Because of the great lineup of the previous years and the great festival we already experienced last year, we are really looking forward to this year’s edition of this French metal party. The fortunate people who have a ticket will be in for a treat, with an amazing lineup and probably many surprises.
At last year’s edition we noticed the long queue at the Hellfest City Square, where people could already buy their early-bird tickets for Hellfest 2016. During the festival this rapidly resulted in a – SOLD OUT – sign at the concerned stall. In the mean time, the festival has been completely sold out for months. Do you have a ticket? Let’s party together! Did you not get a chance to buy one? We will review the festival to make sure you can enjoy it in another way!
The lineup not only features the great headliners and bands from the world of metal, but is also very interesting because of the variation of bands from all of the rock, metal and punk spectrum.
Rammstein, Twisted Sister, Black Sabbath, Volbeat, Korn, The Offspring, Ghost, Abbath,.. The list goes on and on. And these are only few of the headliners that are awaiting us. There’s more than 150 bands on the lineup, where even the sub-headliners and smaller bands are impressive. We can enjoy these bands at the 6 stages Hellfest has to offer. There are 2 mainstages for the headliners, special acts and popular bands, and 4 smaller stages that are divided by (sub-)genre. We can chill out with stoner and doom at The Valley, The Warzone states the obvious chaos and intensity of punk and hardcore, and we can find i.a. death, black and folk at The Altar and The Temple. This way there’s something for everyone and you immediately know where to go.
RUNNING ORDER
Check out this link to make your personal running order.
Some of the bands that we are looking forward to :
Black Sabbath and Twisted Sister, who are both on their farewell tour, and Disturbed, who returned from hiatus last year and at the same time released their first album in five years. Another band that will bring along some new songs to the stage is Amon Amarth, so we’re in for a treat! Rammstein will make our hearts burn with Amour for what we expect to be another amazing and thrilling show. We already got a great show from Ghost at the Vooruit in our own Ghent this spring and we’re really looking forward to another live ritual and King Diamond will certainly blow us away too with a stunning live show. For the fans of the more punk-ish kind of music we can enjoy the old school punk rock from The Offspring and have a Celtic moshing party with Dropkick Murphys.
Needless to say the mainstage area isn’t the only place to see some great shows. Korpiklaani and Heidevolk will start some great folk metal parties at the Temple whereas bands like Testament, Sacred Reich and Overkill will take care of our hunger for the wilder and more aggressive Thrash metal. We could go on and on because of this amazing lineup, but in sum there’s just a great amount of bands for every genre!
LOCATION
From Ghent, or Belgium in general, we have to travel through France for a pretty long time. For this trip you should keep the péage in mind. You have to stop at a tollbooth a few times, keep a hold on your toll-ticket and pay up when asked by the machines. At this time it can come in handy to have a credit card. When you are finally in the neighborhood of the festival, and reach Clisson, there are almost no signs of the festival to be found, so you’ll probably have to search and drive around for a bit. You can try to ask Hellfest’s traffic control crew, but they generally don’t speak a word of English.
FESTIVAL AREA
Most of the festival area is the same as last year, but on the new Hellfest Map we notice some small changes. The Warzone was moved to get a better flow towards and from the area, and the skate park is no longer blocking the main road, but moved to a more remote location, next to the main wine-bar.
In the Metalcorner you can party all night with several (local) bands, DJs and movies. It already starts on Wednesday evening with one hell of a pre-party, where you can bring your own booze and food, since it’s ‘officially’ on the camping site. For the people who have enough money there are also a few bars, a wine bar and some food stalls.
When you follow the road towards the festival site, you will arrive at the Hell City Square, which you will recognize as it is the first place you see when you pass the festival entrance. Here you can find cool building-like artwork inspired by Camden Street in London, toilets, an ATM, some of Hellfest’s partners, the info-point, the Extreme market and probably early-bird tickets for Hellfest 2017. At the Extreme Market you can find labels and distro’s that sell the merch of your favorite bands.
The festival site itself contains a big infield with several bars, Hellfest-food stalls and merchandise stalls. Then there are the different stages we already explained and the usual sanitary facilities. Between The Temple and The Valley and all the way opposite the mainstages there are normal flushing toilets and taps where you can find drinking water for free. There’s a ferris wheel, a forest where you can chill in the shadows of the trees, a skating ramp and next to the forest you can find several great food stalls.
And of course this wouldn’t be France if there weren’t any special wine bars, which you can find at several places in the festival area for the thirsty wine-lovers or elitist show-offs. Santé!
PRACTICAL INFO
In the case of great weather it’s nice to have a (dust)mask to cover your face from the dust. It can also be nice to put it under the water taps and get some refreshment on those hot summer days in Hell.
The Official Hellfest Merch stands are sold out rapidly, so it’s smart to get your Hellfest T-shirt or other merch at the beginning of the festival.
If you forgot your ear plugs: you can get them for free opposite the mainstages, and there’s a possibility to buy (better) ear plugs too.
It’s really great if you speak French, since almost none of the crew speaks English.
You can’t buy cigarettes anywhere on the festival site, because that’s prohibited in France. So bring a stash or deal with it.
There’s an empty spot on Saturday’s lineup, would we get a surprise, like the fireworks last year?
It’s allowed to crowdsurf, but French people seem to barely understand the unwritten rules, so there’s a big chance you will just crash on your head.
FOOD & DRINKS
The prizes of the beverages are really ok at Hellfest. A Hellfest-cup is 28cl and costs €1. But watch out! This is no refund, you really buy the cup, so if you pay for new ones, you’ll have a lot of cups at the end of the festival. Sometimes you get a clean cup in return, but they can just fill up your dirty cup as well. Talking about filling the cups: a full cup of soda or beer (Kronenbourg) is €2,50 and wine €4. You pay €2 for a jug (150cl) which you can fill up for €13 for beer and €20 for wine. So if you don’t lose too many cups the prizes are ok, especially for a festival these days. Own drinks, cans and glass are prohibited on the festival site, but allowed on the camping site.
A really big advantage (especially for vegetarians or people with food allergies) is that you can bring your own food onto the festival site. This can seriously limit the amount of money you would spend at a festival, make it somewhat healthier, or you can bring snacks to fit into your busy time schedule. Between the entrance and the forest there are a lot of food stalls with a great range of food, including vegetarian and gluten-free options.
To buy your own food: there is a supermarket in Clisson, on about a 5 minute walk from the camping site. This supermarket is huge and we’re sure you can find almost anything you would need, so it’s really not necessary to bring your own food from home. You can also buy ice there, to keep your food/drinks cold. The beer in the supermarket is mainly sold in glass bottles. Therefore there’s a lot of glass on the camping site, so you might want to watch where you walk.
PAYCARD / MONEY
There are ATM’s at the Hell City Square and at the supermarket in Clisson, but there will be long queues and sometimes they are out of service so make sure to take enough cash with you. Also it can come in handy to have a credit card, since the supermarket sometimes doesn’t accept normal maestro cards.
Then there’s Hellfest’s cashless paycards. You can put money on them at the Hell City Square and on several locations on the festival infield. You can use this card to pay for your drinks at the Hellfest-bars and for the food at the Hellfest-snack stalls. You can NOT use them at the other food stalls, there you have to use cash.
CAMPING AREA
The camping at Hellfest is included in your ticket, and the area is located just next to the festival area. You can enter the camping site starting Thursday at 2PM with your ticket.
SANITARY FACILITIES & WATER
There is NO free water at the camp site, you have to buy a €6 “water point” bracelet to get unlimited water and to shower. The water points at the infield however, are for free.
The toilets at the camp site and Metal Corner are no Dixi’s, but cartboard boxes that stay reasonably fresh during the hot summer days and they smell a lot less than Dixi’s, thanks to the sawdust that’s thrown into the toilets. A big thanks to the heroes who sit behind those boxes and keep them clean. At the camp site there’s usually toilet paper, but at the festival site you’re smart to bring your own. All the way opposite the mainstages and in between The Temple and The Valley there are normal flushing toilets and water points.
PHONE CHARGING, INFO POINT
Next to the entrance, at the Hell City Street, you can charge your cellphone, but there are often very long queues and you can only charge it for 30 minutes, which makes that you’d better bring a powerbank or find an other way to charge your phone. The info point is located at the Hell City Square, and it also contains the Lost&Found.
GARBAGE & GARBAGE BINS, TRASH DEPOSIT
To keep the area clean you can get a “camping bag” with goodies at the camp site to use as a garbage bag. You can hand in your full garbage bags for a token that holds a possibility to win several prizes and VIP tickets for Hellfest 2017. There are 3 colors of garbage bags, to recycle. You can also put them at the camping “roads”, where the Hellfest crew will collect them. The French are really clean at the camp site ánd the festival site. There are a lot of garbage bins, the reusable Hellfest cups are great and the people really recycle, which results in a nice and clean festival area.
WHEN CAN WE START?
Parking: Thursday the 16th of June @ 12pm
Camping: Thursday the 16th of June @ 2pm, until monday the 22nd of June@ 12pm.
Ticket office : Thursday the 16th of June at 2pm
Festival: Friday the 17th at 10am until sundaynight 2am
GET IN THE MOOD FOR HELL
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1hn3UYERV0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziHF8lDOUvk
IPHONE AND ANDROID APP
The official Hellfest app (iPhone en Android) can be downloaded for free on the AppStore and Android Market! With this app, you’ll be able to follow all the latest news about Hellfest 2016 before, during and after the festival. The application offers the following features:
Festival news
Notifications “Push” (on iPhone)
Full lineup
Photo and video galleries
Integrated Twitter app
Access to e-tickets
Personalize your Hellfest schedule by adding your favorite bands
Practical info (transport, camping etc.)
Sharing on Facebook and Twitter
Geolocalization
MORE INFO
Hellfest 2016 takes place from the 17th till 19th of june 2016 in Clisson, France.
For more information check out their website and facebookpage.
Join the official facebook-event.
And read our own report on last year’s edition.
