Rusted From The Rain "Download 2024" Save me.

 Please excuse me, while I try to find the words and the energy to write this, I like so many am rather sick from eating something that disagreed with us and spending many hours in the medical tent from very early Monday morning till nearly lunch time. I have never had food poisoning before and I never want it again.

I'd spent 45 years happily avoiding it. It is so rare I vomit that no one I know has ever seen me do it. I can keep down most things. But this oh my word, I am going to stop here I think you get the picture. 
Enough to say when I got home on the Monday I slept till the Tuesday. 

So please accept my apologise for this one being a little later than normal, I still feel rough now and I am fairly sure someone will shout at me for doing it later anyway. 

Lets just get into the Wednesday, we got out on time we got to the car park for 9:30am and we were in and set up by 11:30am. Can't fault this well happy got nearly the same spot as the previous year.
Purple camp for us always just because well we like it there. 

So camping wise some moving around of things like the total removal of the loo's from the Green camp so every one was piling into the purple loos in the morning. While they had the Camping Plus in Green and the Eco in Green if you were not part of these camps (Paid extra) you couldn't use the loos.

The weather we should talk about this as well, and this is a bit of an iffy one as the weather leading up to download was all over the shop and even to the point of changing hourly, I wish I had taken wellies, I didn't as the weather before we left was mild shower, what we got on Saturday was thunder storms and heavy rain. Well we got a lot of rain from Thursday onwards which of course as always turns the arena and the village into a mud bath, which in turn saps your strength and stops you slogging backwards and forwards for bands. This resulted in my only going to see bands I wanted to see and while I Planned to check out newer bands I didn't, not that it mattered as a few of them dropped out due to Barclay Card, or because they were ill. 

Thursday night we did wander into the village to see Halocene

Friday, well who did i check out on the Friday?
Well we planned to go down for Halocenes actual set but due to the que getting in we got this for 45 minutes as we were scanned searched and prodded.

Yep that's the que to get through the gates. As a friend of mine said when they came on the Sunday on a Day Ticket they had to get through the entrance, walk across the track and then go through this again. This year they lumbered the day tickets in with the campers and it caused chaos. Well it did on the Friday. 

First band without photo was Scene Queen, Yeah I barely managed to get through the opening song before walking off, and from those I know watched the whole set they declared that it was very mixed signals and contradictions with everything she did. I didn't  watch it as I have zero interest in listening to someone sing about masturbation. And as such I can't really comment on this more but I won't be looking into this group at all.

Here have some photos of us wandering in on the first day instead.

So what is next? Well as I said only bands I wanted to see this year as well you can see the mud already forming plus I am not that interested in the actual headliners today so off I wander to Black Stone Cherry, as always an amazing set, can not fault them all these years down the line they have been knocking it out of the park. Enjoy watching these guys play from seeing them at Downloads past or supporting Whitesnake and Def leppard. Just a good all round sing along band with some very good albums under their belts. I know they have been around for decades.

So, I want to see Mr Bungle so shall take a wander over to the second stage. (I am never going to call them by the names they were given they will always be first and second) Now as always I am going to rock up and I don't know a lot about Mr Bungle I just know it is a Mike Patton thing and I do like Faith No More so lets go see what this nut job is up to here. Yep still nuts, and as always a blinder of a show can't fault it some fun some piss taking, such a good set, total surreal and if you check out there wiki page you can work out why. Just looked like they were having a lot of fun on stage together. 

I would like to see Wheatus. I say this as as close as I got to the tent all I could hear was bad bass and nothing else. All the busted fans had rushed the stage and so there was no chance in getting in to see either, so with this I went back to camp, as I was wet, and tired and the drinks in camp were far cheaper than the ones in the area. 

 

Evening in camp as it is wet and cold so no wandering no meeting new people this year all very dull group stays together. Shall we get on to Saturday?

Up and at them! Due to the rain and the cold it was a nice little lay in for the Saturday. Though we did decide to change the breakfast haunt this morning and it wasn't worth it. I miss the All day breakfast / Chinese that used to be in the village. We would wander up every morning get a full English sit have a coffee plan the day and wander back before heading out it was one of the things we had done for years until the new lay out came into existence. Did set you up for a decent day of drinking and wandering, now a days well the last 3 years it's an English in a bap and not great, or as this year a slightly under cooked English in a box with out the egg or tomato's. 

Lets hit bands who do I want to see today and who will I get too see?
So I want to see Baby Metal. Have never seen them and as such I thought I should as well the songs are catchy, although I am also interested in what everyone else see's in this J-Metal group. They are after all Idols and as such. So annoyingly we have a thunder storm and they get pulled after a song and a half, with a lot of frustration, now I don't know the name of the song that I am about to put here, but the following song the second song I do know the name of, though this don't really go to plan as Electric Callboy are ill. So yeah,  don't actually get them either but that's just me I guess. 

So that is over after some technical issues we will wander over to second and catch Tom Morello, interesting rendition of killing in the name of also known as we sing it they play it which was fun.

Right I was going to catch Enter: Shikari but I have seen them several times before and watched from a distance while also wandering and I picked up merch while they were playing. As the first band I was really waiting for where about to hit the stage and that was The Offspring. 

I can not fault this at all, was a great set with some amazing old songs but would have been nice to have heard let the bad times roll be played, even though we got keep them separated, your going to go far kid and pretty fly for a white guy. 

Shall we go see Billy Talent? Yes yes we shall this time though we are eventually going to get into the tent and yeah I was happy with that by a long shot so happy i nearly forgot to get the video below. I have been waiting a while to see these guys and I was happy I finally got too, yes I only got in the tent for the last three songs but it was worth it and the sound outside was spot on. 

Right then, shall we move on to Sunday? No of course not we need to talk about Fallout Boy! I really enjoyed this and you can tell because it is just photos. Was like a history of Fallout Boy playing through in albums as they went using different parts of the stage show from different tours over the years and I did really enjoy it, that is the thing with me I do enjoy a good performance and a catchy tune and that is what Fallout Boy are. 

Now we will do Sunday. Firstly delays in order to get the arena a little drier so the first hour is cut. Meaning sets are cut and every band is pushing to be finished on schedule or ahead of it. I keep hearing people saying it was Seven Fold that was forcing this as they wouldn't give up their own set time. But unless someone from live nation comes out and says this is fact then I am taking a grain of salt. I'll be honest Seven Fold don't interest me so didn't watch them. 

While wandering though I did catch some of 311, sounded alright, but as said it was while wandering, I also caught the first few tracks of Royal Republic as I was waiting for Bowling for Soup to start. I also wanted to see Zebra Head but the issue was that now they had changed the time I had to bail on tem before the end for Bowling For Soup. 

I am a big Bowling for soup fan and it was nice to be stood in a crowd of people all singing along word for word on every song. Shame Chris was rushed back to the states for medical reasons and I hope he recovers and is back on the road with the rest of the band soon it was good but would have been better with him there.

Lets jump to Sum 41. As I went to get a drink and forgot about other bands. Once more no video for this one as was just enjoying the set, shame it was the end of their time before I ever got to see them but I am glad I did get too.

It might be time to limp with the Bizkit. Seriously amazing set, I wanted to see Corey and Limp but as they were now on at the same time I picked Limp. I was in a high energy mood and that is what Limp always bring to the table. Was such a good set was like being 20 again and back in the pits of old. To old and to broken for that now a days. Was an amazing set and it is a shame they were rushed through for seven fold as well. Seven fold meh.

I did go to see Machine Head, but after the massive up from Bizkit they were mellowing me out, so I went and got food and wandered back to camp and we all know what happened at 1am so lets not go through that again. 

Right let us look at the issues. So didn't really have a parking issue this year the new route in seemed to work for the camping. Toilet issues not enough though neither in the arena or in the camp site, and the green camp site being segregated as it was this was an issue. The camp site lay out as always was good I do like the new layout for the camp site and the solid standing for the village we just need to wort out the toilet issues in these areas. 

Arena got shrunk a little due to the numbers being lowered, seating would be nice they shrunk this down as well, Rocktail Cocktail got flooded out so that was closed on Saturday I don't know if it reopened on Sunday as it was too damn muddy to get over there. Though the rain thing in general allowed me to actually get the merch I wanted and in my size and even in the mid afternoon I was able to walk straight up and get what I wanted! 

All in all the event wasn't terrible, I didn't get to wander because of the weather I would have liked to have Sunday but I'll be honest I was feeling a little rough when I got into bed. 

Anyone else in Purple camp never want to hear Celine Dion ever again after the Sunday!

Right going to go sit in the bathroom for a while and hope this passes soon. 

See you in 2025 Download Festival.