LIVE REVIEW: Download Festival 2025 – Sunday
After a blisteringly hot weekend, the end approaches for Download Festival 2025 as the sun again shines brightly on the final day. It’s been one hell of a weekend so far, and there’s still another stacked day ahead, culminating in a long-overdue headline set from a band that have ever been the bridesmaid, and are finally the bride.
NECKBREAKKER – Dogtooth Stage
Death metal at 11am on day three is a lot, but NECKBREAKKER don’t care – and they’re utterly pulverising. They live up to their name with stankface inducing riffs and thundering groove. It’s an impressive feat for any band, never mind one whose members are so young. With arms waving to some parts and “hey” chants to others, along with a surprising amount of pit action for this point of the festival, they kick off the Dogtooth‘s Sunday offering in glorious fashion.
Rating: 8/10
BLEED FROM WITHIN – Apex Stage
Opening up this incredible set, BLEED FROM WITHIN continued on their rise by proving themselves worthy of the main stage, from the energy, the crowd work and the production. It’s a flawless set, each song building upon the last, to come to the epic conclusion of In Place Of Your Halo which shakes the crowd into a frenzy. BLEED FROM WITHIN took this slot and ran with it, proving themselves to deserve a much higher spot on the stage in the coming years.
Rating: 9/10
AMIRA ELFEKY – Avalanche Stage
She’s had a meteoric rise, and AMIRA ELFEKY finally brings her nu-gaze to Donington Park on the Avalanche stage. With the main stage having been pushed back, she now clashes almost directly with BLEED FROM WITHIN, but still draws a solid crowd for her festival debut. “Are you awake out there,” she grins early on to a deafening reception. It’s vibes music in the best way, shimmering vocals and grungy, 2000s sounding guitars that transport Download Festival back to that era without losing sight of the present.
Rating: 8/10
VOWER – Dogtooth Stage
There was already a lot of noise surrounding VOWER from their previous bands, but they’ve more than established themselves on their own terms with their debut EP Apricity and recent single Deadweight. They’re also making their Download Festival debut on a weekend packed with them – testament to the festival’s renewed focus on platforming new and emerging talent – and are on terrific form as usual. “We’ve been a band for a year,” they marvel early on, before unveiling a brand new track designed to get heads banging. A showing like this, it surely won’t be long before they’re invited back and climbing up the billing.
Rating: 8/10
MALEVOLENCE – Avalanche Stage
One of the worst-kept secret sets thanks to a lanyard printing mishap, perhaps, but still a remarkable booking for the weekend. That ultimately means good luck getting into the tent – but it’s worth the effort for a furious, career-affirming set from MALEVOLENCE. Chants of “Yorkshire” go up while their intro plays before If It’s All the Same To You turns the tent into a war zone. Hurling out Life Sentence early on along with Self Supremacy, which they dedicate to the labels ten years ago who didn’t see what was in front of them, it’s a belligerent set that plasters grins across faces and bodies across the floor. This may have been a “secret” set on a smaller stage, but it cements that the next time they’re here, they deserve to be on a far bigger stage. Oh, and that new album is going to crush.
Rating: 9/10
ALIEN ANT FARM – Opus Stage
A mosh pit for the dads only? Those are the orders from ALIEN ANT FARM frontman Dryden Mitchell. Although struggling somewhat with sound issues, the mic cutting in and out throughout, the California rockers put on a decent show in the baking sun. Mitchell took a moment to acknowledge his three years of hard work to stay sober before playing the emotional Storms Over and the band finished out with their infamous 2001 cover of Smooth Criminal for which the crowd predictably went bananas.
Rating: 7/10
PRESIDENT – Dogtooth Stage
The second anonymous band of the weekend took place in the form of masked mystery men PRESIDENT. Their first inaugural “rally”, as they describe their shows, saw the crowd spilling out of the Dogtooth Stage for a mid afternoon slot with people dying to see what all the fuss was about after a series of great marketing leading up to the show. Their performance saw that the hype and mystery behind the band was worth the wait as they deliver a short set with two released songs, Fearless and In The Name of the Father which already are boasting mass singalongs from the crowd, a huge achievement for a band that has only just come onto the scene. While it’s abundantly obvious who the singer really is, the anonymity behind the band is what makes watching them enjoyable, instead of focusing on the individuals, you’re focusing more on the music which is what it’s all about at the end of the day.
Rating: 7/10
SPIRITBOX – Apex Stage
Cast your mind back three years; it’s 2022 and the Avalanche Stage is bursting at the seams with people hyped about an upcoming band making their UK debut. Flash back to today. That same band are decimating the main stage, having continued to exceed expectations with both their debut album Eternal Blue and its subsequent follow-up, Tsunami Sea, earlier this year. That band are SPIRITBOX, and they are on top of the world. From just half an hour three years ago to an entire hour now, with tens of thousands of people watching enraptured, they bring the house down. Fata Morgana is a blistering opener, while Perfect Soul shimmers in the air. Later, Sew Me Up sashays out of the PA between crushing renditions of Holy Roller and Soft Spine that vocalist Courtney LaPlante dedicates to “everyone I fucking hate”. All the while, the quartet are in command of every inch of the stage and seemingly everyone in the crowd. It’s a masterful showing from one of metalcore’s brightest hopes and proves that with the trajectory of the last three years, even the sky might not be the limit.
Rating: 10/10
BULLET FOR MY VALENTINE – Apex Stage
After abruptly cancelling their tour amid rumours of tension with TRIVIUM, BULLET FOR MY VALENTINE waste no time dispelling any negativity, launching into a thunderous performance of Her Voice Resides. What follows is an electrifying run through their seminal 2004 debut album The Poison – a record that shaped the modern metalcore blueprint. As the Welsh quartet rip through anthems like Tears Don’t Fall and Hand of Blood, frontman Matt Tuck commands the stage like a true headliner, striding down the runway flanked by pyros. The set closes with a bold declaration: BULLET will headline Download Festival one day. After a performance this powerful, here’s hoping the next album gives them the momentum to do just that.
Rating: 9/10
ME FIRST AND THE GIMMIE GIMMIES – Avalanche Stage
On a day where the lineup was dominated by heavier acts, ME FIRST make for a welcome respite from the seriousness of it all. Part stand-up set, part good old fashioned singalong, their set is high energy and encompasses everything from DOLLY PARTON to ELTON JOHN. No flamingos were harmed in the making of this set, but plenty of fun was had, and seeing a crowd of metalheads dancing around to ABBA is really quite something.
Rating: 7/10
KIDS IN GLASS HOUSES – Avalanche Stage
Introduced as “the real Princes of Wales,” KIDS IN GLASS HOUSES returned to the industry last year with Pink Flamingo, their first album after 9 long years on hiatus, and tonight they take to the Avalanche Stage for an hour long walk down memory lane. They open their set with Theme From Pink Flamingo before barrelling into fan favourites Give Me What I Want and Undercover Lover. Unfortunately in typical Download fashion, there are technical issues aplenty during their set. Leading man Aled Phillips‘ frustration is clear as he rips off his earpiece midway through their performance of Sunshine, letting the audience know afterwards “I couldn’t hear myself at all during that” but all credit to him for still producing an excellent vocal performance regardless. The technical issues continue off and on throughout the remainder of the set, but the band power through regardless. We also get the announcement of their upcoming 15th anniversary tour for their second album Dirt before they close out with singalong classic Saturday. Bowing out and wishing the crowd a good time “watching Freak on A Leash,” they snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.
Rating: 8/10
KORN – Apex Stage
The boys from Bakersfield have had to agonisingly wait their turn while their peers (SLIPKNOT, LINKIN PARK and SYSTEM OF A DOWN) all received their shot at headlining the hallowed main stage of Donington Park. 2025 was finally their year and anyone who questioned their credentials to close the festival were firmly silenced with the nu-metal veterans masterfully navigating a career spanning set list packed with front-to-back bangers. Opting to open with iconic single Blind, immediately sending the crowd into a frenzy, is more than enough proof to display that the quintet have no intentions to casually ‘dial it in’ and they don’t take their foot off the pedal for a mere moment. Playing a sizeable chunk from their debut album, KORN also aren’t afraid to delve into the lesser known tracks such as Divine, Dirty and Ball Tongue, meticulously slotting them in amongst singalong anthems Twisted Transistor, Did My Time and Y’all Want A Single.
Unlike their headlining compatriots GREEN DAY and SLEEP TOKEN, KORN don’t dabble in fireworks, pyro or theatricality. Instead, preferring to lead with what brought them to the dance in the first place – raw, no frills attitude. In a set that feels like it vanishes in the blink of an eye, it’s clear to see just exactly what it meant to KORN to finally receive their flowers with frontman Jonathan Davis taking multiple opportunities to thank the crowd for their support betwixt dishing out some of the strongest vocal performances of his entire career during their headline debut. It’s about damn time.
Rating: 10/10
Words: Will Marshall, Alex Morgan, Ed Walton, Ben Blissett, Dan McHugh
And that wraps up our coverage of the Sunday of this year’s Download Festival! Check out our coverage of Saturday and Friday‘s action, we’ll see you next year!
Like Download Festival on Facebook.