FESTIVAL PREVIEW: Bloodstock Festival 2024
Bloodstock, the Mecca of metal in the UK, is back. Year on year, the festival curates a lineup that spans the entire breadth of heavy music for four action-packed days at Catton Hall and 2024 is no different. With numerous stages and countless bands, for newbies and veterans alike, determining who to watch at this year’s Bloodstock is a challenge. Ahead of this weekend’s action, we preview this year’s festival – giving you the lowdown on who to watch!
As is tradition, the Thursday of this year’s Bloodstock Festival intends to ease festival-goers into the action with a small but mighty lineup on the festival’s seconds stage; The Sophie Lancaster Stage. Being tasked to open the festival is no simple task and this year, the task falls to Northern Irish outfit ACID AGE. Fusing thrash with jazz is an odd mix, and one that has intrigue, and it will be interesting to hear how this plays out on the big stage.
Elsewhere, Thursday boasts fist-raising and heavy metal singalongs with trad metal revivalists TAILGUNNNER before shock rockers SOUTH OF SALEM bring the spice to Bloodstock. HELLRIPPER, on the other hand, will inject copious amounts of speed and incite bedlam in the pit with their wicked black thrash cocktail and continue to cement their status as one of the UK’s most exhilarating bands, before Swedish emotive prog metallers EVERGREY close the day with thumping anthems from both their new album Theories Of Emptiness and extensive discography.
Friday marks the first full day of live action for Bloodstock and those with heavy heads fear not, as Oxford-based riff lords DESERT STORM will blow off the cobwebs as they open the Ronnie James Dio Main Stage. Later, the likes of Brazilian death/thrashers NERVOSA, epic heavy metallers GRAND MAGUS and homegrown heroes GREEN LUNG will keep the action in top gear throughout the Friday afternoon. Greek black metal legends ROTTING CHRIST and Norwegian prog-meets-black metal veterans ENSLAVED both will triumph on Friday’s afternoon slots whilst a one-two punch of HATEBREED and CLUTCH will ignite the Friday night party before headliners OPETH will perform a special exclusive set which has been curated by the fans.
Elsewhere, hard rock trio HAXAN and thrashers DISPOSABLE open the Sophie Lancaster Stage and New Blood Stage respectively, before fans are treated to live displays from death metallers BURNER and DEATHCOLLECTOR, prog and UK Tech-Fest flagbearers EXIST IMMORTAL and thumping trad metal from WOLF and ETERNAL CHAMPION. THE VINTAGE CARAVAN will bring their trippy psych rock to Bloodstock Festival‘s Friday evening whilst Sophie Lancaster Stage headliner IGORRR will bring the experimental and the weird to draw the curtain on day one.
Rolling into Saturday, and there’s a wealth of talent on offer for fans of every sub-genre of metal. Whether it’s hardcore newcomers CAULDRON and rising alt rockers UNPEOPLE on The Sophie Lancaster Stage, the trap-metal of MIMI BARKS, industrial-driven tunes of COMBICHRIST or Ukrainian modern metallers IGNEA, there is a breadth of various styles and sounds on offer throughout the day.
Brazilian death thrashers CRYPTA will ignite bedlam, UNLEASH THE ARCHERS‘ will have fists raised with their epic power metal whereas death metal legends DEICIDE will make a UK exclusive appearance and deliver a blasphemous bludgeoning. And looking into Saturday evening’s action and there is much to whet the appetite. WHITECHAPEL will give a set to remember with their crushing riffs before UK heavy hitters MALEVOLENCE, a band who have demolished the festival back in 2022, return to sub-headline the main stage with their biggest show to date. Expect carnage and sheer aural brilliance. SYLOSIS will dazzle with their groove-laden metal and Finnish folk metallers KORPIKLAANI will provie the soundtrack for the party as they close The Sophie Lancaster Stage. Prior to that though, ARCHITECTS will make their Bloodstock debut to headline the Saturday. The band have huge admiration in the heavy music scene and they have plenty of anthems in the locker to keep the energy high. It’s a bold move from the festival given its more traditional affiliation with the heavier end of metal, but if it works, then it will be one for the history books.
By the time Sunday arrives, there will be many flaggers and weary heads from three days of action, but Bloodstock Festival‘s offerings on Sunday will ensure that energy remains high. Comedy troupe RAISED BY OWLS – a band that can boast some of the silliest song titles in death metal – kick off the action on the main stage and later sets by prog metallers SOEN, power metallers BEAST IN BLACK and epic symphonic death metallers SEPTICFLESH will keep the adrenaline surging. On the Sophie Lancaster Stage, melodic metalcore crew AWAKE BY DESIGN will surely turn some heads, OSIAH will deliver an aural wrecking ball to the stage, and hardcore mob GROVE STREET will create chaos and pits aplenty.
Back to back sets from THE NIGHT FLIGHT ORCHESTRA and FLOGGING MOLLY on the main stage is somewhat a leftfield choice given Bloodstock‘s clientele but the cheesy anthems and punky swagger delivered by the respective bands will be a nice palate cleanser before a run of thrash from SADUS and XENTRIX, death metal royalty in the form of CARCASS and powerful modern metal from INFECTED RAIN.AMON AMARTH, arguably one of the biggest bands in our world, return to conquer Bloodstock with an eagerly awaited headlining performance that will boast pyro, epic Viking battles and a soundtrack of epic melodic death metal. And then attention turns to black metal veterans SATYRICON who bring the darkness and snarling riffs to close Bloodstock Festival 2024.
Four days of metal awaits. We’ll see you in the pit!
Bloodstock Festival 2024 is set to take place at Catton Park, Derbyshire from 8th August – 11th August 2024. Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased here.
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