There’s just four short weeks to the best metal party weekender of the year and BLOODSTOCK are still adding bands! Both weekend and day tickets are flying out the door, so don’t leave it too long to get yours if you haven’t already.
Keeping the power metal fans happy will be Italy’s ARTHEMIS, who join the main Ronnie James Dio stage. Having recently released new album, ‘Live From Hell’ and graced the Download Festival stage, ARTHEMIS return to visit their British friends again at Bloodstock. Get a taster of the band’s video for ‘We Fight’ here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf7vboNP89o or give them a ‘like’ on Facebook at www.facebook.com/arthemis.official.
A clutch of additions also grace the Sophie Lancaster stage over the weekend, including GURT, who bring their blues and groove of ‘70s rock and drag it backwards through a Louisiana swamp. Don’t call them sludge, Gurt are GURT! Joining them are Swedish melodic death metallers DEALS DEATH, Manchester five-piece BABYLON FIRE, Brit black metallers OLD CORPSE ROAD, up-and-coming prog metallers, COLLIBUS and lastly but not leastly, the return of the medieval minstrels of death metal, HAERKEN. Having recreated the Battle of Bannockburn with inflatable swords and maces in 2011, prepare yourselves for the funniest wall of death ever!!
The ‘Metal 2 The Masses’ tour continues raging across the land and these lucky bands win places on the ‘New Blood’ stage in August; self-appointed ‘roadkill metal’ outfit CONVINCING CLEARITY (Norway’s M2TM), sludge/noiseniks HOGSLAYER (Cardiff), melodic prog metallers METAPRISM (Bournemouth), old school lo-fi outfit ALL CONSUMED (Preston), anthemic, ground-breaking progsters AKB’AL, Yorkshire power/groove metal mash-up LEATHERNECK (Selby M2TM), Latvian modern metal quintet ONCE UPON, and straight-up headbangers THE SELF TITLED from Kent.
Meanwhile, the lovely folks over at Hobgoblin Beer picked their winners from their annual video upload contest. The death metal-infused KILL ALL THE GENTLEMEN were chosen from hundreds of applications online and voted on by fans worldwide. Catch the Exeter-based boys at the festival and don’t forget to zip by the Hobgoblin tent on site to visit the Goblin’s Lair. Maybe he’ll throw you a couple of freebies!
There’s also three brand new confirmations for the Jagermeister stage. First up, are feisty female Scottish trio THE AMORETTES. Fancy some operatic metal? Then don’t miss ENK ELINATION, with their classically trained former opera singer. Rounding things out, are ALZIR, the ‘intergalactic space porn doom rock’ types. A three piece borne from the love of beards, hard rock and loud valve amps. What’s not to like?!
