wanted to fall over on the tarmac in a mosh down the front.
Following the break up of The Darkness, the members, without their falsetto loving front man, re-grouped, with bassist Richie Edwards switching to vocals and guitar and adding Tom Mac Farlaine on bass. Naming themselves Stone Gods, the band are about to release their debut album Silver Spoons and Broken Bones. Edwards certainly appears to have little difficulty leading the band, which he did with confidence today. Opener Burn The Witch was the only song I’d heard by the band and it’s a much heavier and more serious proposition than The Darkness. The set continued in a similar vein, though being unfamiliar with the material my attention did wander. Edwards informed us that drummer Ed Graham had been taken ill and rather than cancel, Robin Goodridge, formerly of Bush had stepped in to save the day. What I saw of Stone Gods was entertaining and I’d be interested to catch them again having heard their new album.
Stone Gods set list:
Burn The Witch / You Brought A Knife To A Gunfight / Makin’ It Hard / Knight Of The Living Dead / Don’t Drink The Water / Defend Or Die
At the back of the second stage area was a number of porta-loos. Whilst the gents wasn’t such a problem, if a cubical was required a long wait was necessary, as they were clearly lacking in numbers. Again, at Sweden Rock they appear to have got the equation correct. Supply beer, supply toilets. Supply ample toilets, sell lots of beer, make good profit. It’s in everyone’s interest surely.
Having grumbled about that, its time to grumble about listening to Green Day whilst The Black Dahlia Murder were playing Elder Misanthropy. The band could hear themselves and were blissfully unaware that all the crowd were getting is pop punk! Eventually, when the sound engineer wakes up and turns up the band, the effect is something of a wall of noise. Energy exuded from the stage with frontman Trevor Sornad in full flight. Sornad proclaimed his band were from Detroit Rock City, before Black Dahlia Murder launch into What A Horrible Night To Have A Curse. Quite frankly I was struggling to recognise the songs thanks to the sound which thoroughly spoiled the set.
The Black Dahlia Murder set list:
Elder Misanthropy / Contagion / Everything Went Black / What A Horrible Night To Have A Curse / Funeral Thirst / Miasma / Deathmask Divine / Flies
The original aim was to now catch a bit of Firewind, but the distance to walk to the third stage and bumping into a few friends on route scuppered our plan. Then we learned that Kid Rock had felt unwell and had headed off to hospital and wasn’t playing. Disturbed and Judas Priest were preparing to play extended sets instead with our schedule going out of the window.
Next stop was the tent hosting the third stage for upcoming UK band Hostile. We were very familiar with the band’s frontman, Adrian Carloss, who had previously fronted Pain Control who had featured numerous times in RockersDigest reviews. Having been used to Carloss also playing guitar, his stage craft today as solely a singer was impressive. Wearing a very metal long leather coat with steel attachments, Carloss’ stalked the stage with furious looking eyes. Hostile are metal, simple as that. Mixing a classic sound with aggression, whilst unfamiliar to most here they went down a storm. Judas Priest guitarist KK Downing had written them a song called Avenger which was well received and the Brummie six-stringer will be producing Hostile’s debut release.
We had to leave before the end of Hostile’s set to take part in the Kiss face paint photo shoot. The face painting had been a World Record attempt, with the team painting 444 faces. After a serious of photos and filming we shuffled across to the main stage to catch the end of Disturbed’s set. The Chicago band had drawn a huge crowd and was running through a condensed version of the set we had previously seen at Sweden Rock. With the distractions of the photo shoot and again meeting friends I didn’t get to give Disturbed my full attention, but was bouncing about whenever I managed to tune in to what they were playing. Did I mention the steady flow of Tuborg through the day?
Disturbed set list:
Perfect Insanity / Liberate / Just Stop / Stupify / Prayer / Land Of Confusion / Inside The Fire / The Game / Stricken / Down With The Sickness
“We are Motörhead, and we play rock’n’roll”, announced Lemmy as his band took to the stage with Dr Rock. Thus followed a no nonsense set from the legends with little interaction and a lot of the aforementioned rock’n’roll. Whilst the crowd seemed to be taking a bit of a breather, the same could not be said for Mikkey Dee who was beating seven shades out of his kit, proving he was joking when he’d mimicked earlier that he was a bit tired today. The familiarity of Ace Of Spades brought the casual observer to their feet, who would now notice that Motörhead were a four piece, with former guitarist Würzel joining them for the classic.
Motörhead set list:
Dr Rock / Stay Clean / Be My Baby / Killers / Metropolis / Over The Top / One Night Stand / In The Name Of Tragedy / Just Cos You’ve Got The Power / Killed By Death / Ace Of Spades / Overkill
Time for another three piece, who have Motörhead as an essential ingredient to their sound, with High On Fire on the third stage. Frontman Mike Pike is something of a cult hero himself and a sizeable crowd had gathered to see the band from Oakland. I had, up until today, had a preference for the doomier sounds of Pike’s previous band Sleep. However, live High On Fire suddenly made sense as I was swept away by the furious dirty metal. The sound was stripped down and honest with the thud of bass and drums imploring you to move your head. One of the highlight’s of the day.
High On Fire set list:
Fury Whip / Cometh Down Hessian / Turk / Waste of Tiamat / Rumours of War / Devilution
Sadly, I haven’t much to say about Judas Priest that I haven’t already reported in my Sweden Rock review. I’d dearly hoped the Priest would come on and rule the roost today, but with Halford once again bent over struggling to hit the notes and a mechanical performance, this time without the benefit of lights, it was simply disappointing.
Judas Priest set list:
Prophecy / Metal Gods / Eat Me Alive / Between The Hammer The Anvil / Devil’s Child / Breaking The Law / Hell Patrol / Death / Dissident Aggressor / Angel / Electric Eye / Rock Hard, Ride Free / Sinner / Painkiller / Hell Bent For Leather / You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’
So finally to Kiss and as the announcer always says, “You wanted the best, you got the best.” Any doubts over Kiss’ performance were wiped clean away not long after the giant curtain emblazoned with their name fell to explosions and the band descended to the stage. We’d made our way into the front section of the crowd, with someone kindly giving me a wig on route to complete my Gene Simmons look! The atmosphere was fantastic and incredibly friendly with all around us enjoying the rock’n’roll party.
If you’ve seen Kiss you know what we got. All the usual stunts of rocket firing guitars, fire breathing, Gene flying to the lighting rig, Paul flying out to the back of the crowd, a confetti shower and a levitating drum riser. Time constraints meant we didn’t get the whole of the Alive album, however with the encore stretching to 40 minutes there was nothing to complain about. Kiss’ performance was worth the journey and entrance price to Download alone.
Kiss set list:
Deuce / Strutter / Got To Choose / Nothin’ To Lose / Hotter Than Hell / C’Mon And Love Me / Parasite / She / Guitar Solo / 100,000 Years (including drum solo) / Cold Gin / Let Me Go Rock And Roll / Black Diamond / Rock And Roll All Nite / Shout It Out Loud / Lick It Up / Bass Solo / I Love It Loud / I Was Made For Loving You / Love Gun / Detroit Rock City
Aftermath
After waiting ages for a taxi back to the hotel, we arrived to a packed bar. Mikkey Dee had been joined by various members of Ace Frehley’s crew and guitarist Derrek Hawkins. Despite their obvious allegiance, Hawkins and crew fortunately found it amusing that we were in Gene Simmons make-up, rather than wanting to beat us up. With the rum and coke flowing, the remainder of the night disappeared into a haze unsurprisingly!
LINKS:
Download Festival
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