Honestly, Hellsinki Metal Festival was a great addition to the summer loop of festivals in Finland and more specifically Helsinki. It being a mostly open air metal festival focused more on extreme metal than for instance Tuska, who seems to have moved to other pastures in that realm, makes for an exciting time in the festival field. On the level of the line-up, there were definitely no complaints from our side, because contrary to most Finnish festivals they brought way more foreign bands. Which resulted in some really exceptional and special shows of bands that never came to Finland or rarely drop by this corner of the world. We’re hoping that they can continue this trend, because it really sets them apart from all the other festivals!

But the success of a festival depends on so much more than the line-up, since people who come down to the event have to spend a whole day (or several days) there, so there need to be plenty of comforts and other things to do whenever you need a break from the live music. Overall, the food and drinks available were pretty decent. The prices weren’t going too much overboard, seeing that it’s a festival and taking in account the economy, it wasn’t going to break your account. There is definitely lots of space to improve the food line-up, with there mostly being the quite basic festival foods, we’d be curious to see if that gets expanded towards the next edition. On the level of drinks, the basic Finnish festival crowds usually don’t need much more than your standard beer, cider and lonkero options, but it was nice to see some nice variety of cocktail bars being available nevertheless.

The organization was really adamant on promoting their own take on VIP tickets with the “R.I.P area”, which promised to be a whole experience. From our perspective, it seemed like they could find a lot to improve on this, since it looked like they basically had a fenced corner in the outside area with a handful of fancy chairs and a bar, but with almost as big lines as on the outside, it didn’t feel like getting a bang on your buck. There was a bouncy castle which is an odd but fun addition and inside bathrooms which almost no one seemed to find on the first day since there was almost no information on the location of said bathrooms. We’d think people would appreciate to actually get a somewhat more special experience when digging deep in their wallet to afford those extra pricy tickets.

A thing we’ve seen at some other festivals as well, is that organizations tend to put more effort into the festival experience by adding special activities and other elements that contribute to everything besides the performances. At Hellsinki Metal, we found some rather unique things with a chance to do bungee jumping outside, which was super unique and a fun option to do if you wanna do some daredevil stuff while your favorite band is playing.

And of course they also had SLAM! Wrestling Finland Activities providing pro wrestling matches inside during changeovers on the inside stage. Seemingly an oddity for the audience, providing more of a side thing to glance at while waiting for a band. It was still a fun addition and when people got more used to seeing matches the crowds got bigger and more enthusiastic. It was a bit weird though, that the area to do these matches was there since it took a lot of space away at the inside stage, contributing to the frustrating fact that ton of people couldn’t fit in the venue to see headlining bands like Watain. ; There was a ton of vendors in the inside grounds of Jäähalli from various clothing and record stores to a tattoo parlor. Outside was  Also in the same area as the inside stage SLAM! Wrestling Finland provided  Hopefully logistics with pro wrestling are more sorted this year around.

And then there was the “Brutal Bazar”. It sounded really exciting and promising, but honestly, it was a bit underwhelming. After having experienced the expanded Tuska Expo earlier this year, it felt a bit lackluster even though there were some rather unique and cool vendors and stands with even a tattoo parlor and for instance an info booth on the Satanic Church in Finland. It’ll be interesting to see if next year there will be a revamp or somewhat of an upgrade to that, because it definitely sounded really cool in the description when advertising it before the festival weekend.

Lastly, we want to briefly mention the security. While most of them were adequately doing their job and seemed friendly enough people, we encountered some situations that were rather questionable, to say it nicely. A lack of communication between the different crews, crowd and others present, and a seemingly too harsh and violent reaction to people crowdsurfing or moshing. We realize that crowdsurfing brings all kinds of hazards with them, and that they’re banned at most events in Finland, but we feel that there is no need to slam people into the floor and cuff them, simply because they’re having a good time and going a bit (too) wild on the music of their favorite bands. You’d think the security is there to secure a good and safe weekend for all involved, and not to increase the amount of hurting put on people. The security people at the fest might have been not experienced enough, or were not properly informed on how metal shows and festivals can bring out quite some excitement among people, we’re not sure, but we truly hope that this will get fixed towards the next edition.

All in all, we loved Hellsinki Metal Fest. Great bands, awesome crowd and despite the bad things, a very chill atmosphere. This is a fun addition to summer festivals and we believe they are here to stay and grow bigger by the year.