Hellfest Open Air 2011

By Júlio Valada on Jul 27, 2011 in Exclusive Reports | 0 comments

Part 4/4

Day 3: Stand Up And Shout.    

 

So here we are, last day of concerts and coincidentally the last day of the festival. Gladly this was much less hectic than the one before, at least in terms of concerts because it sure wasn’t in terms of crowd. A lot of people stayed for names like Ozzy Osbourne, Judas Priest and Doro, but a lot more were on display that day. To me it was also interview day, with Atheist and Coroner booked for the afternoon.

And it was precisely with Atheist that I started the day, again near the high-noon as in previous days. With a revamped line-up that comes from their latest effort Jupiter and a lot of attitude, the band struck at the hearts and minds of many with their technical arrangements and jazzy moments. For those unaware of Kelly’s preferences in terms of stimulants, a t-shirt spelling “Enjoy Weed” was indicative enough, and the fact that he stated out loud that he needed some weed after the show left the audience giggling. “There’s weed in France isn’t there?” said Kelly to a bedazzled crowd. It was one of the best shows of the festival and one where the classics were ever-present.

 

At the third day I finally returned to the Terrorizer Tent, for the concert of the German band The Ocean. This was probably the biggest surprise of the festival, along with Church Of Misery, as they totally ripped through the audience like a rollercoaster of emotions, waving forth their atmospheric brand of Sludge, with its occasional bursts of Hardcore like the genre normally has. A heavy and emotionally charged display from a young band that deserves the name it’s building up, and a wild participation with the audience that resulted in the vocalist doing crowd surfing like a maniac. In the last song of the set the guitarist joined him on a leap of faith over the enthusiastic crowd, which resulted in one of the sickest moments in the festival. Those were the money shots were you can see Robin Staps playing his guitar while being hold by the crowd. Definitely an amazing show and a band to follow in the near future!

Orphaned Land were having a blast on stage with a barefoot Kobi Farhi dancing and cheering up the crowd. It was a clear display of positive energy and joy, an emotion that can also be transmitted through metal music. I didn’t have much time to see them as I had to run for the interview with Atheist. You can read about it in the proper article, I won’t occupy any space here with it. Sadly I lost Ghost which I was hoping to see. Not so sadly I lost Pain Of Salvation (purposely) because their whining Prog was just too much for my sensitive ears. It was so not the time for “romantic” songs, but I digress.

Another return to the Rock Hard Tent to see the old Swedes, by the name of Grave, demolishing yet again the entirety of the audience present there with their unadulterated Death Metal. They may be old and they may play the same song over and over again, but you know what? They rule! It was a pretty decent show, but I unfortunately couldn’t bear till the end because I had to go on and interview Coroner. Again check the proper article for details on that one. Because of the interview I couldn’t check Anathema, Grand Magus and Morgoth (why cruel world why???), so I had to skip to Doro’s show.

Doro is a name that needs no introductions, be it because of her visibility in the metal world, the quality of her studio material or just her looks, and she proved once more that the title of Heavy Metal Queen is befitting. With an endearing behaviour towards the audience and an array of classic songs, she displayed an energy that few younger vocalists can bear with. She felt happy enough to spend nearly half of the set browsing through Warlock songs, which left everyone in ecstasy! The Queen is alive, long live the Queen!

From the Queen to the Kings, Judas Priest was next in line and the old farts didn’t disappoint as they unleashed their arsenal of classic songs spanning over four decades. The typical Harley Davidson moment was present and songs like “Breaking The Law”, “Painkiller” and “Starbreaker” made the day for many of the present. But it was with “Beyond The Realms Of Death” that they showed how good they still are, and how good their new guitarist is! The guy seemed to be playing with them since forever, showing no restraints and no fear, and it was on this song that he showed how much of a shredder he is. He definitely impressed me with his ease on the stage with such legends. The encore with “You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’” was another highlight of the show.

Therion was playing at the same time of Electric Wizard, so I decided to go to the Terrorizer Tent again and witness the sheer destruction of this British quartet. Do you know the feeling of getting smashed by a steam roller while tripping on acid? No?! Well, check a concert by this guys (and girl) then, as this is probably the best way to describe it. A weird film was being projected on the back of the stage, showing murders and orgies, while the band was displaying their turtle speed Stoner Metal with a big emphasis on feedback. I can say I spent more than half of the show wandering around in spirit form as they were very good.

Back to reality and to the Rock Hard Tent for what would be my last show in Hellfest, given that I didn’t have any desire of seeing the last set of bands playing afterwards. I was expecting Dark Tranquillity to deliver their usual show but still touching a bit of the classics. Sadly they decided to go all Kreator on me and only play songs from the last ten years. This resulted in a very similar set of songs that blended with each other at the sound of keyboards. The highest moment of their concert was when they played “ThereIn”, which was warmly received by the crowd.

The festival still had three more shows happening at the same time but I skipped them, as by this point I was really in dire need of sitting down and resting. The festival was over and all that was left was to sleep a few hours before lifting the camp and departing from the beautiful town of Clisson!

To make a catch-up of Hellfest Open Air 2011 is quite easy. Again the festival went with no major problems, the shows were great and the organization had pretty much everything covered. On the other hand some problems did arise during the festival, namely the excess of people attending the shows since the space of the festival is already too small for packing so many people, and some sound problems that plagued a big part of the concerts. The fact was that many times the drums would be too loud in the mix and overpower the rest while the guitars would wane and become less than audible. Concerning the space issues, the organization has already informed that due to logistics next year’s festival will be held on a different and bigger (we hope so) place. As for the sound problems one can only hope for a better use of sound technicians next year and a proper use of sound dynamics because let’s face it, there’s no point in giving Septicflesh, Mayhem and Atheist the same sound does it? Every band has specific needs sound-wise and a good example of a perfect sound would be the Hail Of Bullets show. The sound was alright most of the time but some shows really lacked a proper sound set, which was a pity! On a different note, it was awesome to have three-hundred reporters covering the event but the constraints of getting into the pits were sometimes overwhelming. There were many shows where the sheer amount of people present made it impossible to photograph them. A corridor on both tents, to separate reporters in line for the pit from the crowd would be a nice addition as well as a different entrance to the pit of both main stages, which this year was shared. Sometimes less is more and I’m hopeful that details like these can be corrected next year as the festival will definitely grow larger and better.

These last couple of years were indicative of the sheer growth and power that Hellfest is experiencing. From having around 70.000 attendants last year to around 90.000 this year and who knows how many in the years to come, this is a festival that is rapidly taking over Europe and putting names like Wacken Open Air to shame with its amazing and super varied set of bands. My prediction is that it will grow even larger next year and this year’s excess of people was indicative of just that, people are coming more and more to Hellfest because they know that there they can see many of their favourite bands. In the end that’s the main reason of attending this type of festivals and the people responsible from Wacken Open Air should realize that a long-term name and marketing isn’t everything, we’re there because of the bands, because of the music! And that’s something that Hellfest has never neglected, in fact they are winning more and more adepts because they manage to please pretty much any crowd, be it Alternative, Industrial, Death, Black, Thrash, Heavy, Prog, Hard-Rock, Punk, Hardcore, etc. So what are you waiting for? Start making plans as I suspect that the new venue and next year’s edition will reserve a lot of surprises in store for us music lovers.

I hope you liked this extensive report from Hellfest, I know I had a blast doing it. We’re counting on you next year. Rock on!