Photo Reports

Knotfest, one of the world’s biggest and most legendary events, has made its way to Finland! What a perfect country to be at with a fest of this magnitude that celebrates all that is metal and up-and-coming. After an exciting first day, this was the moment most people had been waiting for, with the glorious return of Slipknot, in good company of bands like Shiraz Lane, Tesseract, Stoned Statues, Cradle of Filth, Medeia, Bring Me The Horizon, and Moon Shot!

Although hard to find on the internet, there was one show in Europe, right before Yngwie Malmsteen‘s Parabellum tour kicks off in the USA on August 11th. (Which was not even mentioned on the official tour t-shirt).

On the day itself we were informed that the show would start later than first announced. There would be no warm up act and Yngwie would play for 1 hour… but at the age of 59, and after a career of over 40 years, Yngwie is still unstoppable and threw us a show that lasted an hour and a half!

While throwing dozens of plectrums into the audience (I guess almost everyone in the first 4 rows must have had the chance to catch one) and thereby giving a full time job to the guy who took care of refilling the plectrum holders and replace them at the microphone stand, he threw a neo-classical metal performance only he can pull off. While taking control over the whole stage (even telling the photographers where to stand for the next song), he played al his songs we wanted to hear. The classical parts, the hard rock and also the covers (Smoke on the water, Red house,…)

Strange that the venue wasn’t sold out, but then again, like I started: it obviously wasn’t part of a European tour. It looked more like a try-out for the upcoming American tour, and as far as I’m concerned: you got a ‘go’ Yngwie!

Thanks for having us 013 Poppodium!

Knotfest, one of the world’s biggest and most legendary events, has made its way to Finland! What a perfect country to be at with a fest of this magnitude that celebrates all that is metal and up-and-coming. With a really solid line-up on the first day already with Bloodred Hourglass, Stam1na, Sara, Arch Enemy, Lähiöbotox, Lamb Of God, Huora and headliners Nightwish taking the crown, it was the perfect start to the weekend and a good preparation for what was to come still the day after.

The travelling rock and metal festival dropped by Kerava again, and since it’s only a couple of minutes walking from where I live, how could I miss out on this event with a charming line-up of Finland’s popular bands and a nice selection of international acts? The second day was compared to the day before quite a bit more wet with regular bursts of rain, but that didn’t take away any of the fun with bands like Klamydia, Viikate, Stam1na, Melrose, Uriah Heep, Uniklubi, Accept, Cyan Kicks and rock legend Deep Purple to round the weekend up!

The travelling rock and metal festival dropped by Kerava again, and since it’s only a couple of minutes walking from where I live, how could I miss out on this event with a charming line-up of Finland’s popular bands and a nice selection of international acts? The first day was a quite sunny start of the weekend with bands like Mustasch, Turmion Kätilöt, Negatiiviset Nuoret, Dampf, Brother Firetribe, Lordi, Korpiklaani, Eppu Normaali and Popeda…

While they were in the country to play at John Smith Rock Festival, the popular Moldovan modern metal outfit Infected Rain dropped by Tampere and Helsinki for some hot and sweaty club shows. We didn’t want to miss out on the always great band to catch live, so off we went to On The Rocks in Helsinki. With them, they brought the Finnish band Awake Again, and we knew we were in for a great night of catchy modern metal music!

We were happy to attend the Gojira concert in Tilburg. The show was sold out in no time, so an additional show was added (and also sold out). Both shows had to be rescheduled due to the pandemic, but now it was finally there.

Over the many years that Gojira has been on stage, it is clear that they have grown fiercely in recent years. The show was great. The band members were clearly more in tune with each other than they were a few years ago, and the whole thing felt more natural than ever before. Also more mature was supporting act Alien Weaponry. Considering their young age, this can actually be considered literal. Both bands were preceded by English warm-up act Employed to Serve.

The Tollwood Festival is a festival that takes place every six months in the Olympiapark (summer) or on the Theresienwiese (winter) in Munich.
The festival’s programme is very diverse, always with a more popular side in order to attract the maximum number of visitors.

The BossHoss is a seven-member band from Berlin, formed in 2004. The group had their breakthrough in 2005 with country music-style interpretations of pop songs. Meanwhile, rhythm guitarist Hoss Power writes most of the band’s songs himself, as well as their most commercially successful single to date, “Don’t Gimme That”. The origin of the band’s name lies in the song Boss Hoss, released by The Sonics in 1965.

The Tollwood main stage tent was completely packed and the heat in Munich, especially inside, was simply scorching. The Berlin band as always perform in top physical form and the public adore them, they are probably the most popular band in Germany at the moment, with a diverse audience. It’s always good and fun to photograph these guys!

We would like to thank you for the sympathy shown to our reception, we are very happy and hope to come back again!

The passage of the American Goodbye June in Munich happened in the middle of the week, on a Wednesday and it is always risky to predict the affluence of the public, in this case, the Strom club in Munich managed to fill up to watch a night of rock n roll in its pure state. The average age in the room is guaranteed to be around 40 which shows that this is not a show for “kids”!

Scarlet Rebels act as the opening band for the current headliner, they are a classic melodic rock n roll band from a small town in Wales and proudly announce their achievements in the UK charts. With two albums out, the band managed to convince and entertain the audience, showing their music with great quality and maturity on stage. They also had time to send political messages related to the current situation of the UK Prime Minister.

After a nice warm up, the band from Nashville came on stage, I confess that I didn’t know them until recently, but as soon as I heard their songs my memory took me to compare them with classic bands like AC/DC or Led Zeppelin, which is good! The band exists since 2009 and in this tour they will present their latest work, released this year, called “See Where The Night Goes”. When we see these youngsters live, we go back to the time when the stages were almost naked, without many props that could distract our senses. The show is raw and we are absorbed by the genuine rock spirit, where organic instruments are played and there is an artistic express emergency after this obligatory stop because of the pandemic. Goodbye June is a band that deserves to be heard by many people, to have success and to be experienced live, on stage the Americans show that they were made to play for the people, and if on record they are good, live they are excellent in everything they do.

In short, it was a great night of rock at the Strom in Munich and who missed it was only those who were not present!

The main day of Sauna Open Air started with the always good Mokoma. After that Melrose played on the smaller stage. Cyan Kicks gave us quite a big show. Reckless Love around frontman Olli mostly played us their new songs from Turborider. Luckily we had time to regain our breath during Graveyard.
We had just as much fun as Klamydia on stage while listening to them. Skid Row gave us their all with their fast passed songs. Massive Wagons were one of the most entertaining bands I’ve ever seen. Danko Jones spiked their show with a lot of humour and jokes. Hardcore Superstar gave us quite a party, before the day ended with an amazing show by In Flames.