Download 2012

[Judo]

Download 2012 music festival at Donnington park.
I had an absolutely amazing time and was wondering if anyone else went or was interested in discussions about Download in general. Ill put some brief reviews of who i saw and what i thought but its imhoymmv so please add your own reviews and thoughts. Ill warn you now that I really dont 'get' metallica so any and all attempts to persuade me otherwise will be in vain. Ill try and write them in order but i cant really remember...

Friday
fear factor (ok)
terrorvision (ace) - No tequila wtf?
acoustic Breed 77 (good) We only really wanted to hear Zombie
acoustic skindred (ace)
Machine Head (ace) - There was a huge pit that consisted of about 20 clowns. wtf win.
chase and status (epic) - Tough gig for them and they blew the lid off on the bass *No Problem
prodigy (epic)

Saturday
Black Veil Brides (ok) - Teenage heart throbs - adorable.
the yo yos (ok)
trivium (good) - they fill the slot slipknot should be.
most of Gun (good) - I had ice cream.
anti-nowhere league (epic)
couple of steel panther songs (funny) - The fans in their leopard print leggings and wigs are adorable
skindred (good) - accidentally ended up in a pit
Tenacious D (good) - no wonderboy wtf?
we watched metallica for a bit and almost died of boredom so watched a mad film about guys fighting over 2 million dollars. dunno what it was called but it was awesome and had the doc from planet terror in it. Imho Metallica arent the best for shredding, power ballads or vocals/lyrics so they just have no place in my brain for any function of music. I understand they have a crazy huge fan base and only band to sell out a day at download this year i heard on the campsite grapevine but just not extreme enough for me.

Sunday
Anthrax (good)
rival sons (ok)
sebastian bach (god awful) - Not my bag.
acoustic Mordecai (good)
lamb of god (ace) - what a pit
megadeath (ace)
soundgarden (mind blowing)
black sabbath (beyond mind blowing)

TOP 3 HIGHLIGHTS OF DOWNLOAD #3
What a band. So many hits to cram into their short 40 min set with So What, I Hate people, Streets of London, We are the League etc. Animal and the boys were as charismatic yet hard rocking as always - fantastic live band. Woman was my particular highlight as the atmosphere was electric with Animals emotional growls bridging to a hard rock ending that the whole crowd got into.

TOP 3 HIGHLIGHTS OF DOWNLOAD #2
Sound Garden blew my mind. Mixing it up between ferocious shredding and trancey guitar, with funked up 90s bass lines and wailing vocals. So great to see them back together after a 10 year hiatus and they seem to have little compromise, doing 10 min spinal tap-esque instrumental sections. chris cornell is still gorge. An energetic Outshined was my highlight as they shredded it so hard and it just reeked of tension.

TOP 3 HIGHLIGHTS OF DOWNLOAD #1
BLACK FUCKING SABBATH. What a dream come true to see ozzy performing with tony. A slightly shakey start on both vocals and guitar but they quickly found their groove a couple songs in. and when I say groove I mean HOLY FUCK THAT GROOVES ON FIRE. What a freakin epic performance. Original line up sabbath always had to be bucket list for me but the atmosphere and wailing perfect psyche guitar was like an atom bomb. They played all the big hits with Ozzy using every clap-your-hands frontman trick in the book and Tony backing it up with incredibly tight guitar playing. Absolute highlight was Fairies Wear Boots as it is just perfect for rocking live with its guitar frills and flourishes.

other miscellaneous details include gimps, slingshots, neon poi, festival shopping, cool camp neighbours, blow up bed bouncy castle and being really really really wasted x x

[Leigh S]

Saw Sabbath at the warm up gig in May - looks like they did the same setlist (with a different running order) sans "Wheels of Confusion"? - if they were half as good as then, it must have been great!

[vzzbux]

There was alot of bands on that would have been good to see again but work and other commitments prevented me from this.

The thing with Metallica is that they lost something big with the death of Cliff Burton. For me Master of Puppets has yet to be topped.




V

[Albion]

Damn shame Bill Ward isn't involved.
I was lucky enough to see the original line up twice when they reunited before. Once at the London Astoria and again at the NEC. They really were awesome.

[Albion]

For me Master of Puppets has yet to be topped.

Totally agree with that. Amazing album. They will never make a better one.

[Judo]

black sabbath were beyond good which was a surprise as I am always very skeptical about reforms. I was expecting a semi-listless performance or they 'trying hard' sound that reform bands have. Sabbath were absolutely amazing - I would definitely advise any fans to go see them while they can.

Metallica were playing their black album in full. Backwards. And the odd big hit thrown in for good measure. Even the die hard fans admitted it wasn't the most exciting performance metallica have ever given and that they couldn't match sabbaths closing set. The die hard fans sited One as the highlight. Just too middle of the road for me x

Edit - highlight number 3 is meant to say Anti-Nowhere League btw case that wasn't clear since I just wrote League.

[Leigh S]

black sabbath were beyond good which was a surprise as I am always very skeptical about reforms. I was expecting a semi-listless performance or they 'trying hard' sound that reform bands have. Sabbath were absolutely amazing - I would definitely advise any fans to go see them while they can.

Thats the very reason I didnt see them at the NEC in 99(?), despite the fact I live in Brum - as my favourite band, I couldnt face seeing them lack lustre... then I saw the video of it afterwards and kicked myself, so getting to see them finally was a real highlight.

[dweezil2]

My eduring memory of Download 2012 will be mud!

Had a fantastic time though-Soundgarden and Black Sabbath being highlights!

Soundgarden especially as I was down to see them at reading '94 before they decided to split!

Great to see someone dressed in a homemade dredd outfit too-hope they made it to the Anthrax set!

[P-BOT/1138]

I also went to "brownload" this year. Was going to camp then saw the campsite, decided not to. gotta say, my highlight was prob seeing cancer bats after gallows. I liked Metallica's set. saw them last year at soni and was getting a bit bored watching them then. maybe cause i havent listened to the black album for ages i liked it more. wasnt too keen on black sabbath, though. but, then again. i'm not a big fan. The Terrorvision set was really good. happy i finally saw steel panther at download. missed them twice before they were there.

[Mudcrab]

Was there for Sunday. Would agree with most of your thoughts Judo, Soundgarden were mind-blowing and Sabbath more so. A difference from your earlier timetable, Kyuss Lives were also awesome! That's the 3 I was there for so every bit as great as I expected.

Thought Anthrax were great and Megadeth were a bit crap. Actually they were ok, it's just their music I think's a bit crap, so that's just me. Impressed with Lamb of God and we just went for a wander during Black Label Society, didn't sound great.

Ozzy was a bit dodgy at times but mostly he was great. Tony's obviously a God and Geezer too. Drummer was capable, so didn't spoil it much but as expected it was a fair bit different from Ward's style.

Thought about getting tickets for the Saturday but we weren't interested in playing anywhere near 80 quid for them, so went to see Prometheus in Derby instead, but that's a different thread 

[Mudcrab]

Oh, also, someone needs sacking for screwing up the timing of the fireworks at the end i.e. 5 minutes after the end of the gig!

[Judo]

leigh - I cannae blame anyone for thinking that cos I do exactly the same. Spesh with the extortionate priced tickets. I did the exact same thing with AC/DC and said fuck paying 70 squid to see a bunch of aging past it rockers struggle with tunes they hate to death. But again saw ac/dc at download and holy fuck brilliant set! Well except them demanding their own stage which meant half the crowd had a shit view. Still not sure how much I'd fork out for a tour but hey! When you can see 5 bands for a fiver and have a good night then expensive concerts just don't seem worth it.

Dweezil - the mud! Holy fuck mud! I was so relieved we decided to go down on the thurs and not the wed. Felt sooo bad for the people who had to put up their tents in the heavy rain. Haha yeah the anthrax dredd guy was ace... Someone of this board I bet also soundgardens mad instruMENTAL ending was lurve. I was precidely the right amount of off my tits for that whole sabbathgardens 4 hours.

P-bot - yer soo lucky! If I'd had the chance I would never have camped but coming from scotland I didn't have any choice. Worse weather than scotland - home of rain WTFFAIL. Don't you think the terrorvision guy looked like he was half rockstar / half childrens tv presenter trollolol so funny bouncing about the stage!

Mudcrab - am well jell you saw kyuss cos I really wanted to go but alas my mates were in no hurry to get down to the arena, and in lots of hurry to get mangled at the campsite and make a bouncy castle out of blow up beds. Are kyuss still in a law suit with josh homme? I hear that's why they changed their name to kyuss lives! I lurve QOTSA but homme is an arsehole. Yeah what the fuck with the fireworks. I was so out of it I turned to my pal and went 'am I so fucked I didn't notice the fireworks' and she went 'maybe, I'm super fucked too' lol. Yeah I gave megadeath a higher rating than they deserve cos frankly I feel a little sorry for them - they were trying really hard but slayer and bands like that totally raped them all through the 90s.

Someone mentioned cancer bats but can't remember who - I have never heard of this band but would have seen them if they hadn't cocked up the arena opening times >_> if I was american I would have sued cos it opened 2 hours late and I needed to pee SO BAD I was in agony and the security manager wouldn't let me pee because he said I couldn't 'prove I needed' badly enough. I almost had to pee in front of literally thousands of people. Fuckin arsehole >_> x

[daviebond]

TBH I got really bored of Metallica at Download so went back to my tent to do some damage with a nice bottle of Isle of Jura. I kinda put this down to seeing them quite alot over the years and getting told "you're all part of the Metallica family...maaaaaaaaan"

[JOE SOAP]

The only metal band I still want to see is original line-up Sabbath. Get it together lads, give Bill his old stool back.

[Mudcrab]

TBH I got really bored of Metallica at Download so went back to my tent to do some damage with a nice bottle of Isle of Jura. I kinda put this down to seeing them quite alot over the years and getting told "you're all part of the Metallica family...maaaaaaaaan"

Sounds like a fine decision! Seeing them on TV made me glad we went to see Prometheus instead. I don't want to hear Enter Sandman ever again. It's Donington and we've got some sad old gits singing nursery rhymes!  Even a much older Saxon looked more impressive!