Wacken Open Air 2000

Wacken?

For those who don't know Wacken Open Air, an introduction is needed: For the past 11 years this little village in Germany have been the host for this great metal-festival. Slowly through its history the festival has been growing and is now counting about 22.000 visitors and 67 bands.
Metal-heads from all over the world travels to Wacken every summer to enjoy the music, atmosphere and intense partying. And so did we on friday 3rd August 2000 - with our cars fully loaded with tents, beers and some bagage for the weekend - and of course big expectations for what we were about to be part of.

On four stages the program was scheduled so that you had plenty of concerts to pick between - often we end up, walkin' from one scene to another. Perhaps only interupted by a short stop at one of the many beer-stands for a little refueling.

The bands...

Both Friday and Saturday the program was tight filled with great bands - some of our favorites were: Royal Hunt, Rhapsody, Stratovarius, Iced Earth, Gamma Ray, Hypocrisy, Artillery, Labyrinth, Zakk Wylde, Onkel Tom, Sentenced, Entombed, Morbid Angel, Venom and Heir Apparent!!

Playing with fire

Even though we saw Stratovarius in Copenhagen in April 2000, this was
a no-miss event!
In the middle of a great show Timo Kotipelto unfortunately got his hand in the way, when the pyros blasted away. Despite his severe burns, he managed to make it through the show - that's metal!!! Due to the accident, the following tour to South America were cancelled.

Saturday was a day with a wonderful mix of hangovers, more heavy metal music and a lot of beers and fun. Besides a lot of concerts, we also talked with some of the 'stars' in the VIP-area, actually ending up in a long talk with Ville of Sentenced, both about their performance earlier and down-to-earth things like favorite beers and girlfriends.

A Perfect Metal Weekend!

A 3-day trip 150 km south of the Danish-German border can obviously only be labelled A Perfect Metal Weekend - and when we hit August 2001, there's no doubt where we're heading... Wacken Open Air!!. See Ya!