Wacken 2004
After improving many circumstances to reach an ideal organization of the world’s biggest Open Air Festival (if you measure this by the number of visitors) we were curious if the festival was still able to top itself, and it was! So nothing new from Wacken? Wrong! Besides holding the high organization standards the WOA celebrated its 15th anniversary. Everybody who had attended on its 10th anniversary knew what that meant. A maximum of crazy people, a fantastic outdoor-party and of course Heavy Metal. Right in the middle: The Metal-Festivals.com-team! At WOA 2004 played 64 bands in 65 appearances on five stages in three days for about 48000 visitors.
Thursday
True Metal Stage
Zodiac Mindwarp Does anybody know Zodiac Mindwarp And The Love Reaction? Not really? I just remember good rocking albums about 15 (Does this number sound familiar to you?) years ago. So the Americans opened the biggest festival stage with their Heavy Rock and earned with the Thin Lizzy-cover “The Rocker” and “Feed My Frankenstein” (This is not a cover! Zodiac wrote it together with Alice Cooper and they both released it on their albums!) some applause although this show didn’t really become spectacular.
Motörhead The Rock’n’Roll institution saluted the huge crowd with the suitable “We Are Motörhead” and with “No Class”. The spectatorship including numerous of Böhse Onkelz-fans got excited and celebrated every of Motörhead’s many hits. It didn’t matter if those dated from older (“Shoot You In The Back”, “Doctor Rock”, “Metropolis”) or newer ages (“Sacrifice”, “God Save The Queen”, “Life’s A Bitch”). Just “Bomber didn’t find a consideration in their setlist. After the final “Killed By Death/Iron Fist” Lemmy Kilmister, Phil Campbell and Mickey Dee returned on stage left the jubilating crowd with the two encore-classics “Ace Of Spades” and “Overkill”.
Böhse Onkelz The next appearance had been the most discussed one ever in Wacken. Although Frankfurt’s finest had headlined Wacken Open Air 1996 many people doubted the idea to let the controversial rock-band headline Wacken’s Thursday. Anyway they fitted into the Thursday-concept “A Night To Remember” like no other band could. Beginning their last tour before splitting the group bassist and songwriter Stephan Weidner saluted the fans with the anouncement to play one of the longest gigs in the band’s history. As the co-headliner the Böhse Onkelz started with a suitable welcome song (“Hier Sind Die Onkelz”) and from now on the whole festival area celebrated songs from the new “Adios”-output (“Onkelz vs. Jesus”, “Superstar”) and of course the big number of classics (“Finde Die Wahrheit”, “Terpentin”, “Nichts Ist Für Die Ewigkeit”, “Gehasst, Verdammt, Vergöttert”, “Heilige Lieder”, “Auf Gute Freunde”) which were even sang by people who had criticized this band a short time before (Hello Doombek, you seem to know all their lyrics!). Kevin, Stephan, Gonzo and Pe couldn’t have wished a better atmosphere. And Weidner’s anouncement should become true, and even more: With 31 songs in nearly three hours this showcase turned out to the biggest as longest ever have held in Wacken and the longest festival appearance I have seen yet. So they left a satisfied crowd with the evergreen-encores “Mexico” and “Erinnerungen”. In my opinion this show was as the Motörhead-show a nice party. No more, no less! By the way: Around the gig there was no special violence noticed as some people had apprehended before.
Friday
True Metal Stage
Paragon The first Friday-big-stage-band offered True Metal from Germany and so nothing to me. After a bombastic intro which sounded like the “Lord Of The Rings”-soundtrack the band began with the “The Legacy”. By songs like “Thunderstorm” or “Steelbound” they sounded like Grave Digger and worse. Some friend of mine enjoyed it while I didn’t (except the intro!).
Weinhold The solo-project of former Zed Yago-singer Jutta Weinhold introduced the new release “From Heaven Through The World To Hell” in a very pathetic way. Especially the reciting of self-written poems between the songs became pretty ridiculous. Much more acceptance found the finishing Zed Yago-cover “Black Bone Song” in which Jutta “Goethe” Weinhold got support by Holy Moses-voice Sabina Classen.
Brainstorm The five Suebes probably played one of their best gigs. Supported by an astonishing spectatorship in the hot (!) afternoon the gig turned to a whole celebration of Power Metal-hymns like “Doorway To Survive”, “Hollow Hideaway” and “Highs Without Lows”. The sympathic as fantastic singer Andy B. Franck ran the stage as the photo pit up and down and animated the willing crowd. With the cover “Amarillo” they finished a hammer-appearance. Thumbs up except for the burning sun (My poor forehead!).
Grave Digger As their “little brothers” from Paragon Chris Boltendahl’s band didn’t really inspire me. Serving a best of-setlist (“The Grave Digger”, “Scotland United / Rebellion”, “Knights Of The Cross”, Excalibur”, “In The Dark Of The Sun”) and supported by a cool pyro-show they reached much more fans than on the WFF a month before. Those celebrated the gig of their faves until the final “Valhalla” and “Heavy Metal Breakdown”.
Dio The time had come for the metal-voice to entertain the huge crowd awaiting the little man with the big melodies. And he inspired them by a fantastic 90 minutes lasting best of-program in front of a “Holy Diver”-backdrop. Ronnie and his band began his set with “King Of Rock’n’Roll” to present a wonderful choice of classics he had done in his career. Besides playing one song from the forthcoming album “Master Of The Moon” (“The Eyes”) they did a trip through Ronnie’s Rainbow- (“Stargazer”, “Long Live Rock’n’Roll”, “Gates Of Babylon”) as through his Black Sabbath- (“Sign Of The Southern Cross”, “Heaven And Hell”) era without forgetting the numerous Dio-solo-milestones like “Rock’n’Roll Children”, “Stand Up And Fight”, “Don’t Talk To Strangers” and the encore “We Rock”. No question: The “dwarf” was big! Bigger than Joey DeMaio’s (Manowar) guest appearance (non-musically) praising Dio in his words: “Rock, drink and fuck in the name of Dio!” Huhu, “Joke-Joey”! You’ ll better perform here next year!
Doro, Warlock & Orchestra The first part of the show contained Doro performing classic versions of “I Rule The Ruins”, “Always Live To Let You Win” or the final (of this first part of the set) “All We Are” supported by an orchestra. While some Iron Maiden-covers like the opener “Fear Of The Dark”, “Run To The Hills” and “Man On The Edge” she got support from former Maiden-vocalist Blaze Bayley as while “Für Immer” she was supported by Savatage-guitarist Chris Caffery. Her Judas Priest-interpretation of “Breaking The Law” became as conflicting as the whole orchestral part did.
After a long break Doro entered the stage again in the 1986-line-up of Warlock consisting of drummer Michael Eurich, bassist Frank Rittel, the guitarists Peter Szigeti and Niko Arvatis and of course Doro herself. The performance included all the eighties classics of Doro’s breakthrough band from Düsseldorf (“Out Of Control”, “True As Steel”, “Midnite In China”, “Hellbound”, “Burning The Witches”, “Fight For Rock”) to make the second part of this showcase much more valuable than the first one. But the hymn “All We Are” should have belonged to the Warlock-part.
Black Stage
Orphanage The Dutchs represented Gothic Metal of its better kind. After I had seen them on the Dynamo for several times it had been pretty quiet around them. They had replaced all musicians and so they were back. Lead by the sympathic grunter George and by the characteristic female voice Rosan they succeeded with “Driven” and of course the classic “At The Mountains Of Madness”.
Cathedral The British band around the charismatic frontman Lee Dorian offered Doom Metal of its best. Despite the weak sound they convinced for another time by “Congregation Of Sorcerers”, “Carnival Bizarre”, “Ride” and the definite Cathedral-hit “Hopkins (The Witchfinder General)”. Besides those songs the Doomsters presented the “Probot”-title “Ice Cold Man”.
Arch Enemy Again I need to praise the band’s live power with which they excited the crowd by their hits like “Ravenous”, “Silent Wars” or “We Will Rise”. But again I need to point out shouter Angela Gossow didn’t only stuck on my nerves with her stupid comments between the tracks. Ignoring that the show was great musically while I still had enjoyed the former male singer much more.
Mayhem Norway’s cult-Black-Metal-band and the hot afternoon sun didn’t really fit together. Beginning with “Deathcrush” and “Carnage” the Blackies didn’t of course ignore the show-effect. Like at WOA 1999 the stage was prepared by some pierced pig heads which became the object of fronter Maniac’s strange ideas. He burned it or played with it by his huge knife while his tool decided to cut in Maniac’s hand. And not too less as it was obvious by his flowing blood. Shit happens! While I was waiting for the men with the white coats “Maniac Flew Over The Cockoo’s Nest” to “Ancient Skin” and “View From Nihil”. Greetings to the totally unprofessional guitarist! You don’t know who you are (Huhu!)!
Feinstein / The Rods For the first time after ten years the Hardrock-legend The Rods appeared in Germany. And the band around the original members singer/guitarist David Feinstein and bassist Garry Bordonaro started with the classics “Hurricane”, “Crank It Up” and “Power Lover” just to leave the stage suddenly after it. David Feinstein returned with his nowadays solo-band lead by the phenomenal voice of John West to present their new release “Third Wish”. In the end of this showcase Manowar-bassist Joey DeMaio whose ex-drummer Rhino belonged to the “The Rods”-line-up played the intro of “Sting Of The Bumblebee” and performed with the band.
Destruction As you may have noticed I don’t count to the biggest fans of Destruction and fronter Schmier. Nevertheless the German-Thrash-act brought a greatest hits-choice which shouldn’t have left too many wishes of its fans open. Classics like “Mad Butcher”, “The Butcher Strikes Back”, “Bestial Invasion”, “Nailed To The Cross” and “Metal Discharge” took care of a celebrated Thrash-gig which included guest-appearances of ex-Immortal-guitarist Abbath, Hypocrisy-voice Peter Tägtgren and Holy Moses-voice Sabina Classen for the title “Total Desaster”.
Amon Amarth At 2:00 a.m. a much bigger crowd than expected awaited the vikings which showed their importance they had earned over the last few years. And the crowd didn’t get disappointed. Grunter Johan Hegg and his fellowhip inspired their fans with classics like “Victorious March” or new mashers like “Pursuit Of Kings”. After a convincing hour of Death Metal they left the satisfied fans to sleep or to party on.
Party Stage
Mnemic The Danish breakthrough-band presented their debut album “Mechanical Spin Phenomena” in the hot morning (11:00 a.m.). By this one longplayer they had created more than enough Industrial Metal-smashers (“Liquid”, “Ghost”, “Blood Stained”) which also excited live. Cool gig!
Raunchy The next Danish Industrial-attack was performed by our camp-neighbours (We don’t want to mention any of some funny party-occurrences!). The group who had replaced Lars Vognstrup by new fronter Kaspar Thomsen introduced besides the new bandmate the current output “Confusion Bay”, but were handicapped by several sound problems. So they didn’t reach the same power their fellow-countrymen had done before.
Eläkeläiset The crazy “Finnish National Drink-Team” celebrated another beer-influenced “Humpa”-party. The five madmen sat at a table and brought their funny polka-versions of well-known rock-hits like Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ On A Prayer”, Europe’s “The Final Countdown”, IronMaiden’s “Run To The Hills” and Van Halen’s “Jump”. What a party which inspired me to dance some waltz (Okay, call it a try, huhu!) with a nice partner!
W.E.T. Stage
Misery Index The fourpiece from Maryland which consists of some former Dying Fetus-members burned down the tent by their mashing Death Metal. The fans who filled nearly the whole tent were curious by songs from the “Retaliate”-output like “The Lies That Bind” or “The Great Depression” and saw a good as fast show of their faves.
Jim Beam Stage
Mambo Kurt This year the WOA-organization created the new Jim Beam-stage and added it to the beer garden in front of the festival area. But the best of this idea was letting the hammond organ-god play on this stage. Interpreting classic rock- (“Engel”, “Paradise City”, “Thunderstruck”, “The Final Countdown”) and pop-songs (“I Just Called To Say I Love You”, “My Heart Will Go On”, “Just Can’t Get Enough”) in his crazy way and motivated the crowd to do a long polonaise. A well entertained exciting show. Or how Mambo Kurt himself summarized: “In the beginning of this show no security-man/woman seemed to care about and in its end there stood six of them in front of the stage.” Nothing to add!
Saturday
True Metal Stage
Death Angel The Bay Area-institution around Mark Osegueda and Rob Cavestany had to play in the much too hot noon because Saturday’s billing of Wacken’s biggest stage consisted of high quality. Nevertheless the thrashers proofed of their high live intensity by the opener “Seemingly Endless Time”, “Thrown To The Wolves”, “Thicker Than Blood”, “Voracious Souls” and the final “Kill As One”. At least by this gig they should have earned a later position in the billing for the next time.
Anthrax The gods of Thrash Metal are a huge power whether on records or in live shows. The legend had replaced bass-icon and live-animal Frank Bello by Joey Vera well-known from John Bush’s ex-band Armored Saint, Fates Warning, Tribe After Tribe, etc. Without ignoring their current masterpiece “We’ve Come For You All” by its opener “What Doesn’t Die” or the fantastic hymn “Safe Home” bandfounders Scott Ian, Charlie Benante & Co brought many classics to Wacken (the opener “Inside Out”, “Room For One More”, “Got The Time”, “Anti-Social”, “Caught In A Mosh”, even the debut-track “Deathrider” and the final hits “Only” and “Indians”). All those killers were interpreted by John “The Voice” Bush and thousands of fans who filled the festivalsite. Phenomenal!
Nevermore Seattle’s finest appeared for the third time at WOA and once again they convinced without any doubt. Starting by the two “The Politics Of Ecstasy”-tracks “The Seven Tongues Of God” and “This Sacrament” they opened their setlist containing complicated, but kickin’ Power Metal. Supported by new member (full-time or stand-bye?) Steve Smyth known from Vicious Rumors, Testamen, etc. songs from the new album (the title track, “Never Purify” “I, Voyager”) as older milestones (“Next In Line”, “Beyond Within”, “The River Dragon Has Come”, “The Heart Collector” and the final Simon & Garfunkel-interpretation “Sound Of Silence”) were sung by thousand’s fan voices adding this gig to the big collection of Nevermore’s festival-triumphs.
Helloween The German Melodic Metal-institution wasn’t able to hold this high level the bands before had built. Nevertheless the pumpkins offered a best of-setlist containing all younger (“Hey Lord!”, “If I Could Fly”, “Power”) as older classics (“Starlight”, “Keeper Of The Seven Keys”, “Eagle Fly Free”, “Dr. Stein”) which got celebrated by the spectators. And those should be witnesses of the historic part when the surprise guest, ex-member and nowadays Gamma Ray-mastermind Kai Hansen entered the stage to perform with his ex-band its classics “How Many Tears” and “Future World”. Nice surprise (A little obvious perhaps, but who cares?)!
Saxon You can’t stop the Metal-legend! The British band headlining WOA for the third time celebrated its 25th anniversary by an overwhelming show together with about 30000 fans and many surprise guests on stage. With “Heavy Metal Thunder” voice-phenomenon Biff Byford & Co started into a set containing all those classics they call their own like “Dogs Of War”, “Solid Ball Of Rock”, “Princess Of The Night” and “The Eagle Has Landed” before they got support from diverse special guests: The first one was Thomas Jensen (one of the main Wacken-organizors) who played bass while “Strong Arm Of The Law” followed by ex-drummer Nigel Glockler appearing to “747 (Strangers In The Night)”, Stratovarius-drummer Jörg Michael who had acted on the current “Lionheart”-album (“Crusader”), the eagle hanging on the stage’s roof which came out for “Wheels Of Steel”, Savatage-guitarist Chris Caffery and Destruction-fronter Schmier who both appeared to “Denim And Leather”. By the encores “Forever Free” and “Dallas 1 p.m. they closed a great performance which “We Will Remember”. Heavy Birthday!
J.B.O. The Comedian Metal-fourpiece were the last band of this year’s WOA. They entertained a big audience which still hadn’t enough and spread a good temper into the auditorium. The fans didn’t hesitate to accept the invitation and took part in the party. So the Bavarians became celebrated for their interpretation of well-known rock-classics (“Ein Fest”, “Roots Bloody Roots”, “Verteidiger Des Wahren Blödsinns”) as for their own songs (“Ein Guter Tag Zum Sterben”). I had seen them to often to get really excited, but the crowd got and that counts!
Black Stage
Bal-Sagoth The British Melodic Black Metal-formation didn’t really unfold itself because of a bad sound. So the very keyboard-dominated material from albums like “Power Cosmic”, “Atlantis Ascendent” as from the forthcoming new release didn’t reach more than a small bunch of fans in the late morning (11:00 a.m.).
Unleashed After a long time of abscence the Swedish Death Metal-machine had performed well at the same place two years ago. So the growing spectatorship expected a lot and they shouldn’t feel disappointed. The vikings around the grunting “package” Johnny Hedlund animated to headbang by smashers like “Immortals”, “Death Metal Victory”, the Death-cover “Evil Dead” which they dedicated to Chuck Schuldiner as to Quorthon and “Into Glory Ride”. Cool oldschool!
Cannibal Corpse Even to the Deathers from Florida where you’re normally very used to the sun it must have felt strenuous to play in the afternoon under the hottest temperature conditions. Nevertheless the fivepiece who introduced by Jeremy Turner a new sixstringer played a very tight concert. “Front-windmill” Corpsegrinder and Co didn’t fulfill the numerous shouted wishes to play “Hammer Smashed Face” for some reasons the most know. But they also excited with the title track of the new release “The Wretched Spawn” as with well-known hammers like “They Deserve To Die” or the final “Devoured By Vermin”.
Hypocrisy After a long drunk night with Corpsegrinder mainman Peter Tägtgren didn’t really seem to feel well. But he and his band delivered a strong gig they’re known for. Opening with “Fractured Millenium” the Swedish Death Metal-protagonists presented a set that contained new tracks (“Eraser”, “Turn The Page”) as of course a few classics (“The Final Chapter”, “God Is A Lie”, “Deathrow (No Regrets)”) which earned much fan support. Closing an hour of celebrating Death Metal of its best the band played “Roswell 47″ (Tägtgren anounced it “Wacken 47″!) and “Born Dead Buried Alive”.
Children Of Bodom The band from the land of the thousand lakes had a high position in the billing and the huge number of fans who had partly assembled over an hour ago vindicated it. Frontman Alexi Laiho and his band which presented a new guitarist by Roope Latvala (known from Waltari, Stone,etc.) instead of Alexander started with one of their hits (“Hate Me!”) into a set celebrated by the wild crowd with nearly no compromise. No wonder while performing old Melodic Death Metal-pearls like “Silent Night, Bodom Night” and debut-hit “Deadnight Warrior”, “Follow The Reaper”-tracks “Silent Bodom Night”, “Angels Don’t Kill” or songs from the new “Hatecrew Deathroll”-release like “Sixpounder”, “Needled 24/7″ or its title track which represented the end of a a tearing show.
Satyricon & Nocturno Culto (Darkthrone) This Black Metal-collaboration between the successful band Satyricon with the frontman of the underground-cult Darkthrone was one of the most awaited appearances of this year’s WOA. In its first part the band around Satyr and Frost entered the stage and presented their classics beginning with the debut-song “Walk The Path Of Sorrow” over “The Night Of The Triumphator”, “Forhekset”, Repined Bastard Nation”, “Fuel For Hatred” and “Filthgrinder” to leave the stage after 45 interesting minutes in which they were supported by pyros and a fascinating light show.The band returned with “its new frontman” Nocturno Culto to continue with his blackened classics. “Kathaarian Life Code” excited the masses (about 30000 spectators) as after Nocturno Culto’s dedication of this performance to Bathory’s mainman Quorthon “The Hordes Of Nebulah” and especially “Transilvanian Hunger” did. After “Under A Funeral Moon” the artists left the stage and entered it again with the Stayricon-encore “Mother North” to dismiss the impressed crowd which had seen a memorable show.
Party Stage
After Forever In spite of Cannibal Corpse playing at the same time numerous people wanted to watch Gothic Metal. And the gig of the Dutch sixpack became a triumph. Whether songs from their current album “Invisible Circles” (“Reflections”, “Between Love And Fire”) or older compositions (“Glorifying Means”, “My Pledge Of Allegiance Part I – The Sealed Fate”) were celebrated. The reactions became even bigger when they covered Iron Maidens “The Evil That Men Do”. Another advantage of the band was the top performance lead by the characteristic and sympathic female singer Floor Jansen.
Knorkator I was astonished about the area in front of the Party Stage filled up with fans who preferred to watch the madmen from Berlin instead of the shooting stars Children Of Bodom who were playing on the big stage the same time. What happened was a great appearance with brilliant humor. The crazy band started the party on the Party Stage with the debut song “Kurz Und Klein” and besides newer hits like “Narrenkappe”, “Ick Wer Zun Schwein”, “Ich Lass Mich Klonen”, the Boney M-cover “Ma Baker” or the title track of the new album “Ich Hasse Musik” they set their main focus on the great first longplayer “The Schlechtst Of Knorkator” by “Ich Will Nur Fickn”, “Konflikt”, “Klartext” and the final “Böse”. While that Stumpen, Alf Ator, Buzz Dee and Co entertained by their costumes (singer Stumpen wore a yellow body of the impossible kind), by teaching math lessons, by throwing a keyboard conterfeit into the crowd, etc. Hammer show, in my opinion the surprisingly best one at this year’s WOA!
Schandmaul Despite playing against the unique Black Metal union appearing at the same time nevertheless many visitors had assembled to watch the Folk Rock/Metal-hopefulls. The band from Munich which introduced their new release “Wie Pech Und Schwefel” jumped with the euphoric crowd to “Leb”, “Dein Anblick” and “Walpurgisnacht”. Vocalist Thomas “Der Sichelmond” told the audience how nervous they had been because of playing on a pure Metal-festival. A nice gig of a sympathic band which I watched for the first time was finished by “Kalte Spuren” and “Willst Du?”.
W.E.T. Stage
Disbelief The Psychedelic Death Metal-band presented their new great album “Spreading The Rage” in the full tent with the strange smell (Huhu!). Blessed by the excellent frontman “Jagger” and a tight band they invaded the tent and its personal content by a short time with songs like “Misery” and “It’s God Given”. A strong gig performed by Germany’s definite Death Metal elite who qualified for the bigger WOA-stages the next time! Hats off!
Jim Beam Stage
Onkel Tom & Firefighters Band Usually Sodom’s Onkel Tom Angelripper and his drink-orientated side-project appeared as Wacken’s last band each year (exception 2000), but at WOA 2004 they acted on the new Jim Beam Stage in the morning at 10.00 a.m. (!). A hard excercise to celebrate alcohol-hymns like “Es Gibt Kein Bier Auf Hawai”, “Immer Wenn Ich Traurig Bin”, “Delirium” and „In München Steht Ein Hofbräuhaus“ in a appropriate way to which they partly got support from the Wacken Firefighters Band. Suitable to the message of the songs the beer garden was very close to the stage, so nothing could go wrong. But please next time later!
Conclusion:
The 15th Wacken Open Air anniversary turned out to be a great assembly of many interesting bands, lots of nice fans and ideal organized conditions. The WOA-team retained all improvements of the last year to keep the visitor’s comfort high. And against some fears because of the appearance of the band Böhse Onkels the atmosphere was peaceful. So far we know there happened a violentless great party lasting over the whole festival. And that’s why we always return! Like next year! See you then!
A special thanks to Sheree Hesse, Britta Kock and the WOA-team!!!!!
At the Wacken Open Air 2004 rocked, drank and partied Tobi Wan Kenobi, Melli and Dumbo!!!!!