My Download Festival 2009

17/06/09 @ 18:46:05

having not been to Donington for a rock festival i didn't quite know what to expect but having now been to Download 2009 i thought i'd try to sum up my own personal download experience with a small series of memorable quotes, moments and feelings...

as we hunted for any available patch of grass to pitch the tent we could hear Staind in the distance and i blurted out... "c'mon dude, get the pegs in - we need to do some metalling!" this was the moment i realised two things:

1) *everyone* at Donington - that's men, women, children, staff, security, police, ghost busters, you, me and everything in between for the duration have the same name - "dude".
2) you realise any previous life priorities you had (like eating, sleeping and going the to the loo) take a back seat because metalling is the only thing that matters. i think Steel Panther who played the most comical set i've ever seen sum this up best with their song titled "Death to all but metal".

i learned cardboard Tuborg beer cups are highly prized by many metallers - this unique strand of Downloaders will race and tackle each other to grab them from the floor and the dude with the longest stack of beer cups (sometimes 20ft high) earns mucho-respect from all other downloaders - i think there's some sort of beerback deal for every 10 you collect :-)

buttscratcher!!!

if you think Gordon Ramsay has a monopoly on use the F word you'd be sadly mistaken. at download the F word is nearly as common as the (D)ude word.

the quality of things people will send via text message to the huge screens for everyone to read is second to none... a few examples:

"Dave im down Co-op if there's anything you want let me know xx"

"last night a kid ran off with one of my shoes, so if anyone sees a small vulnerable child with one shoe too big... NO MERCY, TAKE HIM DOWN!"

"Paul, i thought this was the best way to break it to you dude, im sleeping with your girlfriend"

"who is this buttscratcher!?!?!"

this brings me nicely on to the whole 'buttscratcher' thing. every couple of minutes you'd hear someone yell 'buttscratcher' for no apparent reason and then someone (sometimes way more than one) would instantly yell it back, this continued for the duration of the festival. i (and apparently many others) had no idea what it meant but we were all still yelling it because it seemed the right thing to do. anyway after some twitter searching yesterday it turns out to be from a Family Guy episode, watch this short youtube vid for a full explanation. the comments below it are hilarious ie; PunkDave says: "Lol......there were a couple in a tent next to us who didn't get it either and were shouting Pound Stretcher!?".

it's this sort of hilarity and sense of knowing you're with the same sort of people as yourself that made the whole festival so much fun. make no mistake, this ain't no Glastonbury with an eclectic mix of people some of which will inevitably be disagreeable chavs... oh no, this is ALL METALLERS - quite possibly the most sound bunch of people you'll ever meet.

performance wise (give or take a few air-guitar playing nutbars) Slipknot for me were the real highlight of the weekend they just blew me away, they are the epitome of metal right now and Corey's dedication of a tune to everyone 'out there' [outside the walls of Donington] who will 'never understand what it's all about' really hit the nail on the head. the pyrotechnic/mechanical show was just fantastic, seeing Joey the drummer being lifted into a vertical position and subsequently rotated whilst still drumming as hard as ever was something else. some pics here.

buttscratcher!!!

i was particularly impressed by some of the younger acts from the Bedroom Jam / Tuborg stages, check out New Device's sound for instance then maybe hop on over to see TurboWolf. so much energy from these guys really putting their heart into it - good luck for the future lads.

the combo of more modern metal and older stuff like ZZTop / Def Leppard made for an interesting mix of people, two guys in the crowd really stuck out for me...

there was this one dude in purple pants who was standing on the right of the stage who at 11.15am was already chucking out some huge air guitar action and i can't explain how brilliant he was, totally in his own little world and by the looks of things note perfect on that imaginary guitar of his. by the end of the act he was in full flow assuming the power stance and swinging his arms around wildly with the odd flick of his hair for good measure. when his mrs sat on the ground beckoned him down for a word about something he DIDN'T EVEN DROP HIS AIR GUITAR - nope, he acknowledged her with a nod that said "look luv we can talk later, right now im on stage and im untouchable" he then of course continued playing. i'd not be surprised if purple pant dude had more mesmerised onlookers than the band who were playing.

pound stretcher!!!

a similar thing happened whilst watching ZZTop this old boy who looked to be about 60 wearing a union jack denim jacket started to rock forward and back... it wasn't long before the metal got the better of him and he was kicking his leg out, waving at ZZTop not realising TV is a one-way medium and hoping they'd see him and respond and then making the kind of arm action that says, "no one can get close man - you guys are incredible - your beards blow my mind". having stalkeresquely followed him afterward hoping for more gold we managed to hear him say to some other random he bumped into in a brummie accent, "aww chuffed to bits with that i am, best show ever". i genuinely think he'd not left Donington since the first festival was opened.

i liked how serious the fans were about the bands they liked and the ones they weren't so keen on. Limp Bizkit i thought were going to be a bit weak but i was way wrong, they got the crowd 'rollin' and seeing them pull two red cap wearing Fred Durst wannabe dudes out of the crowd and letting them actually be Fred for a while was the funniest thing ever - they were more realistic than the real deal i swear!

i think the only moment of passionate anger i witnessed was when this one dude walked out from the crowd whilst Pendulum were playing meanfully shaking his head from side to side in disgust and then turning back to give them the middle finger as he headed off to get another beer. classic.

i learned that in the mosh pit no matter how big you are there is always someone bigger.

tons of people were seen going backstage after the shows - don't know how they got there really but had we tried i think the Wayne's World 2 scene would sum the attempt up, Wayne: "but our girlfriends our back there!", bouncer: "yeah, alotta people's girlfriends are back there"... Wayne & Garth: "denied".

even settling in to go to sleep is fun because of the things you hear people shouting... i witnessed an impressive bounce of ad-hoc randomness from tent to tent that you could never hope to repeat kicked off with the ubiquitos "buttscratcher!!!" then another one yelled with the same emphasis on the syllables "Keith Chegwin" and so it went... "Chuck Norris", "Child Snatcher", "Gary Wilmot", "Jade Goody", "Jeremy Kyle"... this went on for ages. in a similar vein were some other dudes in a tent near us who seemed to be obsessed with 80's Arnie movies particularly Predator. picture the scene - it's dead quiet, most people are nodding off and suddenly you can hear a helicopter coming in to land at East Midlands airport and from outta nowhere in that big distinct Austrian voice comes "Billeeee! get to the chawpper!" genius.

the only bad thing about camping as we all know is the needing to go to the loo at 4am, but you know what's good at Download? the fact that when you do make that move out of the tent you walk past two guys still drinking and one explaining to the other in the finest detail why Iron Maiden *are* the best band in the world ever FACT and, that they will never be surpassed. respect guys, you made my loo visit memorable.

all the 80 thousand dudes at download rocked! they were in heaven, they loved download, i loved download... and everyone was sooooo happy. thanks all for making it such a brilliant weekend.

ALL ROCK METAL! ALL THE TIME!

see you next year buttscratchers.

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