Download 2012 Review: Black Sabbath, Metallica, The Prodigy

The 10th year of a festival to take place at Donington under the name of Download Festival. Download organisers and fans have made the festival one of the most talked-about rock and metal festivals in the world over these 10 years. Rock and metal fans from all over the world travel to Donington each year, and it’s no wonder why when festival promoter Andy Copping keeps bringing amazing line-ups! This year’s festival saw mega headliners The Prodigy, Metallica, and Black Sabbath.

The Prodigy opened with ‘Worlds on Fire’. They finished with classic ‘Smack My Bitch Up’ before coming back with an encore that included ‘Take Me to the Hospital’, ‘AWOL’, and ‘Their Law’. They provided a stunning light show with lasers and wild visuals.

Metallica opened with their very own epic take on ‘The Ecstasy of Gold’ by Ennio Morricone, providing a dramatic start. They then kicked off with ‘Hit the Lights’. After ‘Master of Puppets’, ‘The Four Horsemen’, ‘For Whom the Bell Tolls’, and ‘Hell and Back’, Metallica played the whole of The Black Album from finish to start. They began with ‘The Struggle Within’ and ended with ‘Enter Sandman’, playing the entire album backwards in track listing. There was only one encore this time, as they came back to play ‘Battery’, ‘One’, and finished with ‘Seek & Destroy’.

During a break in ‘Enter Sandman’, frontman James Hetfield got the crowd to repeat: “Metallica, Metallica, we’re like family, it’s a family, it’s Metallica family.”

Fans in the crowd were holding up signs saying “Fu**IN PROUD TO BELONG TO THE METALLICA FAMILY”.

Saxon is a band that has been around for years, but they are still rocking. “We played the very first Castle Donington in 1980, we played a tent somewhere over there,” said frontman Biff Byford. On top of playing Download in front of thousands of fans, they are just about to set off on a world tour. This could be their last. Biff said to the Download crowd, “This could be our last time on this stage.” The excitement seemed to get to him when he found some wood with wheels on the bottom (probably for moving kit) and decided to surf across the stage on it.

Some would call them a comedy act; some would call them a totally rockin’ band stuck in the ’80s. Steel Panther confused some people but made everyone laugh. From the foxiest guitar player Lexxi Foxx asking “Who likes the zoo?” to lead singer Michael Starr explicitly telling the audience what he would do to some of the girls in the crowd, this is a band you can’t help but laugh at. They opened their set with a song from the new album Balls Out called ‘Supersonic Sex Machine’. They played some classics from their previous album Feel the Steel, such as ‘Asian Hooker’, ‘Community Property’, ‘Eyes of a Panther’, and ‘Party All Day’. It’s great to see thousands of rock and metal fans sing the line “My heart belongs to you, but my cock is community property.”

They ended with their most well-known song ‘Death to All but Metal’ with special guest Corey Taylor (lead singer, Slipknot), who actually provided vocals on the album.

Cancer Bats couldn’t play their set due to the late opening of the area on the Saturday morning. Billy Talent were however nice enough to let them play one song during their set; they chose ‘Hail Destroyer’. The Bats got rescheduled to play the Red Bull Bedroom Jam stage after The Gallows. Despite The Prodigy playing on the main stage at the time, Cancer Bats pulled in a good crowd. They opened their set with their version of Beastie Boys song ‘Sabotage’. The excitement had built up with the hardcore fans who were disappointed to miss their set earlier that day. They may have played a small tent, but that didn’t stop the circle pits!

Ones to look out for in 2012 are Golden Tanks. Named after a Cancer Bats track, you can see where they get their inspiration. They won the “wild card” in this year’s Red Bull Bedroom Jam competition, and we can see why the judges chose them. The punk rock-sounding band are currently on a European tour; catch them back in the UK at Heavy Fest 2012.

In a recent interview with NME, festival promoter Andy Copping said he has already booked one of the headliners for Download Festival 2013. RAMzine certainly looks forward to hearing the predictions.

You can pre-buy Download 2013 tickets now at downloadfestival.co.uk.