Live Review

Sonisphere Day 2 Review – Knebworth

• 3rd Aug 2010

Saturday started with a hop and a skip and then a full out pelt in order to make it to the Media Centre ready to take on the day’s host of bands that festival goers had flocked to see. Yes Saturday also saw the arrival of the bulk of people who were missing from the Friday start the night before – and with bands playing all day long we Sonisphere was working on full steam.

After forcing together Glasswerk’s team of four we discussed who was heading in what direction (of which you will hear much more about from the team in the reviews to come!) My first item on my agenda was to get to the main Apollo stage and shoot Lacuna Coil.

Working hard as a media person (being both Photographer and Reviewing) can be at times frustrating at a festival as you have to run around so much more than someone simply enjoying the music (Yesterday I may have pointed my camera at an impressionable Europe, the frankly amazing Gary Numan, and a sadly lacking Alice Cooper – I still managed to miss their retrospective hits “The Final Countdown,” “Cars,” and “Poison” as I was so busy!). Make no mistake – I wouldn’t want to give it up any time soon – but it is very exhausting with barely time to drink or eat along the way.

Every band we wanted to shoot we had to rendezvous with the stressed (probably even more so than us) PR who would escorted us behind the scenes in order to access the photo pit at the front of each stage. I was fairly relaxed for Lacuna coil as I only brought one lens with which to shoot them, and fairly indifferent to what their sound was going to be. So here it is best said I am not really much of a fan of this type of rock. I do love my female singers in rock, and think there should be more. But I’m more on the gothic and ethereal and twisted side of this than the balls out manly rock that happens to incorporate a female singer.

So despite Princess Scabbia looking the part and putting in an energetic effort, her male counterpart vocalist grates the ears with his throaty shouting. The rest of the band are kind of there playing rock we’ve heard before. But not wanting to rain too heavily on their parade once I got the shots I went for a gentle walk through an early and impressive crowd looking for the next item on my list.

Turns out the next thing on my list was to go sit on my ass and charge up two of our Mobile devices and camera batteries whilst another reviewing went off to shoot another band. Here I got to listen in on some interesting press and photographers views on the music and the set up of the festival. But I was only down for about half an hour as it was then time to get in line for taking photos of Anthrax. Last year Anthrax had a similar mid day spot with 90’s vocalist John Bush – who played a large part in converting me over to becoming more of an Anthrax fan.

This year almost seemed like DeJa-Vu as the band took the stage looking (and dressed) almost identical to last year – but the big difference was the absence of John Bush as they band have since reformed with their original long term singer Joey Belladonna. And although I knew he was back, I was worried about what he may or may not do for me as a fan – and (like last year) I was knocked away with the effort he put in. I didn’t think it was possible that the band could punch the same impact as I took from them last year but they did it!

I leave headed up to check out the Bohemia tent as a friend of mine recently got me into Katatonia. But it all becomes too clear that this band belong on a bigger stage – and at the ;likes of Bloodstock that’s exactly where they would belong – and even on their own turf their name would be heralded higher than it is here. The Bohemia tent itself oddly seems smaller than last year – but my fellow reviewer isn’t sure himself. But we agree that the stage looks tiny and that this tent is not going to fit in the right crowds when certain bands take its stage.

Disappointed with the Bohemia tent I relegate my attentions for the rest of the weekend to the main stages and the smaller outdoor stages to make life easier. I sit back for a while outside the Saturn stage and catch a pretty impressive Apocalyptica. There aren’t many metal acts that use cellos as for their bass lines and they work a treat. From here I manage a short break and then get far too excited about now shooting Skunk Anansie also on the Saturn Stage.

The open with “Selling Jesus” and leave no doubt in anyone’s mind that one of the days’ best acts just arrived. Anansie’s front woman has trouble holding still, but no problem making contact with her audience. In the opening songs she is eyeing them up with a vivacious glare and soon after actually finds herself clambering onto the crowd whilst continuing her set. There are more big acts to follow this day, but I can tell you now that this is the one I had the most enjoyable experience with.

Placebo are on the Apollo after this – but I decide to skip it as I want to go watch some heavier Rock instead. Last year this festival had Feeder appear and although Feeder are fine for what they do – it seemed very odd that they were placed in a metal festival. I have trouble even referring to them as Rock. So when the bands were being announced for this year’s festival we were having a sceptical look for who will be this year’s Feeder. And for a while Placebo were it. There have been a few emo acts added to the bill like Good Charlotte who are here for the teenage girls benefit – but ironically it turns out that the actual Feeder of this year’s Sonisphere are FEEDER!!! Yes added we didn’t go but apparently at the end of the day after Therapy performed were a band on stage called Renegades, which turned out to be Feeder in disguise (Renegades is the name of the new material).
So after skipping Placebo on came another legend band to headline the Saturn stage which comes in the form of Motley Crue. So all the ladies’ eyes were on the stage, and all the men’s were on the screen waiting for ladies in the crowd to get a bit topless for the band – and they were not disappointed. I’ve seen random festival flashing before – but the Crue seem to have that appeal still going strong for them where they just want to bare their breasts. Probably apt that they end on “Girls, Girls, Girls.”

After this there is barely 5 minutes to literally run to the Apollo stage for Saturday’s main headline band, Rammstein. Apparently each show costs them thousands and thousands in pyrotechnics. And whilst the stage design is impressive, and the fire work used is done so very well it isn’t as big as you may have been led to believe. The band themselves are very impressive with their lead singers voice coming over all classically trained and powerful.

If anything its just annoyed that the press materials had them down for a 2 hour set, but it actually was only 90 minutes. So they ended fairly early than expected. But they managed to hit a lot of their popular material – Du Hast, Sonne, etc.

After this we find it literally impossible to gain access to the Bohemia tent where Therapy come on (after two failed starts) to play the entirety of the “Troublegum” album. But wanting to hear it we sit outside on a bench and listen in for the entire set and it ain’t half bad!

So ends Day 2 and the first full day of acts. It’s time we hit the media bar and let off some steam for missing the bands we missed, feeling low about the ones that disappointed, but elate ourselves with tales of what were the high points. And so that’s exactly what we did.