Sonisphere 2011

FRIDAY

In a whirlwind of noise, rain, sunshine and shit-stained toilets came this summer’s heavyweight Metal Festival.

Nestled by Knebworth castle, the festival's rampagingly historic line up had most of Friday's crowd decamped at the main stage for The Big 4: thrash's holy godfathers were the big draw.

Anthrax lacked the visceral punch that you might have expected, and on a stage where they should've been able to hold their own against younger bands, they merely ambled through - although a highlight was a cover of Sepultura’s ‘Refuse/Resist’.

A swampy lake of bodies covered the area for Dave Mustaine’s Megadeth, whose nasally thrash was on form with the band throwing themselves around
with style and belting out classics such as ‘Holy Wars’.

Mother fuckin’ Slayer is where things got really intense. Metal's hardcore congregation were out in force, and the band met the challenge - coming on like demonic Vikings who meant business.

With your correspondent being bounced around like a pinball in the heart-exploding moshpit, the band delivered ‘Angel of Death’ and ‘Raining Blood’ to euphoric and approving growls.

Slayer were the devilish little brother to the well oiled machine that was Metallica however, and tonight their set was all about the early days; ‘Hit the Lights’ ,‘The Shortest Straw’ ‘Master of Puppets’, ‘Call of Ktulu; and a rousing chorus of ‘Memory Remains’ got even the most ardent metal fan a little moist.

To make it even more trouser twitching, fire balls exploded from the stage constantly as strained voices did the damndest to keep up. But it was taken to another level when they brought out members of Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeth and Diamond Head to perform ‘Am I Evil’; 17 aging metal heads playing in synch was a sight
to behold.

SATURDAY

Day two and my voice had had a night to recover, so at 11am I strolled over to see master lounge singer Richard Cheese tickling the fancy of a huge audience (for that time of the morning). The sun beat down as he crooned out versions of ‘Down With The Sickness’, ‘People = Shit’ and ‘Creep. Cheese is a god amongst the Vegas set.

Over on the other side of town were Brighton hardcore types Architects who performed a heroically accomplished set with a circle pit so big you could land a spaceship in the middle of the damn thing. Go see them and expect to be blown away.

Frank Carter of Gallows announced on stage that he is parting company with the rest of the band in the following weeks; it was not met with cheers. But what started with a luke warm reception to ‘Misery’ ended with half of the crowd causing a six-person deep typhoon-like circle around the sound desk, as Carter snarled his way through ‘Belly of the Shark’, ‘Abandon Ship’, ‘(Knebworth) Is the Reason’ and ‘Leeches’. They will be sorely missed.

Over to Bad Religion for a bit of old school punk, they swaggered across the stage belting out ‘21st Century’ and ‘Los Angeles is Burning’.

Also squeezed into the tent were our favourite grizzly shouters Pulled Apart By Horses who ripped Sonisphere a new butt hole, playing to a packed crowd and showing zero sign of intimidation. They seemed to thrive, even pulling out a new song ‘Wild Fire, Smoke & Doom’.

Weezer were an odd choice and didn’t really fit in. Still, a cover of ‘Teenage Dirtbag’ set the scene early on, and they provided the crowd with the classics; ‘Pork & Beans’ and ‘Buddy Holly’. Meanwhile, Mars Volta excelled in their psychedelic space-jazz-rock tomfoolery with a now poster boy looking Cedric Bixler-Zavala.

Biffy Clyro were a brave choice for headlining material - and they found it hard to muster attention from the middle to back of the audience, many having decided to turn their attention to something else. British rock is in an interesting place at the moment as despite it being in a very healthy stage, we lack the superstardom of our American counterparts. It was a wet end to a soggy day.

SUNDAY

House of Pain, like Richard Cheese the day before, provided the perfect way to start the day and as the crowd filtered back into the horizon bodies leapt and bounced away to ‘Jump Around’.

Australian metallers Parkway Drive were one of the surprise highlights of the day with a storming set, whereas despite a hefty following Airbourne seemed a little too derivative, and are less than the sum of their influences.

By contrast, Mastodon provided a titanic set that consisted of flitting between ‘Blood Mountain’ and ‘Crack In The Sky’ whilst slipping in a few new songs which tip the balance on the heavy scales away from their proggy predecessors.

Getting into the tent for Cancer Bats was near impossible, and despite the room only half full security kept the baying crowd out. So, it took a few to break through the barrier and the rest of us charged in and we weren’t disappointed.

‘Sleep This Away’ and ‘Darkness Lives’ were insane, throat ripping monsters whilst the obligatory popular cover of ‘Sabotage’ was inevitable.

Despite resurgence in recent years, you'll be heartened to know that Limp Bizkit were emphatically shit! Fred Durst's nonchalant manner sent ripples of anger and disappointment through the crowd; the half-arsed frontman turned up seemingly without a set list, asking the crowd what they wanted instead.

Bill Bailey was another brave choice by the bookers and drawing the largest comedy crowd in the world ever, he looked nervous and at times seemed to panic, but with some impressive guitar work and coming on stage wearing a mask of his own face he warmed the crowd on a very wet evening and during a Rammstein version of ‘Scarborough Fair’ and a cover of the Wurzels we even saw a little moshing and crowd surfing.

Slipknot are one of the few bands that rival Metallica, Iron Maiden and Slayer et al on fan support - and with this evening's immense performance it was easy to see why. Corey Taylor managed to get 40, 000 people to all crouch to the floor and then threw themselves in the air in unison.

‘Psychosocial’, ‘Spit It Out’, ‘Wait And Bleed’ and ‘Duality’ were all given the Slipknot treatment and what a treat it was. The finest Metal band of their generation.

The night ended with a little secret set by Bat Sabbath; Cancer Bats playing Black Sabbath covers.