Hail to all MetalHeadz !!! Here come the Wacken Open Air 2001 review.

The Beginning

It all begun August 2nd, 6PM, as our plane landed on Hamburg, 50 km away from the festival. It took us almost 5 hours to reach the entrance of the festival, between the highway that were saturated and the camping entrance that was quite slow, we thought we wouldn't make it, but finally, around 23:00, while getting ourselves tickets, Blackie's voice overwhelm the entire place. The 4 Metal Reviews warriors then hurried up to enjoy this special show on August 2nd called : A Night To Remember.

The Warriors

4 members of MetalReviews were in Wacken this year to cover this exceptional metal event :

Danny aka Metal Messiah
Chris aka True Metal Defender
Paul aka Sentinel Of Steel
Alex aka The Metal Apprentice

August 2nd - A Night To Remember

W.A.S.P was magnificent, Blackie singing hits after hits while the crowd was heating up the atmosphere. From Chainsaw Charlie to I Wanna Be Somebody, the show was a real pleasure for our eyes and our ears. An excellent sound and a great lightshow accompanied this live performance. It's the first time I see WASP in live, and I'm glad we didn't miss it.

Crematory who were suppose to play their last concert ever didn't made it to WOA in time, so they made their concert the Saturday afternoon instead.

August 3rd - The First Day

After a rough night (rained like hell), we woke up to see the first shows around 10.30 AM. As for the weather during the weekend, it was often cloudy but it didn't rain that much, almost not at all actually, except for that first night which was really cool as we all know how annoying it is to watch a concert under the rain. Back to the morning, the bands playing were: Nostradameus, Stigma IV, Carnal Forge, Soilwork...

The festival bears 4 stage, like almost every year now, the Wet Stage that is outside the entrance and under a tent, the Party Stage and the 2 Mega Stages. To put all the bands in the timeline, some bands are playing in the same time than other bands in different stages, except the double Mega Stages where there is never 2 shows that plays together (being right next to the other one would have make it impossible without hearing both concerts in the same time which I'm sure would not be terrific. Anyway, we had a look around, had lunch at one of the many many food stands. There you could find pretty much anything : pizzas, French fries, crepes, kebabs, sausage, Chinese, fish,... everything but the incredible if not even mighty spare ribs that I enjoyed so much in WOA99... :( ... those were gone, too bad. Anyway ;), we ate, had beers and/or other drinks and watch the bands perform all day. Like always, the less the sun was going down, the more interesting the things got. In the afternoon we enjoyed Holy Moses, Kamelot, Primal Fear, Paul Di Anno and more bands... unfortunately, Wizard had to cancel their live show... well, we missed you guys ! Hope to see you rock the Wacken festival next year for the continuation of the Iron War (or maybe in tour if you pass by Switzerland) !

Then serious things really started as the sun went down... Sonata Arctica on the Party Stage was magnificent (while Overkill was performing on the Mega Stage I), then Therion with their choirs for which almost everyone gathered to attend the show and it was almost impossible to move near the double mega stage while they were performing. Then it was the time for Helloween to make their demonstration and bring their Dark Ride ! But right after the real show was about to begin : SAXON ! What a show my friends, one of the best live in my life and the best show of this year Wacken Open Air as far as I'm concerned ! Biff was not only rocking the place but he was funny as hell and did perform a song from his forthcoming album amongst the many hits he did throughout the show (who was recorded for a DVD).

While getting tired and heading up to base camp, we could hear Dimmu Borgir waking up the dead on the Mega Stage I while after a long and rough day of running all over the place, we finally went to sleep to prepare ourselves for the next day.

August 4th - The Second Day

After a much better night of sleep, it's with smile in our faces that we woke up, reminiscing what great event we attended the day before. Around 11:00, while Chris had to finally get up (lazy bastard :) !) mostly because of Cryptopsy. Even in the camping he could hear the noise emanating from their performance on show... not that he has anything against it, it's just that he doesn't like such aggressive music much, especially when he didn't get much sleep during the night. A very interesting morning with great bands playing, like Dark Tranquility, Brainstorm, Vintersorg... Unfortunately in the afternoon we all had to make our choices on lives to attend as they were many playing at the same time, whilst Paul would go see the Brazilians Death Metallers Krisiun, Chris went to see Metalium, maybe only to regret not going out to see Chinchilla perform in the Wet Stage. Unfortunately the Wet Stage being outside the festival entrance, one must go out to get in right after, and the queue can sometimes last 5 to 10 minutes so you have to be motivated to go out :). Having seen Metalium a couple of times already and while noticing that this show was far from being there best so far, Chris went to the Metal Market to spend all his money (that's too unfair, how can anyone get out of there without 10 CDs, posters or T-shirt in their hands :) ? ).

The newcomers from Massacre Soul Doctor performed on the party stage while Culprit were performing on the Mega Stage party. After that it was the turn to Annihilator to make their show while Chris went to get some sleep and to rest his back since it hurted like hell (but that was already the case before the festival already). During that time Paragon, Tad Morose and then Rage performed. Chris went back just in time to enter the Wet Stage and see Lost Horizon perform a hell of a show ! Then Subway To Sally performed on the Mega Stage and like always they had the huge success they always have in front of the crowd. Arch Enemy couldn't perform and were canceled and that's too bad because that band really rocks !

Things got serious in the beginning of the evening just like the day before, at 19:00, Grave Digger lighted up the crowd of the festival by delivering a hell of a show that was recorded for a future live CD. Chris (MetalReviews, not Boltendahl :) ) literally lost his voice while shouting and headbanging all over the place (to finish his back once and for all !). After that it was time for Jag Panzer, playing on the Party Stage but we had to split again as Chris wouldn't miss In Flames for the world. At 21:30, Tarja did the effect she usually does, she made everyone fall in love with her while performing the magnificent songs of the Nightwish discography. It's impressive for such a band to play at the Mega Stage and at that time only after 3 albums, while other very well known bands struggle not to finish at 11:00 in the morning on the Party Stage. But Nightwish is one of the greatest newcomer bands and we were not really surprised by the response of the public. After that, for the sole pleasure of Chris who was running all over the place like a dog finding his bone, Hammerfall did their usual show as the True Metal Warriors. And although Chris thought Joacim should not try to improvise new vocals too much he and the rest of the pals enjoyed the Hammerfall show a lot. The day was almost over, as soon as Hammerfall finished the public in front of the stage almost instantly doubled and it was a real struggle to start moving around while Motorhead performed their show. Right after them, Sodom concluded the night and the festival !

It was our second time here (Danny & Chris) at Wacken, and although we did prefer the 10th years anniversary we had a hell of a good time and are looking forward to attend the next editions of the biggest Heavy Metal festival in the world. If you haven't seen Wacken once in your life then you oughta to ! This is truely the Temple of Metal.

The Great Moments (reviewed by Chris)

WASP - The first BIG show

Well, Blackie and WASP are amongst my favorite Heavy Metal bands, no doubt about that. And this show was my very first show from them and I'm very glad we didn't miss it (we almost did, actually we missed the first 10 minutes and heard it from the tickets zone). Blackie did a hell of a show, he did entertain the public, performed a hell of a setlist being sure not to forget the best hits behind, and for my sole pleasure and the pleasure of the whole crowd singing loud : "I wanna be somebody, be somebody soon !"... I think I exploded my lunges on that song, I had merely no voice at the end of the show and this WASP show was simply the best ever possible way to start a festival. I'm fucking glad I was there to see Blackie makes his show and spit his false blood. As some of you probably know it Chris the guitar player left the band and was replaced, and I can tell you that the crowd didn't really welcomed the new one. I thought the show was great and that the songs were really like on the albums so I didn't complain about it really, but I hope the next WASP albums will still be good ones as I love this band. It's no secret that both Blackie and Chris were the one behind the songwriting and now that 50% of WASP left away with Chris I hope that good tunes and spirit will still be there. I have no doubts in Blackie ability to write killer songs, so I don't worry that much to tell your the truth ! Blackie forever !!!!!

Click on the pictures to see bigger versions

SAXON - The best show

I believe that Saxon was the best show of this whole festival, not only Biff was raging and heating the crowd like I had never seen before but he was funny as hell. We had the pleasure to see the lightmade eagle from their old show back in the glory days of Saxon. Although I'm a new fan per say, I mean compared to my brother who knows and loves them since their first albums, I've taken interest in Saxon with the last two CDs and I look forward into listening to the entire discography once again as I can tell you, and I'm sure I don't have to convince you (it would be very presumptuous from my part if I tried) that Saxon rocks and is one of the greatest Metal band ! So, we had the eagle flashing all over the place while Saxon performed hit after hit, interspersed with jokes like : "let's get this 3 times, one for me, one for you, and one for the fucking eagle !" ;)... hehe, thanks Biff for the laughing therapy and I already look forward into watching the DVD that was made during that show to bring back this fabulous souvenir from time to time. Two words to conclude : Saxon rules !

 

HELLOWEEN - Classic

Well well well, Helloween is Helloween and when they sing Future World or Eagle Fly Free then they get the entire crowd eating in their hands, but it's a chance that the band is a huge one otherwise the show would be a lot less entertaining. No offense but our friend Andi Deris is a hell of a singer but a poor entertainer ! He barely said 3 additional words out of the song he performed. So I won't try to compare him to Biff from Saxon which is the exact opposite and not only he feels the pulse of the public but awakes them and keeps them sharp. Anyway, the news songs from The Dark Ride are excellent in Live and the show was really great, we had great setlist and even I Want Out.... but let's make one thing clear, this one was Hammerfall's version of I (cover)... I mean, of course the song is an Helloween song, written by Kai Hansen, but Andi Deris and Helloween performed it exactly as figured in he HF cover :)... funny. The original song having a much less faster tempo. A very good show !

 

LOST HORIZON - Impressive to say the least !!!

This is absolutely no secret that I love this band. I was completely crushed by their debut album Awakening The World. Well, that's what they do, they awake the world and let me tell you one thing, they do it with style, high musicianship and cool attitude on stage. I would like to award their singer a "fictional award" : The best singer of WOA 2001 ! !!! OH .... MY .... GOD !! I thought I was listening to the CD, the high pitched screams were perfect, in such a way that I had never seen in a live show ever before and the entire band were moving and entertaining on stage, too bad they got the poor little Wet Stage, cause these guys really deserve to be on the Mega Stage (I know it's too soon...), or at least the Party Stage and I hope that next year they come back on one of these stages. A big bravo to this brilliant band that never stop to amaze me and which I personally think are without any doubt or hesitation the biggest newcomer band of the year, and I predict that these guys will make a lot of noise and they will warm up our Metal hearts for years to come. Long live Lost Horizon !!!

 

SONATA ARCTICA - Blasting melodies from the North

What can I say people... Sonata Arctica, the biggest newcomer of last year have already stroke a deadly arrow right into my heart with their new masterpiece album Silence. It was a real pleasure to see them on stage again. I had the pleasure to meet them during last year tour with Rhapsody and Stratovarius and this time I was very happy to see them perform more than 25 minutes like during that particular tour. Already then I noticed how good they were in live, this time was no different, maybe except some mixing problems but that wasn't the bands fault. What's funny with them is that they absolutely not have Metal looks nor Metal and black clothing and attitude that usually goes with Heavy Metal :). Nope, jeans, T-shirts (the "Brytney on guitar player T-shirt might be pushing it a little ... lol), funny hair and so on... but they rock, one of the best Melodic Speed Metal band ever ! Keep on going Sonata Arctica.

 

IN FLAMES - Shy in the beginning then : BOOM !

Well, the live show began a bit shy on the vocals, I mean the voice wasn't ready probably. But after a few songs it got much better and the more it went the best the songs became. A bit like the new Live album, that is almost catastrophic during the 3 first songs then becomes better and better until the end where it reaches some kind of climax and makes you want more of it. Although a very funny outfit for the singer in business man with a white shirt and a tie (for the upper part of the body), reminding me a lot Brad Pitt in Fight Club. Excellent setlist for this band that slowly but surely takes my winner position in the Melodic Death Metal division although I think they need to deliver ore power during Live shows. But Clayman being for me the best release ever in that style, I can't live a week without having to listen to it at least once, and this is the most addicting metal release ever. Looking forward to listen to their next album and to see them on stage ! In Flames rules !

 

NIGHTWISH - Beautiful as always

Well, If it weren't for Tarja ;). Hehe... when I first listened to their first album I knew they add something different, I knew they were something else and I knew they had a great future in front of them. Well, it would seems that I was on the right track. Tarja is an incredible singer, and I'm not saying that because she's the cutest girl on Earth, no, no really, she has everything for herself, an incredible voice, an extraordinary presence, incredible eyes... etc etc... shit I think I also fell in love with her.... dammit ! :). Anyway, the show was great, so was the setlist. Nightwish performed 2 songs from their new EP Over The Hill and Far Away. I think she could have mentioned that this song was a Gary Moore song cover before singing it, I believe new True Metal fans that were brought by the True Metal wave don't know about Gary Moore and although I love the cover song I also love (and prefer) the original, and let's face it that song is what it is because of Gary. Anyway, thought I'd let you know ;). So, vocally Tarja is amazing, although she might not always be as precise and correct as in the album and she sometimes commits some small mistakes, but the overall is pretty good and the band rocks on stage. A band that have quickly climbed the stairs to success in the Metal scene and that truely deserves it. I also take the time to salute the one behind the curtain Tuomas Holopainen who writes everything in Nightwish and who stays in Tarja's shadow most of the time. You write incredible music and you've found the perfect voice to put on it, continue to write kick ass songs ! As for Tarja, well, I would leave her my number but I don't think she would call me ... hehe.

 

HAMMERFALL - The Templars Of Steel

Right after the beautiful Tarja was the Hammerfall show. Well, Hammerfall is one of my favorite bands and I didn't saw them live since the 99 Wacken show, so I was really happy to see them once again this year to perform songs from their great new album Renegade. The setlist was near perfection, with hits like Heading The Call, Steel Meet Steel, Let The Hammer Fall, Stronger Than All, Destined For Glory, Renegade, Templars of Steel, Raise The Hammer (instr.), etc, etc...the show was great once more and the templars once again rocked the Wacken Open Air show. Only regret would be that Joacim Cans should not change the way he sings compared to the album and try to experiment too much, although on some very rare occasion his experimentation turns to be interesting it's almost not the case most of the time and sounds weird. No big problems of course, but I think fans prefer hearing the songs like they are on the album. Beside that little detail the show was really enjoyable and the only thing that might be even better for next time would be a better ligthshow. In Hammerfall I trust !

 

GRAVE DIGGER - Nowhere near the grave

I literally fell in love with that band with the Knights Of The Cross album. Since then I can't escape this band, they really are one of the most epic Metal band ever. Chris vocals is what kept me away from them for a long time, but after I while I could finally stomach them and like for Children Of Bodom, not only can I stand these vocals but I actually like them. The setlist was almost perfect, Nights Of The Cross, Excalibur, Morgan Lefay, Heavy Metal Breakdown, The Round Table, Lionheart, Baphomet ... almost exclusively concentrating on the last 2 fantastic albums, the show was a killer, which was recorded for a forthcoming live CD and was one of my favorite moments of the festival. I'm looking forward to listen to the next album : The Grave Digger. A band that is nowhere near the grave if you ask me, but that awakens the dead with their epic tunes ! Keep on rockin'

 

PRIMAL FEAR - Excellent as always !

Well, it must have been the 4th time I saw our friends from Primal Fear, no surprise, they always deliver kick ass shows. Ralf is one of the best singer I know and he really rocks on stage, I just miss his hair :). His new "Halford" look being a bit common and he lost a bit of his presence with his hair missing, but that's just personal taste. Anyway, the band are hot on stage and Ralf, Sinner and the guys delivered a wonderful setlist with many killer tracks from their atomic bomb 3rd album : Nuclear Fire ! Angel In Black, Nuclear Fire, Eye Of An Eagle but not to forget their past hits like Church Of Blood or Silver And Gold to name only a few. A few month after having them on stage here in Switzerland at the Z-7, with Children Of Bodom (my god what a show from these 2 killer bands), it was again a real pleasure to see and listen to their tunes !

 

--== MORE PICTURES ==--

 

Sonata Arctica	NightWish
Primal Fear	Paul DiAnno

 

Organization (Parking, Camping, Tickets, Toilets,...)

Well, like all festivals, things get better with time. Still there are some things that I think need to be thought a bit more. For example, when you arrive at Wacken, if you arrive the Thursday for example, you must be very patient as it took as 3 or 4 times the times to enter and park the car somewhere that it would have taken us walking from the town to the festival. I believe we took more than an hour and a half from the town to find a place (and a temporary one as the camping we were directed to was full !). We indeed almost missed WASP. I believe the bottleneck for the cars to enter is where the organizers should look into, maybe more people, more ways to actually get that part faster. Once you're in there's not much to think about that, although it's not always easy for cars to move inside as people walk everywhere and you can hardly move with a car. Maybe separating walking and car zones should also something interesting.

As for the toilets, they where a good number of chemical toilets all over the festival and even in town, which is good. Of course for so many people it's maybe still not enough, but well this is probably the harder part for a festival, toilets. There were paying toilets which I guess were cleaned often and although I did not try those they had to nicer as the queue to enter them was huge to say the least.

Camping was funny, but don't expect to find more sleep, although it's not you probably go there for, people are partying all night and you might find yourself having trouble to get some sleep if you're not used to that, otherwise the ambiance in the camping is great, lots of people laughing and drinking and celebrating the metal spirit ! A nice experience, although with my back into pieces before arriving at the camping zone I might have preferred or enjoyed an hotel this year :). Anyway, we had a great time at the MetalReviews base camp

Below pictures of the mighty MetalReviews tent and of the camping area :

Shopping : A golden mine for both shops and fans !

If there is a good place to shop then this place is Wacken, I always buy so many stuff when I come here than when I come back home I have to put myself into a diet to compensate the money I've spend ;). But really, there are so many shops, so many things you can buy : albums, posters, T-shirts, rings, collar and other artifacts, clothes, ... This year there was also a Supermarket, and this is more than welcome and I hope it will also be the case in the next editions as you can buy water, food and stuff for your camping and for the festival, even a Redbull like WOA official drink.

So beside the great time delivered by the shows all over the weekend, you can also find many albums you've been looking for in the MetalMarket. Separated from the other shops, and under a tent, you can access this jewel of rarities and new releases for the price of 4DM. Fortunately you only have to pay that "get inside fee" once since they give you a bracelet. Inside you can find some really rare CDs and I remember than I bought more than 10 albums in Wacken in which there was many many release I couldn't find neither in Switzerland or on the net. So if you have a list of rare pieces you want, take that list with you to the MetalMarket cause there's a good chance you can find some if not all of them there.

Food : The mighty spare ribs are gone...

I guess you all think I'm just crazy with the title I choosed for that section, well, you might be right. Hehe, in 99, for the 10th years anniversary, there was less food points than this year, so therefore less variety of things to eat, but that wasn't really a problem for me as I only ate Spareribs with barbecue sauce at the time, these spare ribs were so delicious that I almost was sad when I realized I couldn't find them this year. Anyway, the food points were numerous and you could pretty much eat anything you wanted, from steaks to sausages, French fries, fish (favorite food of our Metal Apprentice), Pizzas, Kebabs, Crepes, Greek, Chinese, ... etc etc. Well, there was enough to eat, that's for sure :), and not very expensive neither which was more than welcomed. As for drinking, well, the usual drill, a lot of points to drink too with the now famous Wacken glass that you pay 2DM and that you can keep as a souvenir (or get your 2DM back by giving it back, your choice).

Below are some pictures showing the entrance, the Metal Market, and different shopping/food areas :

 

Public : General attitude

Well, it's maybe strange to me to talk about that, because I don't like crowd, but actually I avoid it as much as possible as I don't feel comfortable with lots of people around me, so you'll tell me what the hell am I doing listening to Metal and going to festivals ? I dunno, probably that my love for Metal is far more greater than my problem with crowd :). Hehe.

I must say that I believe that the public was a bit more aggressive than my souvenirs of 99, I remember clearly being in front line of the show when Axel Rudi Pell and Pretty Maids played on the True Metal Stage in 1999, but I also remembered clearly that nobody was pushing me, which let's face it was an entire whole story this year. I believe too many people did their public bath, begin pushed in the air by hands and all and floating over the public. This is funny sometimes, but when it comes to have 30 people doing it all in the same time plus when you accidentally end up with a feet in your face while you're peacefully watching your shows might become annoying and even more from time to time. I know I'm going to make myself enemies in the public, but my advice to the organizers is to not only get this people of the pit zone when they reach it, but also to get them out of the festival area so they have to walk 10 minutes at least to come back, this way I believe a lot less of these movements will arise and everybody will be able to enjoy their concerts in a more peaceful way. Of course there's no problem whatsoever about willing to have fun, that's the exaggeration of some people that systematically went for 25 of those public bath inside the same show that I really think need to avoided.

The general ambiance is really cool, and I liked the fact that people are very nice to each other, there are no riots and no fights whatsoever, at least I did not see any of them and even if there was, considering the lot of people, I think that the general attitude was really a great one. Nothing to compare if you take a soccer game for example. Of course no one is playing to win here, which makes a good difference I'll admit.

In the end, the more people there is, the more "incidents" or "troublemakers" you'll find, but these are way beyond the tolerable here and only on a few occasion did I get pissed by some people attitudes.

Backstage / Photo Access

We were fortunate to be granted backstage and photo pass, and we'd like to say thank you to CMM Online and the Wacken Open Air Crew once more for that opportunity.

The only thing I'd like to say was that for entering the photo pit, there was a lot of pushing and it was pretty common to get pushed hard to a limit where it gets dangerous for the photo equipment. I didn't understand such attitude from the photographs and I must admit some of them really pissed me off. I believe a system with numbers distributed (like in post office for example...) would take care of such childish and deplorable attitude from among some of the photographs. We personally want to say again a big thank you for the access to the pit as it gave us the opportunity to bring you back picture of this super event !

Conclusion :

I'd like to say that it was really a great pleasure to be part of WOA this year once again, and that we all look forward at MetalReviews for the next edition. Next year we'll try to make an even bigger coverage of the show with interviews and more. In the end I'd say that despite some minor organization issues, the festival continues to grow and grow beyond limit and that it's without any doubt the place to be for all die-hard fan of Metal !

That concludes our 2001 WOA review, let us know if you liked it and don't hesitate to ask us more details if you need some or if you have any specific questions. It's our first ever Live review so don't be harsh on us too much ;). If time permits it we would like to make a Live Review section in Metal Reviews to review every live show we attend. Let us know if you'd like that and we will do our best to keep you informed about Metal, like always !

Chris & the Metal Reviews Team !
See you all next year in Wacken !!!!