Hellfest is a force of nature, it’s the cool guy that you want to be friends with or the leather jacket that you’ve always wanted but never quite been able to afford
It has been the pinnacle of festivals since its inception in its current form in Clisson in 2006 and over the past couple of years has expanded even more, moving the Valley stage away from a tented venue and more significantly expanding the Warzone to an amphitheatre style and arguably the most popular stage at the festival.
This year’s opus was a 4 day event and with over 180 bands and as a result split up our team to cover. Our colleague Cécile handled the Temple/Alter stages as well as interviews, and myself (Gavin) and Hailley covering primarily the main stages with the occasional soiree over to the Warzone and the Valley.
The first day of the festival was greeted with the usual sunshine and high temperatures and as per normal, the whole town of Clisson joins in with the festivities, before heading the main festival site we took in the plethora of bands on stage in the car park of the local E.Leclerc Supermarket car park. Only at Hellfest could you drop in for a baguette and walk out of the front door of a store straight into a mini festival where the beer is flowing.
We have been attending Hellfest since 2014, having forsaken British festivals, and the likes of Download et al can certainly the learn a lot from Ben Barbaud and his team.
From the free camping and travel on French trains to the general tidiness and reasonable food/beverage costs there are so many lessons that could be learned by UK festival organisers. The main difference more of a cultural one in the total lack of the drunken nuance causing idiot that plagues UK festivals. Despite the amount of alcohol available and the 30 plus degree heat, I can honestly say that in ten years I’ve never seen someone being a dick and it is a major plus factor.
The Hellfest team also has continued to expand its Hellwatch team, which is a creative way of combating sexual and gender based violence at the festival with a team of over 50 volunteers that are contactable in various ways and cover the site over the 4 days.
After a peruse of the shops at the Hell City Market and a quick beer, we move down to the main stage area to wait for the first band to kick off the festival.
Normally this would be a young up and coming band, but this year, it’s Asinhell, the death metal side project of Volbeat frontman Michael Poulson. This gives things a big boost and it certainly perks the crowd up as they rip into their 8 song set. Poulson looks very comfortable in passing centre stage to vocalist Marc Grewe who immediately has the crowd in the palm of his hand. By the end of the final track “Fall of the Loyal Warrior” there’s a definite feeling that they have given the bump start that it deserves, but from my point of view, putting them on later on in the day would have been a better move, given the response they got.
If we’d already had the bump start, then the nitrous oxide button was well and truly pushed as Scotland’s very own Bleed From Within hit the stage. From the get-go they show why Slipknot have picked them as the opening act for their 25th anniversary UK & European tour. It’s action and pyro from the opener “Sovereign” with vocalist Scott Kennedy on top form, covering every inch of the stage and giving the early evening crowd quite a show.
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The band have been going for nearly 20 years and they are on top form, going through their set at break neck pace. Hopefully the European Slipknot crowd at the back end of the year will take to them as well as the Hellfest one did here.
We were really looking forward to Ice Nine Kills but they came and went, sounding ok, but their stage show looks like what happens if you ordered an Alice Cooper show on Temu.
The crowd swelled massively before Kerry King and his new band hit the stage. Reviews of initial shows were very favourable, and from watching this performance, it’s easy to see why. The band are very tight from the start and King looks as if he’s never been away from the stage since Slayer played their last riff in 2019.
The new songs stand up very well against the Slayer catalogue and vocalist Mark Osegueda sounds even Tom Araya like, especially during the 3 Slayer songs played, Slayer will be reforming for some shows in 2024, but on this showing, King needs to concentrate on his solo band rather than a couple of shows with Slayer, especially with them effectively becoming their own tribute band as a result. If you get a chance to see King’s band live, do it.
Baby Metal are the marmite of the day, loved by some, hated by others, but they win over the Hellfest crowd pretty easily. I’m not a fan of their music but the show that they put on certainly made the watch worthwhile.
I’ve seen Megadeth over a dozen times since 1986 and all bar one of those times has involved some form of technical glitch, this time is no different as Dave Mustaine’s vocals are virtually inaudible during the opener “The Sick, The Dying… and the Dead!” The sound tech recovers his touch during “Rattlehead” and from then on we get a cracking set, with the highlights being a rip roaring version of “The Mechanix” and “Holy Wars… The Punishment Due”.
The big surprise of the day is Marseille’s very own Landmvrks. I didn’t know what to expect, but boy did we get a treat. Metalcore doesn’t really do it justice, so throw in a bit of rap, Linkin Park, Parkway Drive and a big chunk of showmanship and the result is Landmvrks.
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They get a fair crack of the whip at thirteen songs and the crowd are in top form throughout the set. Yes, it helps being French, but that had nothing to do with how well they went down. They’re certainly someone I will be checking out live when they make it to the UK. For those who haven’t checked them out, their latest album ‘Lost in the Waves’ is exceptional.
Next up are headliners Avenged Sevenfold, who start their set somewhat bizarrely with vocalist M Shadows sitting in a chair with a balaclava and sunglasses on. Luckily things pick up from there as they rip through their set of new material and old classics assisted with some pretty impressive real time AI graphics that dazzle the crowd and provide a great storyboard for the set.
They have undergone a significant image change of late, looking somewhere in between In Flames and Fall Out Boy but that hasn’t affected the quality of the music churned out by the band. They play five songs from their latest album Life is But a Dream… and despite the change in style, Shadows distinctive vocal style comes out in the mix.
For the first headliners of the weekend they gave a solid performance that set the stage for the rest of the festival.
Given that the unenviable task of following a headliner is normally the proverbial short straw, Hellfest regulars, Dropkick Murphys take it all in their stride. With their stage show a fine tuned machine, it’s easy for them to control the crowd and get them jumping about, even when their pumping out their anthem ‘I’m Shipping Up to Boston’ at two in the morning.
This was a great start to the festival and only a taste of things to come.
- Highlight of the day – Landmvrks
- Disappointment of the day – Megadeth’s mix
- T shirts bought – 3
Photos by Gavin Lowrey
