Download Festival 2006 - Review!!!!!

Check out the Roz McGarry crowd and band shots in the Skiddle gallery!

https://www.skiddle.com/gallery

Friday:

Clueless security guards, beer crates as luggage, half-erected tents, extortionate ice poles for sustenance, and more sun than you can shake a flag pole at - it can only be our annual home from home…Donington fucking Park. Another madass weekend awaits - but can it trump 2005’s return of Black Sabbath and a blinding System of a Down show? The less said about Feeder, the better.

No self-respecting metalhead starts their weekend until after lunch (which is technically breakfast when you only got up half an hour ago), so for many the first real band of the day is Soil - pity, then, that their generic metal falls flat-as-fuck. Everyone knows "Halo" and we’ve all caught them live at some stage or another, but no one truly cares about this...the grassy hill becomes a cheeky sunbed, and we all kick back with our first Ribena Ice of the day. The festival’s off-and-running, flags are hoisted, t-shirts are off, strangers are chatting and lapping up the heat, so the ten-a-penny riffs are of no real consequence. "Wake me up when Strapping Young Lad are on..."

"HELLO! MY NAME IS DEVIN, WELCOME TO A&W BURGER! CAN I TAKE YOUR STINKING ORDER!" shouts legend Devvy Townsend before tearing into another punishing anthem. Like no-one else in the scene, SYL can get laughs from a crowd without ever straying into novelty music - their metal is as brutal as it comes, the moshpits made all the more gruelling by the onset of sunburn. It just so happens that Devin is a funny bastard. That a mid-card Friday band with little-to-no exposure through the mainstream rock outlets (helmed by a crazy singer whose bald spot is flanked by elbow-length hair) are pegged "Band of the day!" "Band of the weekend!" and at the least make Top 5’s says it all. This is pure rock festival fun. As an offshoot of a much better band, the most you can say about Soulfly is that they’re always perfectly enjoyable. Metal with a samba flare, the now-heaving crowd starts jumping to a set we’ve all seen before - aye, they do "Prophecy", "Back To The Primitive" gets an airing, and "Roots Bloody Roots" is as intense as ever. Good shit.

If you don’t bother digging as deep as the music-enhancing graphic novels, the lavish promo videos and an on-going story arc that continues across five albums, then what you’ve got at 17:30 on a sweltering Friday afternoon (shouldn’t there at least be a breeze by now?!), is guys with mad hair blasting out emo-prog. Coheed & Cambrai. And for most of us that don’t have a subscription to the comics, it’s GREAT right up until Claudio opens his mouth - is it a girl? Are his pants on too tight? Does he need medical assistance? Can we have Deftones, please? When we get just that, with a refreshingly sober and on-form Chino, life is sweet once more. Stunning renditions of "My Own Summer", "Hexagram", "Change (In The House Of Flies)", "Be Quiet and Drive", it’s too good - we should really be hidden in the Gibson tent, pretending to like Cathedral for the kudos, but Kerrang’s favourite Californians put on a party. When Moreno mentions bringing out "a friend" for a duet, the Tool fans soon heave a sigh of disappointment - no, it’s not Maynard James Keenan for "The Passenger", it is in fact Max Cavalera doing "Headup". Still, it’s cool, so who’s complaining?

For all the mystery, complex lyrics, rumours of alternate album tracklistings, Maynard’s elusive reputation and the weird 5-year hiatuses, there’s simply one word that describes Tool’s set tonight - infectious. From the second they hit the sunset-framed stage, MJK dressed in jeans, a cowboy hat, and very little else, Tool lace hummable, headbangable riffs with immediate, singalong choruses. No filler, no jamming, no weird shit - just their own dark, bitter, hash-spiked recipe of pop’s finest ingredients, and note-perfect to boot. Their better-known singles "Vicarious", "Aenema", "Schism" are all well and good, but it’s the frantic megaphone-driven "Rosetta Stoned", old school "46 & 2", and shit like "Lateralus" that make a blinder of a set. It was never going to be predictable - no "Hooker With A Penis", no "Ticks & Leeches", a complete lack of the title track from their newest album, it all adds up to a refreshing performance that keeps you guessing at every turn. With only a few digs at shoeless, dread-locked hippies, Maynard makes very little in the way of conversation, but he’s certainly not back-of-the-stage reclusive as his reputation goes - he’s front and centre, dancing, throwing bottles of water into the crowd and seemingly having a rare auld time. The only thing you can fault them for is disappearing after 90 minutes without so much as an encore - when your £10 stage-times necklace promises a 2-hour show, and the music is this awesome, your heart sinks a little.

Saturday:

On officially the hottest day of the year, asking for a shot of suncream while extreme black metallers Satyricon play is perhaps the oddest moment of Download - if not, it ranks up there with the campsite Ghostbusters and the guy in full knight attire. Heavy fucking metal doesn’t get much better than Arch Enemy’s "Ravenous". By this point dirty, smelly, hungover and just a little bit exhausted, the crowd fight through their battle-weariness for a bout of all-in metal-wrestling, in the form of some serious headbanging, moshpits, raised horns and screams. AE have played better, but when the tunes are this filthy (sorry, but it’s still hard to believe that’s the voice of a hot chick!), we’re all having too much fun to notice. "Carnivorous Jesus! I need! Your flesh!"

A mid-card billing below Avenged Sevenfold may seem a strange ‘un for grunge legends Alice In Chains, but on reflection it‘s spot on - crowd demand is huge, but the show is nothing stunning. New singer William Duval does a good job of filling the late Layne Staley’s boots, Jerry Cantrell chokes his guitar with the usual precision, and it’s a bit of a greatest hits set with "Them Bones", "Down In A Hole", and "Rooster" amongst the tunes. Let’s not kid ourselves though - without Layne’s majestic voice, AIC simply ain’t the same.

Oh look. It’s Corey Taylor. A guy from Slipknot, playing Download. Shock horror. Let’s all cheer. Even with a new album due out, Stone Sour is a stinker of a booking for the Donington folks - yes, Corey, us "fuckers" are indeed ready for some "fucking metal". There’s some new tunes which sound pretty good, a sad lack of the "Bother" anthem, and the ever-awesome "Get Inside", but not much else to shout about. Even as a fan of Stone Sour, it’s hard to see what they were thinking on this one. Uninspiring.

Bands come and go, but thank God we still have ‘Tallica. Yes, the ‘90s were hit and miss, yes, you could record an hour of toilet noise making a better album than St. Anger, but dear fucking lord is "Master Of Puppets" a classic record from top to bottom - and after an opening salvo of "Creeping Death", "Fuel" and a decent new song titled simply...umm..."The New Song", the boys play the musical beast in its entirety. The opening half of setlist stalwarts - "Battery", "Master Of Puppets", "The Thing That Should Not Be" and "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" - are enjoyable as ever, heightened exponentially by their natural running order. But it’s the second half of the lesser-played "Disposable Heroes", "Leper Messiah", awesome instrumental "Orion" and fan-favourite "Damage Inc" that really lifts the crowd into nirvana...it’s a Metallica fan’s soaking-wet dream and not a duvet cover in sight.

For 20 years now, this is an album that’s INSPIRED, delighted, amazed and been cited as one of the most important metal albums of all time. To see it performed live - with James and the returning Lars (who famously missed 2004’s appearance) firing on all cylinders, reenergized and laughing it up with some great crowd banter - is truly history-books special. The grandkids are one day going to hear about this, but in the meantime we’ll make sure mates, colleagues, aunties, neighbours, and anyone else within earshot is in the know. We saw "Master Of Puppets" performed in its entirety...live metal simply doesn’t get any better. You’d be forgiven for thinking it was Christmas, with corking renditions of "Sad But True", "Nothing Else Matters", "One", "Enter Sandman", "Die Die My Darling" and "Seek & Destroy" thrown in for good measure...it’s alright lads, we really do forgive you for the 2004 mishap!

Sunday:

(meanwhile....) In the shade of the Snickers tent, the refreshed crowd are ready for a metal masterclass from the technical-whirled hardcore wizards Sikth. Stepping up from recent intimate gigs like their slot at Manchester’s Damnation Festival, Sikth are running into the open arms of "the big time", with thousands crammed in for a glimpse and critics ready to lavish praise on their corking new album "Death Of A Dead Day."

Despite Mikael Akerfeldt’s cheeky mid-set claims, Opeth are not "cock rock". What they are, in fact, is the best progressive death band around. Albums "My Arms, Your Hearse" and "Still Life" gave them scene credibility, and recent Roadrunner debut "The Ghost Reveries" granted them the exposure they deserved...so it’s a busy tent of folks that’s opted for Terrorizer’s favourites over a farcical Korn, albeit far from capacity. And from the moment they step on stage, there is a real sense that we’re about to witness something special...because while Korn may have a rotating roster of big name guest vocalists, Opeth have one of the finest back catalogues in metal to pull on. In a short forty-minute, four-song slot, throwing in a random track like "Leper Affinity" takes huge balls...but Opeth have never been about predictability. In keeping with their genre-juggling reputation, they shift ever-so-sweetly from slit-your-granny aggro to Bach-inspired piano twinkling and gentle guitar strumming. It’s this touch of class that’s brought so many fans to their corner over the years. Vocals with all the grace of Brian Molko, relaxing guitar meanderings that stretch on for 10 minutes, atmospheric keyboards and a half-empty tent of people sitting down...this is just the chill-out we need. When you’ve already moshed your way through Down, Arch Enemy and Alice In Chains, with Metallica still on the table, some spacey indie-rock is the proverbial wet cloth to the forehead. Weary headbangers lie down, zone out and absorb the rich, cooling textures of sound. Bliss.

"So who’s got a Myspace? Are we your Friend?" shouts Hundred Reasons’ Colin Doran. Major cringe. Excuse them their moment, ‘cause Hundred Reasons do bring some mighty fine slabs of rock to the proceedings. There’s the obvious "I’ll Find You", epic ballad "Falter" and crowd-chorus "If I Could", but what’s most interesting is the new, harder material inspired by Doran’s foray into heavy hardcore side-projects. If you want to avoid Dani bloody Filth, then this is as good a place as any.

Shambles. It’s the only word to describe what’s happened here - Funeral For A Friend can’t pull a crowd further than the soundboard, but the Snickers Tent’s Prodigy have a mob baying for a rave. What the fuck did Livenation expect? Spiralling out of control since 1994’s "No Good (Start The Dance), The Prodigy have been the biggest and best guitar-based dance band the nineties generation has known - their crossover appeal is no secret, so when 10,000+ Metallica/Pantera/Maiden fans turn up wanting to hear "Firestarter", you have to wonder how else the organisers envisioned this one. Regardless...it’s the best performance since Friday’s Tool. Working through mostly singles, The Prodigy inspire a dance the likes of which has never been seen on the sacred home of rock n roll...strangers link arms, Guns N Roses t-shirts bob in-and-out of sight amidst the heaving, jumping horde, and people on the outside thrash around blindly to the live band’s heavy chaos. Main man Liam Howlett looks on from behind his sample decks, surveying the scene, knowing that he’s well and truly trumped anything that GNR can pull out of the hat. Simply magic.

The main stage’s lessened crowd still recovering from the FFAF-induced fleeing, there’s suddenly a commotion...doo-da-doo-doo-doo...doo-da-doo-doo-doo...surely not? The first teasing riffs of "Welcome To The Jungle"? A mad rush ensues, and sure enough, Axl fucking Rose explodes onto the stage screaming the banshee-like howl as only he can! Never mind the album delays, the hired hands, the club bust-ups...it’s AXL FUCKING ROSE (!), at Donington, doing THAT song! It’s a good day to be a rock n roll fan! Or, it’s not, as it transpires. Because as good as it is to hear them work through just about every greatest hit you could wish for, amidst a whopping five new tracks, it just can’t excuse Axl’s prima donna antics. Teddy out the cot, dummy out the pram, mic stand launched into the drum platform, Axl bemoans the slippy stage during an amazing rendition of "Sweet Child Of Mine", and with only a brief explanation he’s off. When you’ve been brought in by chopper from the Silverstone Grand Prix, surrounded by minders at all times and no doubt personally sucked-off by the organisers backstage, tensions are bound to be running high. Maybe his cornrows are too tight. Who knows? But a boring (though somewhat appropriate) ten-minute "Don’t Cry" guitar rendition doesn’t excuse Axl’s behaviour. When he does return, it’s to booing - not too much, because like a photographer stalking a rare-spotted bird, we don’t want to scare him off - and gets back to doing what he’s always done best, rocking the fuck out.

There’s no denying Axl his place in the rock history books. His voice is rocker ecstasy, his stage presence is equalled only by Jagger, and he’s penned some of the biggest anthems of all time - it’s just a pity that he’s a ginger gimp. After more mishaps barely worthy of column inches - bass player nobody throws guitar into camerman, storms off, then reappears apologetically and begs not to be the target of piss bottles - Guns N Roses pull it together. The second half of their 2 hour-plus fiasco is worthy of Donington. If you’re going to act rock n roll, you’ve got to have the talent to back it up, and GNR scrape by...guest appearances from original Gunner Izzy Stradlin, duet with Skid Row legend Sebastian Bach and a spine-tingling "November Rain" with pyro just about nets you your money’s worth

You can’t help but feel that a night with the Sick Of It All lads in the Gibson tent would have been the wise choice.

Gav Mcinally & Graeme Johnston.

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