Festival Magic!

I remember my first festival back in 1999, where my mate and I went on a road trip to Athens from north Greece, on a coach along with 30 more metalheads from Wizard rock bar. Sodom, Immortal, Mercyful Fate (King Diamond) and Manowar, along with Greeks Nightfall were the bands that formed a decent first experience. The best festivals though were the 2004, 2005 and 2006 Downloads in Donnington, here in the UK. The bands were way better (Black Sabbath, System of a Down, Slipknot, Korn just to name the few) but the company and incidents were what made the experience even better- thanks you guys. Latest fest was at Novarock in Austria with Rage Against the Machine, Sex Pistols and Cavalera Conspiracy.

I remember five-six years ago driving up from Wolverhampton to Birmingham, picking up friends, then off to Donnington for the long 4-day weekends! Where to start? The long walk to find space for setting up our tents? Carrying heavy supplies whilst doing that? The fact that every single year there was a goddamn heatwave during Download fest? Hay fever? Difficulties setting up the tents? Personal hygiene gone missing for days? IT WAS ALL WORTH IT!

I will never forget:

•  Metallica performing songs only from the first 5 albums in 2004 with Joey Jordison and Dave Lombardo on drums due to Lars Ulrich’s sickness. Needless to say, the drumming was 5 times heavier and everybody was standing in awe.
• Same year – seeing Dimebag Darrell playing with Damageplan a few months before a jackass shot him with a riffle in Ohio. Rest in peace man :(
• Black Sabbath in 2005. It has been always a dream seeing Black Sabbath with their 70s line up: Tony, Ozzy, Bill and Terry. Their performance was really something! Really
• Korn (original line-up right after Take A Look In The Mirror album), Slipknot (first year all 9 members, second year in Download without the Clown), System of a Down (performing on Persian carpets), Prodigy on the second (smaller) stage with people hanging from the ceiling, Guns’N’Roses starting earlier than they were supposed to (I think this must be the only time this has happened...ever!), Trivium playing at 13:00 during their first year ending up headlining the fest some years later (many admit their 2005 performance kickstarted their career), Tool, Alice in Chains, Slayer, Bowling For Soup, HIM, Lacuna Coil, In Flames, Cradle of Filth, Paradise Lost, and many many more bands performing their best.

PS. Dedicated to (in alphabetical order): Angeliki, Eugenio, Isabell, James, Mark, Panos, Tina, Vasilios, Walter + Sakis & son, guy from Rhodes whose name I can’t remember. If I’ve forgotten something important/interesting please add your thoughts here if you want.