Music, over everything. We started with the nostalgic view of 3 INCHES OF BLOOD, the good old Canadians. Lots of fans mention that as soon as they hear 3 INCHES OF BLOOD, they remember how they used to play Tony Hawk Underdog 2 and got to know this band.

Skálmöld vikings from Iceland with their songs in native language, epic music and cheerful faces looked like nothing in this world could ruin their mood that day. And it was such a beautiful start of the overall festival endeavour (in a good sense, of course).

Fleshgod Apocalypse, an Italian theatrical show with some touches of death metal, symphonic, classical elements and again, smiles on their faces was already pinpointing where this is going: we had 4 days of good heavy music and high spirits (just the tiredness wasn’t there yet).

Americans Inter Arma on the tiny Octagon stage were exploding on stage, mixing and matching probably all kinds of metal music, sounding raw and wild, blowing away the minds of their listeners – amazing act.

Then came the Evil Disco, Static-X with their recognizable blend of industrial metal, nu-metal and, of course a red-eyed humanoid robot with a mohawk on stage as well as that huge green monster which made lots of people smile again.

Another US-based band Frayle were captivating with their haunting witch-doom metal, beautiful yet unsettling and heavy performance and astonishing vocalist. A delicate and deep performance.

Then it was time to run to Dying Fetus show and these Americans were very different: brutal death metal veterans with just John Gallaghers from the original members since 1991. However, the band sounds as strong as has always been.

Oranssi Pazuzu never ceases to amaze. Their anger, their chaos and destruction in music, the cosmic lyrics and energetic performance can hardly leave anyone indifferent. They are captivating, and even if you’re not a fan of this Finnish psychedelic black metal, you just can’t look away: their movements, their sound and their overall presence on stage is nearly impossible to forget.

RUÏM was another anticipated show, and a huge success at the itsy-bitsy overcrowded Octagon. No wonder – although it’s a relatively new project, some names in it are legends without any exaggeration: the founder is Blasphemer from Mayhem and Vltimas. The whole project is based on the forgotten or lost tapes of Mayhem from 1998-1999, so it’s a nice touch to the history, and the weird lyrics in English, Norwegian and Portugese sets the band apart from the “usual” black metal. That was really impressive.

Kerry King in one of the main stages was doing a Kerry King thing: the legendary Slayer is never far away from him, and Kerry was showing everyone what good old thrash metal is about. Brilliant energetic show.

But that was not all – the first day couldn’t be better without the Greek gods Rotting Christ and their usual colossal show. You just can’t turn away from legendary Sakis because of the charisma, the ability to raise the public from tiredness and sleepiness, and the power in this Greek black metal is simply incredible.