July 24-29
The time had finally come for what became the highlight of my year, and one of my life as I arrived at a festival I heard a lot of great things about and somewhere that has been an annual pilgrimage for several of my friends back in the UK – MetalDays. This was to be the very last time it was held at its location near Tolmin, Slovenia, due to the construction of a bypass in the location of the site, so this was a very emotional time for a lot of people. There was a sense of apprehension since I would be spending six days in a tent on a backpacker’s airbed, and whilst it was not comfortable it wasn’t unbearable either, and there were showers which I made much use of whilst I was there! Afternoons we mainly spent bathing in the Sochi River, since the mercury barely stayed south of 40 even during the coolest part of the day, and I finally fully embraced river swimming. One of the activities we all enjoyed to do was get inflatable floats and allow ourselves to float slowly down the river – my first time was a bit of a disaster cause I bought this shark which was only really designed for children and I kept falling off – thankfully I gave it to a friend who had much better luck with it whilst I bought myself a large float which I had better results with, giving myself full marks out of ten for not just wimping out and being able to fully participate. I did get sunburnt in spite of being extra diligent in applying sunscreen though, not as severely as previous sunburn incidents – it was only sore for a day or so. There was also the morning ritual of going to a pop-up bar which was erected in the car park of a local supermarket and getting some grilled meat with a Fanta and beer, along with a DJ which played metal alongside random cheesy pop and disco – and offer shots of local liquor which people queued for (none of us lot took him up on it).
The general vibe of our group was to treat the festival as a kind of camping resort holiday which just happened to have several of the world’s best metal bands playing during the evening – I was one of the only people to see a band in the afternoon after the inflatable shark incident, when I wasn’t feeling up for it that day. It was a Slovenian doom band called Mist, which was advertised as “this generation’s answer to Black Sabbath and Coven”, which was pretty accurate I felt and I was impressed and was left wanting to check them out further.
But it was in the evening when we all emerged from our watery siestas to rock out. Countless Skies were great as per usual, even more so with Arianna Mahsayeh on cello. Saor blew my mind away, such passion and emotion in their music, their performance was out of this world. The same went for Rotting Christ, the third time I had seen them and always great. Jinjer played a great set where the spotlights were occasionally set to the blue and gold of the flag of their native Ukraine, and several people were sporting Jinjer t-shirts with the slogan “We want our home back” – Ukrainian bands, along with friends and loved ones being just as affected by the Russian invasion and occupation as everybody else in Ukraine. Czech band Gutalax also impressed me, with a theme centred around a certain bodily function, and you had people get into the vibe by decorating themselves with toilet paper, one person was even wearing a toilet seat around their neck, furthermore they counded great. I also enjoyed watching Incursed, a pagan folk band from the Basque Country in Spain, Nanowar of Steel and The Great Old Ones, who were fantastic. Finally the festival closed with Mercyful Fate, who were just amazing and I was so glad I saw them even though I wasn’t intending to.
But alas, all good things must come to an end, and this was even more bittersweet for the veterans of the festival since next time it will be in an entirely new location, and many are concerned that it won’t be the same – (although after they announced where it will be it looks like the new location sounds very promising). However I was eternally grateful that I made it over even if it wasn’t 100% joyful, 100% of the time. It was still fantastic and I was privileged to be a part of it, and to experience the festival as everyone I knew had experienced it.
Top left: Me wearing my Countless Skies t-shirt waiting for said band to play.
Top right: Cellist Arianna Mahsayeh performing with Countless Skies.
Bottom: As good as a view of the band as I could get from that angle with my phone.
Mist.
Incursed.
Jinjer.
Saor, one of the best performances I have ever seen.
Gutalax.
The Great Old Ones.
Rotting Christ.
…and finally, last but most certainly not least, Mercyful Fate, a brilliant way to end the
festival!