‘Welcome home, where’s the beer’? The first line you hear when you get to Wacken. Then you know you’re in for a good time. Unfortunately, time flies by very fast when you are heaving fun. Rain or shine. This year, Wacken was definitely a shine edition. With temperatures above 30 degrees, the free ice cold water was more than welcome. Luckily there were enough places to get water, you just had to find the right one where there was no waiting line. But enough of these random facts. Lets get to the point.

Friday, August 3.

Friday started off with Amaranthe (***). It’s been 6 years since they played at Wacken. A couple of their bags were lost, so they had to borrow equipment from the festival itself. But nevertheless, they always put up a great show. With ‘Maximize’ as the opener, ‘The Nexus’ as the closer and songs like ‘Amaranthine’, ‘Digital World’ and ‘1000.000 Lightyears’ in between, this was a solid show with mostly all hit songs. Lead singer Elize Ryd said they were releasing a new song on august 9, and they did. It’s called ‘365’ and it has this kind of more poppy/electronic vibe to it, check it out here:

Korpiklaani (****1/2) was simply awesome! I don’t think I ever danced so much during a show before. Including polonaise and arm-in-arm dancing and the lot, it was fun and awesome! The crowd is really important for the experience of a concert. I noticed that now. Having seen Korpiklaani before, but with a crowd that doesn’t move is completely different than with one that wants to built a party. The Wacken crowd definitely wanted to party. They played songs like ‘Rauta’, ‘Vodka’, ‘Beer Beer’ and ‘Man With a Plan’.

2Cellos (***1/2) was one in particular that I was curious about. They are known for their stuff on Youtube, but they proved they are really good live as well. Plus you can basically put them on any festival. They just adjust their theme. Now they played rock/metal songs like ‘The Trooper’ from Iron Maiden, ‘Can’t Get No Satisfaction’ form the Rolling Stones, ‘Highway to Hell’ from AC/DC and ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ by Guns ’N Roses. At the end they ran out of rock songs to play and they played an Avicii song. That one didn’t do as well as the rock songs. But none the less is was a really cool experience. Kind of like an ‘Apocalyptica light’. You know, Apocalyptica plays with 4 cellos and 2Cellos, with, you know, 2… Get the joke? I’m just trolling around here.

Nightwish (****) gave a good mix of new songs and old songs. New songs like ‘Elan’ and old songs like ‘Nemo’, ‘Slaying the Dreamer’ and ‘Wish I had an Angel’. Actually, more old songs if you look at it. Lead singer Floor Jansen does sing the songs a bit lower than they originally are, but she makes it fit for her voice and one hell of a blast comes form her and the band. Really nice to hear these songs again. Always elegant and beautiful, yet very powerful.

In Flames (***1/2) always has a very emotional show. They put all their energy into every note they play. The stage was filled with different pillars with screens, that blended in with the big screen in the background. It was used for amazing visual effects. On top of that, a lot of pyrotechnics in front of the stage were used as well (Yeah, In Flames used a lot of flames. Didn’t expect that huh?). Opening up with ‘My Sweet Shadow’, fully assisted by flames, was one hell of an opener and one hell of a show in total.

For more pictures go check out our photo coverage here.