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Events and Reports - Wacken Open Air 2003 - Steen´s Wacken Diary
Let me start with the conclusion: Wacken Open Air 2003 was a most excellent festival!
Now, for the full details. Here is my Wacken diary 2003!
I'm sorry if my concert descriptions are a little "lacking", but I was usually up in the photpit taking pictures for the first three songs and then had to fight my way back to get a good spot in the crowd, so usually half the concert was over when I got time to concentrate on the music. Well ok, that was just a bad excuse for me being drunk half the time... haha, no seriously, I wasn't that drunk :)
Well, to start at the beginning...
Wednesday, July 30.
My Wacken Open Air couldn't have started much worse than it did. The door to my apartment has two locks, one of them is always turned off, but just as Tommy (who dropped by the night before) and I had carried our luggage into the hallway, I slammed the door and heard the top lock click shut! Damn, I couldn't get back inside!!! Argh! Well no time to worry, the bus was leaving in 25 minutes... I of course blamed Tommy through the whole bus ride! He must have fiddled with the lock somehow...
At the bus we met up with Tajs, Anders and the other Danes. After a beer stop at the German border, we got to Wacken around 3 in the afternoon. The first test came when we had to walk three times back and forth between the bus and our camping spot just to carry our beer, alchohol and other less important stuff like the tents... The weather was hot, the sun shining and it was pretty much perfect.
The first big laugh came as Anders was setting up his newly bought and very very cheap tent. It turned out that it was cheap for a reason. It was in fact only half a tent! After Tommy and I had spent ten minutes rolling around laughing it was decided that Anders would get a spot in the corner of Tommy's mega-tent and we would use the "half-a-tent" for other puposes...
After setting up the other tents we sat down for a quick beer, and I suddenly felt like I was home!
There was no music playing on Wednesday so we went out looking for the other Danes from the bus and when we finally found them, we had a small party at their camp before hitting the sack.
Thursday, July 31.
Thursday was the first day of music and I was pretty excited to hear Circle II Circle and Annihilator. But first we had to get our press passes! This turned out to be almost a one day event, as we weren't sure where the Check-in place was located. We wrongfully assumed that it was placed near the festival area, and after walking around in Wacken for an hour we finally found a guard who directed us to a place 1 kilometer outside of town to a container behind a big Spar supermarket. I must say that this was probably the craziest spot to place the Press check in!!! Please change that for next year!?
Well, after standing in line for more than one hour in the baking sun we got our stuff and headed back to town where we met up with Morten, Ulrick and Lasse who were setting up their tents at our camp. I was supposed to meet Nina at the press check-in every hour as she would arrive later in the day on another bus from Denmark. But as it took an hour to walk out there I decided to forget that. Instead I sat down across from the bus stop with four beers and started waiting for the bus to arrive. Of course it was a couple of hours late...
After maybe ten minutes of waiting and talking to some Spanish guys, this old man came out of his house and started talking German to me. From what little I understood it turned out that he was a local resident of Wacken and we had a nice little chat. It was fun trying to speak German again and we talked for a while about different things and I ended up pretty much getting his life story... At one point I offered him one of my beers which he accepted gladly and we talked some more. After I had run dry he offered me to come and sit in his garden, while he got me a cool Holsten beer from his cellar. Well, I couldn't say no to that! :) So I ended up sitting in a nice garden chair drinking cool Holsten beers with an eighty year old Wacken resident and his wife for about an hour. That was most excellent!
At one point two neighbourghs popped by for their afternoon tea and it was almost like being on vacation with my grandparents again (R.I.P.) Well, after a couple of beers at his place, I saw the Danish bus driving up to the camp site. I gave the old people a big hail and went on my way back to the real world of Wacken.
After leading Nina to the camping grounds I ran for the stage area as Circle II Circle were getting started on the first concert of the day. The band delivered a good concert. They suffered from some sound problems, but Zachary Stevens had a great stage presence and the rest of the band played excellent. I definitely look forward to hearing more from these guys. Beside their own songs they did two Savatage songs, "Edge of thorns" and "Taunting cobras" along with the biggest surprise, Metallica's Sanitarium. That was very cool! Good job opening the festival!
Annihilator blew most people, including me, away with their fast paced thrash-like metal. Jeff Waters was amazing and I remember liking their new singer too. Other than that I really can't say much, sorry. I think it was that old guy who got me drunk with all his cool Holsten beer :) This was also the one day where I could just drink away as I didn't have any interviews lined up. So I did just that and it resulted in a huge memory loss later on in the day. I also completely missed Running Wild's show as I was desperately searching all over the festival grounds for my camera, which I thought that I'd lost. I later found out that I'd in fact forgotten it back at the camp. Well, I guess the old Wacken saying works for me "It's nice to get drunk in Wacken"
I won't get into what happened for the rest of the night as it was just too far out :) Let me just say that waking up the next morning wasn't that much fun...
Friday, August 1'st.
Ok, time to get serious! (No, just kidding :))
Now the festival was getting under way and Morten, Ulrick and Lasse had taken their spot in our camp. One thing was for sure, whenever I came cack to the camp, at least one of them were there, listening to a Maiden tape on Morten's stereo.
The first band I wanted to see was Freedom Call playing at four in the afternoon, so there was plenty of time for a warm up party at the camp. Nina and I went to interview Raise Hell at 2PM. Before the interview we went to check out the backstage area. A very nice place with a special bar where they even sold Smirnof Ice! That made my day! :) The interview went fine and we got on our way to see Freedom Call.
The audience at Freedom Call
Freedom Call played a much better concert than when I saw them at Blind Guardian Open Air a month earlier. Chris Bay sang like he should and the selection of songs were better. Personal highlight was the epic The quest
I really wanted to see Lotto King Karl, just to get a chance to shout "Bingoooo!!!" in my best Mr. Bean imitation, but somehow I ended up back at the camp instead and that was fun too :) All too soon I had to run down and get some pictures of Raise Hell at the Wet stage tent. Unfortunately I was only able to see the first ten minutes of their show as Primal Fear was taking the main stage at that time. As I left the tent it was completely filled with metalheads ready to bang their heads to the energetic show that Raise Hell was putting on. Giving the stage a "Sorry but I have to go" look, I ran for the True Metal stage and got the pictures of Primal Fear. The little bit that is left of my hair was nearly blown off by the powerful sound and the pyros that went off right in front of me on the stage. Ralf Scheepers was fantastic as usual and the rest of the band backed him with loads of power. Nuff said!
Primal Fear
Gamma Ray played a set consisting mostly of rarely heard songs. Having seen Gamma Ray live before, I thought this was very interesting. The highlight was a powerful version of the old Helloween song Victim of Fate. I also wish that special guest Ralf Scheepers had been used some more. Already after only ten minutes Kai began a sing a long with the audience. I remember the last time they played at Wacken (In 1998 I think) where they spent more than ten minutes on Somewhere out in space doing that. Personally I would much rather have another song than spend so long on getting the crowd to shout. Especially when the band only plays for little more than an hour.
Gamma Ray
After Gamma Ray I also watched most of In Flames' show, but only knowing one of their songs didn't help to keep my interest as I was very tired at this point. Still they put on a very energetic show and I have to check them out in the future. Lead singer Anders also thanked all the other bands for warming up for them... Best part of the show was definitely the song from The jester race which I recognised...
Having been quite disappointed with Twisted Sister at Sweden Rock, I decided to head back to the camp for some beers while they played. I'm not sure if that was a good decision as everybody I talked to afterwards said that they were the best band of the festival! Even some Death Metal guys were freaking out over them... I just couldn't believe it...
After a few beers I headed back around 2 in the night to check out Lordi along with Nina. They were supposed to be some kind of monster band closely related to GWAR. And sure enough, some funny looking monsters were on stage playing Accept's Midnight mover as we arrived. I was giggling through most of the concert, where the band continued to play their very simple, yet somewhat catchy Hard Rock. The song I remember most was one called something like "You're my monsterman" and that song unfortunately hung around in my head for the rest of the night. Overall I was pretty disappointed with that show. There was no real show or special effects on the stage. Just the costumes. I had at least hoped for a head of some kind to be thrown around :)
After Lordi we needed a drink, so we went to the backstage area to check out if anything interesting was happening there. NO, was the clear answer to that, but we still hung around filling ourselves with the tasty Smirnof Ice... As the clock got to around 6 in the morning we decided to head back to the camp. But wouldn't you know it; the exit back to the camping grounds had been closed of... After speaking to several guards we were told we had to make a big detour through the town for a few kilometres and basically walk around the whole festival site to get back. It would have taken us five minutes on the usual road...
Well, we were in no way going to walk for an hour to get back to the camping grounds, so we calculated the right direction and charged one of the fences that circled the festival area... Then we walked straight back in five minutes... The same thing happened the next day too. A little advice to the organisers: Please consider the press people who are not staying at the special press camping ground and keep the road to the normal camping grounds open!!! It can't be that difficult. I would also like to complain that the excellent food guy ran out of Chicken on the last day of the festival! :)
Saturday, August 2.
After a couple hours of sleep the other guys were waking up, so was the sun and it became quite impossible to sleep anymore... Oh well, a beer for breakfast is always a good thing :)
Nina, Tajs and I got together to check up on our questions for our Masterplan interview later in the day. It turned out that we were in serious lack of creative questions. Oh well, it's Wacken, so we can't take things too serious :)
The interview with Roland Grapow fortunately went pretty well, all things considered.
When Masterplan finally took the stage I was definitely ready. Just as at Sweden Rock they delivered one of the very best shows of the festival. Jörn Lande has an amazingly powerful voice and his 30 second scream made the small hair on my neck stand up. We were treated to songs like Spirit never dies, Enlighten me, Crystal night, Soulburn, Kind hearted light, Bleeding eyes and a small Helloween medley consisting of Chance and The departed (Sun is coming down). I would naturally rather have heard another song than the lengthy band introduction I'd already heard in Sweden. Still, a powerful concert by a tight band filled with positive energy.
After Masterplan I had to go and use the nice Internet connected computer that was available at the backstage area, to write a mail home to my neighbourgh in the hope that he could get a spare key from the janitor of my house ready. This meant that I missed Eidolon and that was maybe my biggest mistake of the festival. Sorry guys! Hopefully I'll get another chance somewhere in time.
Rage
I got up to the photopit just in time to get some pictures of Rage. The three piece band put on an excellent show and I was impressed with the powerful sound they were able to achieve. Victor Smolski on the guitar had an impressive solo spot followed by one of the better drum solos I've listened to. I only have a couple of Rage albums and the songs I knew were played perfectly. I'm definitely checking this band out in the near future.
The audience at Rage
After a quick beer run back to the camp Stratovarius took the stage and as always they delivered a brilliant concert. I was pleasantly surprised when they played a great version of Visions. That was excellent! Other highlights included Twilight Symphony and the set closer Black Diamond, which was an expected crowd pleaser.
Stratovarius
Due to an unexpected toilet incident I only caught half of Slayer's show. But what I did see was a band that just played a full on assault of Metal, never slowing down one bit. Every song from Reign in blood reared its head at some point during the show and I'm sure that most Slayer fans were in heaven.
Sonata Arctica
Last band I had to see at this years Wacken was Sonata Arctica, who played at 1 in the night. While they put on a great performance it never managed to quite reach the fantastic concert I remember seeing at Sweden Rock. Still they put on a great show with some songs being different from their set in Sweden. One highlight was Replica, another was of course my personal favourite, My land. I did miss Last drop falls though. But overall this was definitely a great way to end Wacken Open Air musically!
Sonata Arctica
Tommy, Nina and I met up at the Smirnof bar in backstage area afterwards, but to our great shock Smirnof Ice was sold out!!! Well, that couldn't have been our fault :) Instead we had to try this half beer half something else called Desperado. It was ok though, so we soon found the comfy sofas (soft cushions included, but no Spanish inquisition) in the press tent and sat down to relax a while. I was completely wasted at this point and we soon decided to go back to the camp for a last beer. Of course this meant scaling the fence again... Back at the camp everybody had gone to sleep, so we sat down and had tried to keep the party going. Finally at around 5 in the morning I fell head first into my tent and had a well deserved sleep...
Before I forget: A big hail goes out to our Manowar neighbourghs who even lent us their stereo one night. That was excellent guys! Please send me those pictures you took if you see this!!! We will be back to sing more Manowar for you next year! :)
Wacken Open Air was as always the experience of the year and if you missed it I feel truly sorry for you. I know I will be back next year. Hope to see you too!
Note to the organisers: It is possible to treat your press people with a little more respect! The "toilets" in the backstage area were a disgrace. Maybe I just never located the real ones? In the press tent the service was good though...
Sunday, August 3.
After five days with no bath I couldn't even get inside my own apartment when I finally got home. But after calling a locksmith who luckily turned up pretty quickly, I got in, put some Metal on the stereo, spent half an hour shaving and then took the longest bath ever!
I was home! (again)
| You can click most of the pictures to get a bigger version.
This is not the tent I bought!
Something is not right here...
Two guys in serious need of some sun...
Cheers mate!
Circle II Circle
Circle II Circle
Freedom Call
Freedom Call
Freedom Call
Back at the camp
Primal Fear
Primal Fear
Primal Fear
Primal Fear
Primal Fear
Gamma Ray
Gamma Ray
Gamma Ray
Rage
Rage
Stratovarius
Stratovarius
Stratovarius
Stratovarius
Slayer
Slayer
Sonata Arctica
Sonata Arctica
Sonata Arctica
Sonata Arctica
Sonata Arctica
All pictures taken by Steen | Written by Steen
Saturday, August 9, 2003 |
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RevelationZ Comments
| Comment by Yoni (Anonymous) - Sunday, August 10, 2003 | VERY entertaining reading! :)
..soon i will invent a cheaper solution to air travel!
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| Comment by Steen (Staff) - Sunday, August 10, 2003 | 
View Profile
Comments: 518 | | Excellent! You do that, and I'll keep the beers cool! :)
One day I will give you the full Wacken tour! One day...
Posted by Steen (Staff)
Sunday, August 10, 2003 |
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| Comment by Tommy (Member) - Sunday, August 10, 2003 | 
View Profile
Comments: 74
Ratings: 31 | | Well what can I say, we had a blast. Why is it that Smirnoff Ice always seems to get into the picture when we do things?
My report should appear sometime soon.
Looking forward to next year.
Tommy
RevelationZ Magazine
Posted by Tommy
Sunday, August 10, 2003 |
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| Comment by Anders (Anonymous) - Sunday, August 10, 2003 | But it looked like a tent when I bought it - seriously!
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| Comment by Ulrick (Anonymous) - Monday, August 11, 2003 | . what a tent it was. aahh. thx for an outstanding festival! he he See ya next year! Saxon here we cum!!
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| Comment by Bjarne..... (Anonymous) - Tuesday, August 12, 2003 | How stupid can someone be when you buy halt-a-tent......
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| Comment by Mads (Anonymous) - Tuesday, August 12, 2003 | How dumb are you??? just knowing one In Flames Track... If I have told you once i've told you a million times to listen to In Flames... you would be suppriced how brilliant they are...
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| Comment by Morten (Anonymous) - Tuesday, August 12, 2003 | ...had the Wacken experrience this year as well.
This was with out doubt much better organized than last year, every thing worked... and wuhuuu you did'nt have to walk for 30 min. to make use of a real toilet, way to go W.O.A. crew!
The music... well I'm not a big power metal fan... and not really into the black stuff as well, so-ooo well at least we had Jørn Lande, - very nice guy by the way, not at all as arrogant as I had imagnet. Well Mr Lande had the best vocals with out of doubt!! And we got to hear half of "Sunset Station" - not too schappy!
Slayer... well what an imbarresment, how arrogant can you be, they were the disgrace of W.O.A. 2003.
Twisted (Fucking!!!) Sister on the other hand, never really liked the music, but Dee Schneider was the stage precence of the festival - he kept running of stage, was he snorting coke or??
The band to bring home this year was The Quill, I would'nt call it metal, but heavy rock 'n' roll that grooves the heck out of any power metal (I call it Polka Metal) band, 45 min and 5 songs - Rock on boys! Oh year they were Swedish of caurse...
I could go on and on but I will not, hope to see some of you next year!!
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| Comment by Dennis your Virgin steel Brother. (Anonymous) - Wednesday, August 13, 2003 | That was the most excellent report and pictures. I`ve read and seen from a pretty fuc.... cool festival. Count me in next year! see you at iron maiden concert in nov.
cheers mate!
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| Comment by Dennis your Virgin steel Brother. (Anonymous) - Wednesday, August 13, 2003 | That was the most excellent report and pictures. I`ve read and seen from a pretty fuc.... cool festival. Count me in next year! see you at iron maiden concert in nov.
cheers mate!
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| Comment by YemKay (Anonymous) - Wednesday, September 8, 2004 | Thanks dude! My pics of Sonata Arctica from Wacken 2003 are bad, so thank you for putting those pics on!
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| Comment by Rock-Punk 4-ever!!! (Anonymous) - Monday, November 22, 2004 | sali zämmä, ich kenne twar di band nid.. aber ich finde jedi musik isch besser als, hip-hop so classsische scheiss u so züg..
jo ich lose wen metal den metallica... jäjo.. also schönne no
bye bye...!
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