Author: Urban Bolta
Photos: Urban Bolta
Location: Dessel / Belgium
Concert date: June 22, 2012
Attendance: 80,000
Ticket price: 155€ (three-day ticket)
Graspop Metal Meeting is one of Europe’s biggest metal festivals, even if it’s nowhere near as well known in our neck of the woods as, say, Germany’s infamous Wacken Open Air or the increasingly established Hellfest in northern France. Graspop takes place near the small town of Dessel in Belgium, in an idyllic countryside setting full of classic Flemish architecture and friendly locals.
The festival’s history goes back to 1996, and over the years it has grown to a capacity of tens of thousands, becoming one of the biggest music festivals in the wider region. Actual attendance numbers vary depending on the source, but by my estimate, a good 100 thousand souls sworn to heavy rock showed up this year. Dessel is about 1,150 kilometers from Slovenia, which means around 13 hours behind the wheel of your trusty steel steed, though there’s of course the more elegant option of flying into nearby Treviso, Belgium. The festival kindly offers free transport on the Belgian railways, so if you fly into Charleroi, there’s no need to worry about the cost of getting to Dessel.
The three-day event serves up music on four stages. The gigantic main stage hosted the commercially biggest names, while everyone else was spread across three smaller stages, all of them inside tents that can only take in a limited number of people. In the evening, when the tents hosted relatively big names like Lamb Of God, Dimmu Borgir or Children Of Bodom, the crush was unbearable, and the sweat drops flowed freely with all that body-against-body rubbing.
After an all-night drive to the festival, our little crew of five brave travelers took some time for a good long rest in the morning, so we missed a few of the opening bands. My first real taste of the festival only came a few minutes before 3 p.m., when POSSESSED took the stage at the Metal Dome. These are legendary American metalheads who, in the first half of the eighties, took the brutal sound of Venom and Motörhead one step further and became pioneers of the death metal genre. The only one left from the original lineup is paralyzed vocalist Jeff Becerra, who was shot several times by a cowardly bank robber in the late eighties and confined to a wheelchair for good. But you can’t just shoot the will to play metal out of someone! Becerra now carries on the Possessed story with a crew of new musicians, and it has finally become part of Graspop too! The trip back to the mid-eighties and the cult albums »Seven Churches« and »Beyond The Gates« was decent – thrashy riffs gave safe shelter to Becerra’s recognizable guttural vocals, even though the relatively cool reception from the crowd suggested most had come just to satisfy their curiosity about what original death metal sounds like a quarter of a century later. Despite the demanding delivery, Becerra didn’t disappoint vocally, and one of the highlights of the gig came when the frontman rolled his chair to both sides of the stage and greeted the front rows up close.
After a few songs, the urge to catch BLACK LABEL SOCIETY again drove me to the other side of the grounds, in front of the main stage. The American heavy metallers, with their trademark dash of Southern rock, pulled an enormous crowd onto the huge meadow, which you’d expect from a band with a loyal fan base and an almost cult status. Frontman Zakk Wylde is roaring like a lion again! After a few health scares in recent years, including blood clots that landed him in the hospital, his health is obviously treating him better now. Wylde, a real bear of a man, is the band’s central pillar, and with that Native American feather headdress he pulled most of the eyes below the stage onto his shoulders. He bet on his bearded charisma and, with no unnecessary chatter, relied purely on the music to connect with the crowd. In a set just shy of an hour, Black Label Society ran through their career of a decade and a half, and the heavy, stoner-tinged metal riffs peaked with Fire It Up and the closing Stillborn.
Next came a jump to the festival’s second-biggest stage, under the roof of the Maquee I tent, where the banner behind the stage announced even before the start that the next 50 minutes belonged to the madness known as SACRED REICH! The American thrashers reunited in their classic lineup a few years back and have finally made it to the Old Continent (sadly nowhere near Slovenia). The now short-haired guys put out some excellent records in the second half of the eighties, but despite the backing of Metal Blade, they’re sadly a half-forgotten gem of the eighties thrash scene. Judging by what I saw, Sacred Reich have a tremendous hunger to prove themselves, as their years of inactivity erupted on the Graspop stage like a wildfire of untamed kinetic energy, sending the living and the dead into the mosh pit all the way back to the mixing desk in the middle of the tent. Unlike most similar bands, the typical Sacred Reich sound actually lifts your mood, especially thanks to the likable frontman Phil Rind and his singing, which at times turns into straight-up talking. Rind practically spat out his lungs delivering the verses, and the other three guys spun an honest musical tale with an equally committed performance. Between classics like The American Way and Ignorance, Sacred Reich slotted in their Black Sabbath cover War Pigs, and the surfing through their original catalog ended with the speedy Surf Nicaragua. No doubt one of the gigs of the day!
Meanwhile, a crowd in Guns N’ Roses shirts was already streaming toward the stage, not for the band itself but for SLASH, who played the main stage as a solo act. This year he released his second solo album, »Apocalyptic Love«, and presenting it was the focus of his Graspop set. But Slash has the misfortune that his name is a media magnet and everyone knows him only as the guitarist of the former hard rock giants, while hardly anyone bothers to dig into his solo career. So his set could be split into two parts. While the G n’ R classics Nightrain, Mr. Brownstone and Sweet Child O’ Mine grabbed the crowd like the juiciest bait, the solo songs that made up most of the setlist were received almost apathetically. The sound didn’t do Slash any favors either, as the rhythm section drowned out his guitar in the overall mix, so for lack of sonic ecstasy we sometimes had to settle for just watching his fingers. The frontman of his backing band is Myles Kennedy (Alter Bridge), so as expected we got their joint song Back From Cali from Slash’s self-titled debut, and the trip through old and new hard rock mischief ended (as expected) with Paradise City. The gig left me cold, though I don’t doubt it would’ve been a completely different story had I seen one of his own solo shows. Putting G n’ R songs in the repertoire was actually kind of funny, considering that two days later that very band stood on that very stage…
Next I meant to check out the British gothic metallers Paradise Lost, but I wandered into the wrong tent by mistake, where Devil Driver were tearing it up at the same time. They’re Californian extremists with exceptional punch and raw bursts of energy, and despite all the aggression they also manage to toss in some melody during the guitar solos. The jam-packed tent proved that Devil Driver are hugely popular with the youth, but since I’m personally not a big fan of this take on metal and the »growl« vocals, my path led me on toward the beer tent for a can or two of the hoppy stuff.
Meanwhile, Swedish power metallers Sabaton were shaking the main stage with their new historical epic »Carolus Rex«, and right after them, a little past 8:30 p.m., thrash metal giants SLAYER took the stage. The American quartet had already played nearby Zagreb just two weeks earlier, but this time Slayer traded the miniature stage of Močvara for the Graspop main stage, where they last played two years ago. Gary Holt is still in the lineup, and has been filling in for original guitarist Jeff Hanneman for a year and a half. Even though reports a while back said the blond »spiderman« might return after a severe infection from a spider bite, so far there’s no sign of a comeback.
As I said, the main Exodus guitarist skillfully makes the most of his absence, and he has by now »befriended« Slayer’s first guitar, Kerry King, to the point that the two spontaneously interact on stage. Holt has also taken on a few of the solo spots, and anyone seeing Slayer for the first time could easily have said Gary Holt had been a standard member of the band since forever. Tom Araya, the frontman of Chilean roots, is visibly worn down by the grueling concert life of recent decades: you can’t blame him for the more passive vocal work, which was especially audible on War Ensemble, nor for the weight he’s put on over the last few years, let alone the increasingly gray hair. He’s simply a man who, at fifty, can no longer throw himself into the stage show as intensely as he did at a dewy twenty-five. If Araya has been winning over the fairer sex with his constant smiles lately, the same certainly can’t be said for Kerry King, an intimidating tattooed bear of a man who shook deadly riffs out of his sleeve and opened with classics like Chemical Warfare and the surprise of the tour, Jesus Saves (“Reign In Blood”, 1986). Behind the kit, hidden behind sunglasses, Dave Lombardo reigned supreme, one of the best metal drummers around, showing off his rich bag of tricks with the dynamic pounding that Slayer’s multilayered compositions demand. The hour-and-a-quarter slot left no room for an encore, so the Americans wrapped up the show without catching a breath, with the standards South of Heaven and Raining Blood. Even though Slayer aren’t as fired up as they once were, meeting them is still delicious! Judging by the »Slaaaayeeeer« chants, which have become folk songs among metalheads and which the drunken horde used to keep the campsite awake all night long, I can safely conclude that the routine set fulfilled its mission of complete metal ecstasy.
Then came the wait for the day’s closing chapter, and my mind toyed with a so-far unfulfilled wish that we could be waiting for Black Sabbath instead of Ozzy and Friends. At the end of last year, Black Sabbath officially joined forces again and would have gone on a European tour in June (their first in seven years) if Tony Iommi’s serious illness hadn’t wrecked their plans. The already booked slots were then filled by OZZY OSBOURNE and his crew of star backing musicians, offering all Black Sabbath worshippers none other than himself as a consolation prize.
This year marks thirty years since the death of Ozzy’s first guitarist, Randy Rhoads, so after the opener Bark at the Moon, Ozzy remembered the late Quiet Riot guitarist with the triplet of Mr. Crowley / Suicide Solution / I Don’t Know. Gus G. laid down the guitar riffs, teaming up with the atmospheric backdrop from keyboardist Blasko. The Firewind guitarist is technically well schooled, but he’s got many more years of proving himself ahead before we can compare him to his predecessors in Ozzy’s band. Despite his seemingly frail little body, Ozzy Osbourne handled the stage tumbling well. The old man easily steered the crowd with his charisma and fed it the standard shouts of »I can’t hear you«, and the routine showmanship was at times replaced by playful teenage sparkle. Yes, Ozzy Osbourne has all of that inside him!
The »Prince of Darkness« remains a first-class entertainer! If last year at Sweden Rock he harassed the official festival cameramen with a foam-spraying water cannon, this time he went after the security guards below the stage. The roars of laughter didn’t fail to arrive, and neither did the memorable moments when Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler and guitar star Slash joined Ozzy on stage. The middle of the show belonged to Sabbath classics from the early days, meaning slow doom salvos of high-flying atmosphere. Slash, in a slow guitar style that’s uncharacteristic for him, went through the cult Iron Man / War Pigs and N.I.B. riffs like a pro, before Zakk Wylde (BLS) replaced him for the rest of the show. Before the encore, Crazy Train hit alongside some clever visuals, and engine driver Ozzy invited all his guests back on stage at the end for a joint headbang to Paranoid. An hour and a half of retrospective musical recreation, thankfully untainted by any songs from the catastrophic latest album »Scream« (2010), lived up to expectations and personally touched me too, since even in the autumn of his life Ozzy hasn’t given up on his crazy rock’n’roll tradition. The opening day was behind me, and with nightfall, the colorful festival life was only just getting started…
Setlist
BLACK LABEL SOCIETY:
1. Crazy Horse
2. Funeral Bell
3. Overlord
4. Parade of the Dead
5. Fire it Up
6. Godspeed Hell Bound
7. Concrete Jungle
8. Stillborn
SACRED REICH:
1. The American Way
2. Administrative Decisions
3. Love…Hate
4. Ignorance
5. Crimes Against Humanity
6. Who’s to Blame
7. Independent
8. War Pigs
9. Death Squad
10. Surf Nicaragua
SLASH:
1. One Last Thrill
2. Nightrain
3. Back From Cali
4. Shots Fired
5. Mr. Brownstone
6. Halo
7. Anastasia
8. Sweet Child O’ Mine
9. You’re a Lie
10. Slither
11. Paradise City
SLAYER:
1. World Painted Blood
2. Psychopathy Red
3. War Ensemble
4. Die by the Sword
5. Chemical Warfare
6. Hate Worldwide
7. Mandatory Suicide
8. Altar of Sacrifice
9. Jesus Saves
10. Seasons in the Abyss
11. Hell Awaits
12. Dead Skin Mask
13. Snuff
14. Angel of Death
15. South of Heaven
16. Raining Blood
OZZY OSBOURNE & FRIENDS:
1. Bark at the Moon
2. Mr. Crowley
3. Suicide Solution
4. I Don’t Know
5. Shot in the Dark
6. Rat Salad
7. Iron Man
8. War Pigs
9. N.I.B
10. Fairies Wear Boots
11. I Don’t Want to Change the World
12. Crazy Train
13. Mama, I’m Coming Home
——————
14. Paranoid
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