If you’ve not come across unpeople yet, you’re missing out. They’ve quickly become one of the most reliable festival staples in the UK over the past couple of years, and this slot at Download opening up the Apex stage proved exactly why. Frontman Jake Crawford kicked things off with a defining “WAKEY WAKEY!” yelled straight into the mic, ringing out across the whole arena. They began with ‘waste’ and slipped in unreleased cut ‘bottle it’, both landing with the same easy, summer-soaked energy that’s made the band feel like such a perfect daytime festival act. Their sound sits somewhere between alt-rock and pop-punk, all huge riffs and melodic, gang-vocal choruses built for exactly this crowd. As has become something of a tradition, guitarist Luke Caley launched himself straight into the crowd during ‘the garden’, getting passed around on shoulders before crowdsurfing his way back to the stage. Their set was proof that everyone in the scene needs to wake up and start paying attention to unpeople immediately (no pun intended).
Bloodywood are unlike anything else on this bill: a New Delhi outfit who fold dhol drums, flute and tumbi straight into a wall of metalcore riffs, with Hindi and Punjabi choruses sitting alongside furious rap verses. Returning to Download for the first time since opening the main stage back in 2023, their set felt like watching a full theatrical production rather than a straightforward gig, every song staged with real intention. They opened with ‘Dana Dan’, and from there the pits only got bigger and rowdier. Between songs, the band spoke about how grateful they are for UK crowds continuing to back them, especially given how little space metal occupies back home in India. It’s rare to watch a set that manages to be a celebration of an entire culture and a full-throttle metal show simultaneously, but Bloodywood somehow make it look effortless.
Rumours had been swirling all weekend about who’d be filling Download’s secret slot, with various beloved bands all thrown around. However, it was the almighty Skindred who reigned within the Dogtooth tent that afternoon. The stage was rammed well before the reveal, chairs scattered outside for anyone who couldn’t squeeze in, though we still managed to fight our way up front regardless. Benji Webbe strutted out in his now-trademark, faintly unhinged headgear and sunglasses to gleefully welcome us in. Skindred‘s whole sound is built on that same chaotic mix of reggae thrown headfirst into pummelling metal riffs, and it’s exactly that genre-blending energy that makes them feel tailor-made for Download. From there, it was one continuous party. The crowd moshed as hard as the crush would physically allow through ‘You Got This’ and ‘Nobody’, before ‘Warning’ brought the inevitable: shirts off, swinging overhead in a full-blown Newport Helicopter. A timeless tradition that somehow felt just as essential to Download as any of the headliners.
By this point in the weekend, sunburn had well and truly won, so Boundaries were watched from the back of the tent rather than the pit. However, the view of the chaos up front was still something to behold. The band make exactly the crushing, technical metalcore that demands a tight squad up front, and even from a distance the whole tent was moving regardless of where you’d planted yourself. They opened with newer cut ‘Skies Cast Amber Black’, a brilliant choice that set the tone instantly, offering a welcome change of pace after a day leaning more towards pop-tinged metal elsewhere on the bill. They closed with ‘Easily Erased’, the lead single from 2024’s Death Is Little More, and the whole crowd belted that chorus back at full volume. It was a heavier, more straightforwardly brutal set than most of what we’d caught so far, and a truly great one for it.
Bad Omens pulling out of their 2024 slot made this one feel earned in a way few sets at Download manage, and the crowd clearly felt it too. The pit was absolutely crammed with hardcore devotees right up front, every age bracket represented. They opened with ‘Specter’, and within seconds people were up on shoulders screaming the lyrics straight back at the stage. Their sound sits at the messy, brilliant intersection of metalcore, industrial textures and huge pop hooks, and that contrast was on full display from the first song. Glitchy visual interludes threaded between tracks, building out something closer to a continuous narrative than a standard festival run-through. Crowdsurfers kept coming in waves throughout, everyone clearly having the time of their lives. It’s obvious this isn’t a band anyone listens to casually. The devotion at the Apex stage was unmistakable. Parts of it did feel like a pop concert, all soaring choruses and cinematic builds, but the heavier corners of their catalogue still got their moment. ‘Glass Houses’ and ‘Artificial Suicide’ tore the pit wide open the second the breakdown hit. They closed with ‘Dethrone’, arguably their heaviest cut, which should be more than enough to silence the handful of metal purists who still insist on writing this band off as too soft.
It was A Day To Remember‘s first Download appearance since 2022, a full headline slot on the Opus stage, and the band certainly made it count. Their blend of pop-punk singalong nostalgia with proper metalcore weight brought the energy throughout, like a party in full swing. They opened with ‘The Downfall of Us All’, that iconic intro instantly pulling the whole crowd in. The band leaned heavily on 2009’s Homesick throughout rather than playing it safe with only the newest material, yet ‘All My Friends’ off recent record Big Ole Album Vol. 1 fit in seamlessly alongside it. Jeremy McKinnon had the crowd attempting “double surfing,” stacking one crowdsurfer on top of another for the chance to, in his words, go home a legend. ‘Mr. Highway’s Thinking About the End’ landed as a genuine highlight, before closing out on ‘If It Means a Lot to You’ and ‘All Signs Point to Lauderdale’ to some of the loudest singing of the whole weekend.
We started the evening camped out on the hill for Linkin Park, fully intending to watch from a comfortable distance. That plan lasted about two songs before the gravitational pull of the pit became impossible to resist, and we ended up embedded right at the front for the rest of the set. Before the band even appeared, a teased documentary clip played out across the screens, a cinematic, heavily produced moment that made clear just how much thought had gone into every visual beat of the night. There was a real sense of occasion in the air too, and rightly so. This was Linkin Park‘s first Download appearance in over a decade, and the first time the band had ever headlined this festival fronted by someone other than Chester Bennington. Emily Armstrong stepping out made her the first woman to ever headline Download in its 23-year history, and the crowd packed in around us felt like proof of how much that moment actually mattered to people.
They opened with ‘The Emptiness Machine’ before sliding straight into ‘Lying From You’ and then ‘Crawling’, an opening run that balanced their newest material against some of the most beloved songs in their catalogue almost perfectly. Emily’s voice handled both eras with total ease, never once sounding like she was trying to imitate anyone. Between songs, Mike Shinoda spent a good chunk of time hyping her up to the crowd, at one point asking if anyone in the pit had followed her old band Dead Sara before Linkin Park. They threw in a curveball not long after, covering ‘Where’d You Go’ from Mike’s own side project Fort Minor, a fun, slightly unexpected detour that the crowd seemed delighted by regardless.
The biggest moment of the night, symbolically at least, came during ‘Two Faced’, when Mike called on the crowd to make room for a pit made up entirely of women, as a tribute to Emily’s place in the band, joking that she’d hate the attention even as the crowd roared in approval. Watching that happen in real time, with women of every age throwing themselves into it, said more about what this line-up change actually means than any amount of pre-show debate ever could. Not everything ran perfectly: ‘One Step Closer’ had to be stopped entirely partway through after someone apparently lost a shoe in the crush, which the band took in genuinely good humour before picking the song back up without missing a beat.
By the time the closing run hit, ‘Papercut’ to ‘In The End’ and then straight into ‘Faint’, the whole field turned into one enormous singalong, hands and crowdsurfers riding the surface of the crowd as far back as you could see. Hearing tens of thousands of people screaming that song’s signature refrain back at the stage in unison is one of those moments that’s hard to put into words once you’ve actually lived it. The band didn’t rush off afterwards either, sticking around to take photos and properly soak in the moment with fans pressed up against the barrier, which said plenty about how much this performance meant to them too.
There had been plenty of noise online in the lead-up to this set, plenty of people questioning whether Linkin Park without Chester could still mean anything at a festival like this. Watching it actually happen answered that question pretty definitively. Linkin Park remain just as universally loved as they’ve ever been. Chester’s absence still felt rather than ignored, and Emily Armstrong isn’t trying to replace what came before so much as carry it forward into something new and exhilarating.
