Download Festival –LIVE REVIEW by Carina Lawrence / Dark Art Conspiracy

Download Festival 2024 marked the 7th one I have been to. Still, for the first time, I arrived on Wednesday the 12th of June, two days before the arena and main music started, as I usually would arrive very early on the first day of the arena opening. It was nice to experience the other festival activities on Wednesday and Thursday, the 13th of June, such as chilli eating contests, axe and paddle bushcraft demonstrations and some bands playing in the Doghouse. I especially enjoyed seeing Bleed Again from Brighton, a local band I am very familiar with and was proud to see them crushing it, headlining the Takeover Stage with a good turnout. There was also lots of comedy, including on Thursday with Andrew O’Neill’s History Of Heavy Metal sketch, which was a highlight pre-main festival, which was entertaining and took you through the milestones of metal with Andrew playing the heavy hitters on guitar and adding some funny quips in the mix to a packed tent. The two days before the arena opened was also lovely weather, perfect for sitting around in camp, enjoying a few drinks, and enjoying the atmosphere; it’s just a shame that the weather took a turn for the worst on Friday, 14th June, just in time for the main event!

Friday 14th Of June

The first band I caught on Friday 14th June on the Opus second stage was Hanabie, a Japanese Nu Metalcore band who were good fun to watch with their sweet, cute Japanese vibes that quickly transitioned to impressive heavy screams and riffs, a nice perfect mix to open the day and drew in a good crowd who seemed pretty into this strange concoction that was highly enjoyable. You could tell the band was very happy to be there making their mark in the UK, and they will have earned some new fans.

Welsh rockers Those Damn Crows hit hard early on in the day on the main stage, bringing fire and high energy and bought in a large crowd to hear their anthemic offerings. It was after Those Damn Crows that the weather started to get really bad, so unfortunately, I ended up sheltering away for a long time and missed a few bands that I would have liked to have seen.

I emerged again in the evening to see the bizarre and fascinating ritualistic performance from Heilung on the second stage, which really drew the crowd and me in with their dark and beautiful experimental folk sounds. Their sound and performance were enthralling, with some members sporting evil-looking headdresses and masks and others covered in black paint and with shields and sticks, making for a weird and wonderful set that was perfect for the miserable weather and was a personal highlight for me, bringing something completely different to the festival and delivering an unforgettable experience, leaving you feeling like you may have joined a cult by the end.

First-time headliners of the festival, American rockers Queens Of The Stone Age, delivered a polished set with good presence and swagger, opening with their hit ‘Little Sister’  and further in pulling out all their top songs such as ‘Paper Machete’, ‘Go With The Flow’ followed by ‘The Lost Art Of Keeping A Secret’ and of course, towards the end, they played ‘No One Knows’. Although I enjoyed them, especially when doing their most popular songs, after a while, they didn’t feel that engaging, considering they were headliners, and the crowd didn’t seem that interested compared to previous headliners. There was not much crowd interaction, but the miserable weather halfway through their set didn’t help matters either. Although they are a huge rock band, they didn’t seem to fit as headliners, at least for this festival anyway, but I appreciate that booking different headliners is a challenge and a risk, and it isn’t one that exactly failed. It just didn’t hit the same as other headliners have seen at the festival over the years.

Saturday 15th June

The second day, Saturday the 15th of June, didn’t get off to a good start after relentless rain; like most others, I spent hunkered down in my tent waiting for the storm to pass so I emerged sometime after 2 pm to finally brave the arena after the weather cleared up, at least temporarily so the first band I managed to see was Australian progressive metallers, Karnivool on the second stage who have got a distinct interesting sound and sounded great despite their short setlist due to their time slot and length of songs but they of course fitted in their biggest song ‘Themata’ which sounded spot on and ended with ‘New Day’, they delivered a very diverse and captivating set.

The next band that was due to follow on the same stage was Russian-British deathcore act Slaughter To Prevail, which I was settled down to watch until the heavens opened up once again for a massive downpour, which caused me and everyone else to seek shelter where you could to try and ride it out. Still, unfortunately, the conditions left it unsafe for the main stages, so the festival was forced to temporarily stop the bands to wait for it to clear up. Luckily, it wasn’t too long before it did so considering all that, Slaughter To Prevail was met with a big and eager crowd going into their opening song ‘Bonebreaker’ followed by ‘Baba Yaga’, with vocalist Aleksandr “Alex Terrible” Shikolai expressing his gratitude to the fans to be there in between his demonic growls. Although I was enjoying their set, I started to move across the arena in preparation for the further onslaught of bad weather I could see coming, so I caught the tail end of Babymetal on the main stage, who had a huge crowd also. Still, unfortunately, Babymetal don’t appear to have much luck when it comes to weather at Download as they only managed to play four songs due to the bad weather yet again. I caught some of their final song, ‘Ratatata’, which features Electric Callboy, who was also due to be at the festival but cancelled to the dismay of many.

The weather continued to be colossally bad, so I ended up sheltering away again for an extended period, feeling a bit deflated by the miserable weather but emerged later for punk rock veterans The Offspring, rightfully on the main stage, which gave me and I’m sure others a much-needed boost of enthusiasm and joy and for their set, I managed to forget the woes of mother nature and be fully immersed in their nostalgic punk anthems with them delivering hit after hit, opening with ‘Come Out and Play’ and playing the likes of ‘Want You Bad’, ‘Million Miles Away’, ‘Why Don’t You Get A Job?’ and ‘Pretty Fly (for a white guy)’ – I thankfully just caught ‘Pretty Fly’ as had to leave a bit early to catch Pantera on the second stage. The Offspring was one of my favourite sets of the festival, with non-stop anthems and energy, and it helped make the day a fun one after all the bad weather.

The legendary Pantera was one of the bands I was most excited to see on the line-up. They didn’t disappoint, delivering one of the biggest crowds of the festival and uniting everyone as you want and expect from a headliner set (they headlined the second stage), with everyone headbanging, moshing and singing like mad throughout. Everyone fully appreciated being there to witness their first reformed show in over two decades. Longtime vocalist Phil Anselmo and bassist Rex Brown were joined by new touring additions guitar virtuoso Zakk Wylde and Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante. It felt special and thunderous from start to finish, opening with ‘A New Level’ and playing all their crushing offerings from ‘I’m Broken’ and, of course, the instantly recognisable song to any metal fan ‘Walk’ which was epic to hear live with everyone shouting the lyrics and punching their fists in the air. They also played heavy hitters, ‘Cowboys From Hell’ and ‘Fucking Hostile’ –  they truly delivered an epic and unforgettable set which left me, and I’m sure many others thinking they could have easily been one of the main headliners. The clips and homage to Dimebag Darrell, who was tragically killed in 2004, and drummer Vinnie Paul, who died in 2018, only added to the significant set.

You have got to love the diversity Download festival offers as it is quite an odd experience to go from the blistering heavy set of Pantera to then head to the other main stage to see Saturday headliners, American pop-rockers Fall Out Boy dazzle with the lighthearted and fun vibes. The crowd was pretty impressive, and everyone seemed to be enjoying their anthemic tunes, which they were eager and quick to pull out, keeping the crowd happy and engaged with the likes of ‘Sugar, We’re Goin Down’ followed immediately by the infectiously catchy ‘Dance, Dance’ which invoked many to move their bodies as it should and they also played another of my favourite tunes of theirs with ‘This Ain’t A Scene, It’s An Arms Race’ so I was happy. They were in perfect form, with Patrick Stump sounding brilliant throughout, and the band seemed thrilled to be there. Although they may have seemed like an unusual choice for a headliner, they were better and appear to have been more widely received than Queens Of The Stone Age.

I didn’t see Avenged Sevenfold headline the final day on Sunday, but I have seen Avenged Sevenfold a couple of times before, including a previous headline slot at Download, so they were my favourite band of the three headliners and notably the only metal one, but comments sound mixed about their performance.

As noted above, I ended up having to leave on the Sunday morning of 16th June, especially after the overnight downpours of more rain meant that the arena was delayed opening so the organisers could try and make the conditions a bit better/safer for everyone which meant they were an hour late in opening the arena and set back the early bands time slots as a result. Still, it sounds like there were some of the best acts featured on the Sunday, such as Sum 41 and Limp Bizkit (which would have been my top picks to see if I was there for it!), so it sounds like the final day ended on a high.

Despite the weather making things more challenging and meaning I didn’t catch as many bands as I would have liked, I still really enjoyed the bands I did see, and it was great to see everyone still smiling and having a good time in the rain and mud. The 2024 edition of the festival was always going to be an interesting one, trying out new headliners, which some were happy about and some weren’t, but either way, whether you agreed with the choices or not, you can’t deny that Download Festival offers a bit of something for everyone, covering a wide range of rock and metal from stadium rock to experiment folk, so even if you don’t go for the headliners, there is plenty to choose from throughout the festival to cater for the masses and it clearly landed well for the majority, as 2024 was another sell-out year for the festival. It will be exciting to see what Download Festival 2025 holds in store!

In 2025, Download Festival will return to Donington from Friday 13th June – Sunday 15th June. Limited Early Bird tickets went on sale on Monday 17 June from www.downloadfestival.co.uk.

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