Motörhead - Soulfly - Clawfinger - Bloodhound Gang - Millencolin - Misfits - Sepultura - Sodom - The Bones - Discipline - Hammerhead - Cro-Mags - All Shall Perish - Elvis Jackson - Disco Ensemble - The Carburetors - Neaera - Kamikaze Queens - Peter Pan Speedrock - Hatesphere - Anthrax

A brand new festival, made to get another piece from the action, launched by old stagers yet with proper teething troubles and negatively experienced moments… The DEVIL SIDE FESTIVAL 2009!
But before I get started with some points let me say one thing first – and here all ones of the writing guild agree – many, many thanks to Gisela ov Spider Rock Promotion and the guys & girls of CCS Security for the exceptional and amiable support and assistance. Without you we would have been in a fix ;) Thank you so much!

So! I also would like to put in front the fact that I absolutely loved the motley billing and audience. The inaugural festival offered bands I probably would never have went to see at a “normal” show. There were some big surprises and all for a really fair ticket prize.

:: Livestory :: Photos ::

Roughly 8000 people found its way to this wonderful location called LaPaDu in short (Country park North) and this although there were many other festivals taking place this weekend (Graspop, Bang Your Head, Tuska, Peace & Love, Serengeti...etc.). Roughly 8000 people who really knocked at the door at 11am when ANTHRAX was supposed to kick off this festival. And here a long list of shortcomings set in, which made this festival to somewhat of a negative-event, despite of all the cool bands.

Don’t get me wrong: It’s the first festival the guys from the Matrix Club (Bochum, Germany) organized on their own, BUT… that’s not people totally unknown to that business. No way! These guys have a long, long experience in organizing shows, events and co-hosting festivals. How they still could fail at so many points… That’s totally incomprehensible to me. Not professional at all.

The facts:
• Sold tickets in advance – approx. 6000 – were known. The weather forecast was safe: hot and sticky. The opening band: ANTHRAX, booked by the organizers of course, no secret act, ya know. ANTHRAX was supposed to kick off at 11am, HATESPHERE at 10.30am. Guess when they opened the doors? At 10 o’clock! With already 5000 fans waiting in front of!!! First big mistake!
Who made it inside was NOT allowed to leave entire area again (car, drinks, meeting friends outside etc.) No wristband. Only 1 tetra pack was allowed to take inside, no bottles at all. The next huge bummer!!!
• Inside: 10 beverage carts for 8000 people at 29 °C and sticky weather = 45 up to 60 minutes queue time for warm beer with more froth than liquid and 3.50 Euro. Service was hopelessly overstrained, acting bitchy and snotty. After half of the festival has passed by, no beer, no water, no coke anymore, neither cups nor change!!! It was unbelievable. There was a fire service standpipe that needed to be guarded by the security coz of the terribly long queues and first riots.
In the meantime there is statement to read about this situation on the organizers festival homepage.
• Next problem: TOILETS!!! There were none! Just a handful of Dixis (a 20th row), for 8000 people! Even backstage a huge problem, seeing the artists “using” hedges, bushes and trees with own tissues. Sorry, that was an absolutely NO-GO!!!
• Last but not least: The waste! I saw only 4 dumpsters on the entire festival area, which is designed for 12.000 people. No refuse-bags anywhere. What was in hands got dropped, everywhere. Great, isn’t it? Later I saw 3 teens walking around with gripping tongs but they didn’t even try rudimentarily to keep at least a small place clean. Well, who would at this?
• At this amount of attendees the festival area was already unpleasantly crowded and shuttling between the stages was quite troublesome. I never could see an entire show, because I wouldn’t have made it into the photopit on time for the next band on the other side of this area. Maybe organizers should have located booths outside the stage areas, especially the cocktail bars, which were exactly put in the middle between both stages, in the middle of the field of view.

Press people got stitched here. From the fourth band on we only could pass accompanied by security, who led us outside through the backstage area. If they forgot to pick us up, we had to slap through inside. Literally. Around the 8th band rules got even tightened: Take photos and out of the pit (everybody, also the writers) and off to the other stage! Means, only 3 songs to see and hear from a band. Because, when arriving on the other side you couldn’t hear anything anymore. Sometimes we not even had this 3 songs as there was another (very harsh) security company at Hellstage its guys couldn’t count till 3. Besides, the stages were pretty high and the pit small. A pain for the photographers but a pleasure for the fans I guess ;)

And at the end a couple of Nazis attended this festival, one even with naked body allover tattooed and showing his preferences for special bands. Of course, he remained unmolested. Such fuckers don’t belong on such festival!!!

Upshot: discontented fans in series. Not less left this festival long before its end. Much criticism was passed on the festival, even more will follow. Fans that made it to the beverage carts didn’t order beer in normal cups but in 2 or 3 liter units and indulged in pressure fueling. With the known aftermath. Better than to die of thirst I guess, since nobody knew when and where to get the next drink…

As it seems there will be a second edition of this festival in 2010. If the organizers don’t want to go bust they have to change a lot of things. Shortcomings were clearly named by many, many people and need to be fixed. Fewer bands, more time in between and the same kind of great billing… then it might be a successful one. Oh, and get yourself a proofreader for the festival booklet, then there might be less embarrassing mistakes.

story & pics © Dajana