Download festival, once known as monsters of rock festival
throughout the 80’s and 90’s, returns for it’s 10th anniversary in
2012 and in the words of Andy Copping “the best Download yet”. Of course he
says this every year because Download does just seem to get better and better
year after year and last year saw Def Leppard, System of a Down and Linkin Park
headline and many other famous faces of rock play throughout the weekend. Bands
that played that weekend included the likes of Thin Lizzy, Cheap Trick, Alice
Cooper, Alter Bridge, Twisted Sister and many more! I thought that Andy had got
the line up just right and thought that would be a hard year to beat but
somehow he has managed to beat that great line-up once again to Download 2012.
The 10th anniversary of Download sees the new age
punk band The Prodigy headline the Friday, heavy metal band Metallica headline
the Saturday and the recently reunited Black Sabbath take the stage on the
Sunday. For Black Sabbath it will be the only festival they play and for the 10th
anniversary of this historic festival I couldn’t think of a better place for
them to play. After their small homecoming gig at the o2 in Birmingham everyone
was ready to see these guys rock the world of 100,000 people!!
One of the main things that had been on everyone’s mind was
‘why the hell is Chase and Status playing Download’ I haven’t a clue but festival
promoter Andy Copping thinks differently about the matter stating in an
interview I did with him “Chase & Status will surprise everyone and blow
people away. Their live show is off the scale. They will move people in the
same way that The Prodigy did in 2006 and 2009 and Pendulum in 2008, 2009 and
2011. People back then said I was crazy to book those bands and I knew I was right.
If Download does not diversify it will die in the same way Monsters of Rock
did.” This is a bold statement from him saying that they would move people in
the same way as The Prodigy, I do have to disagree with him on this one as
after all The Prodigy are a new age punk band and appeal to the Download
audience and having Chase and Status on the bill just didn’t fit that “spiritual
home of rock” category. When they were on there were more people moving away
from the main stage and going to watch Nightwish on the Zippo Encore stage, who
by the way knew how to please the audience and put on a great show! The main
headliner for the Zippo encore stage that Download promoter Andy Copping had
got was the guitar shredding Slash that featured Myles Kennedy on vocals.
Download festival also has 3 other stages, apart from the
main stage (renamed the Jim Marshall stage shortly after his death) and the
second stage (Zippo encore stage) which are the Pepsi Max stage, the Redbull
jam stage and the Jagermeister stage. These last two stages mainly played host
to less known bands than the bands that played the main and second stage all of
which played well and did Download proud!
Please check out my site where you can get in contact with me and see my work site and my photos here at M.Wright photography
Or here to my Facebook page where you can see up to date live reviews and photos Facebook page
