Tears Don't Fall, But Shinedown can bring me to my knees. "Download Festival 2025" in review.

 So we did it again, we set up we rocked up and we hit the home land once more.

This year the heat was just on that cusp of causing harm, some people did get the heat stroke due to that giant gas ball in the sky, but as always stayed hydrated and the hat on my head keeping it at bay.

After last year I was a little worried about the food issue and while it hurt I will say this year all food was up to spec and keeping us all fed and hydrated, tiny price increases but generally still within a decent tolerance for another year. No MASSIVE price hikes anywhere.

So Campsite, no real change, they removed Green and expanded ECO and Plus in that area. Which really makes more sense. 

District X (Village it will always be) no major changes new toilets, with suction and water and hand washing stations. Minor issues with them when they clog or fill up they turn off.  

So this is probably going to be a lot shorter blog on the festival this year as not a lot happened yeah I went and saw a lot of bands, no I can't recall all of them, yes I talked to a few people, but all in all the year felt a little more peaceful.

There was this weird calm all the way through the festival. Green Day headlining Friday were awesome but the energy after the set was not there, every one wandered back to camp and went to bed. The camp site was quiet and peaceful over night. Wasn't the crazy noise and partying until the dawn light. 

Saturday Shinedown where awesome. I didn't see Sleep Token, I saw them in the tent the other year and they didn't do a thing for me, wasn't impressed live found them rather dull so called it a day after Shinedown. And once more the night was quiet, we sat up talking and drinking until the early hours but the camp site itself was generally quiet. 

Sunday! Well Sunday ended with Korn and that was a full on full power high energy ending to the weekend and you could feel it in the camp site, though as Sunday people bail after the headliners you could hear the excitement and energy after in the campsite, which was annoying as I had to drive in the morning but even myself I had the energy to want to go and do stuff from the adrenaline rush that was Korn. Even through the heat of the day. 

I think this might have been the issue, the fact while we had bands headlining and they should have been there as said. (We will talk about Sleep Token later) they weren't the bands that pump up the blood and make you go crazy resulting in the camp site being a frenzy of high jinks and noise afterwards. 

Here are some photos of the camp site: While Setting up:

Well that's the camp site area, as always since the redesign we manage to end up in Purple Camp site which is a nice enough distance from every where and only 30 minutes walk to the arena if that. It did get busier within the camp site and while normally I Would have take more photos I Was having a lazy year. I'd had a bit of a bad few weeks and part of me didn't really feel like being there. It did change I did get my arse into gear but it did take a few days. 

Okay this should be Friday but there is a thing and it appears to be that a lot of bands on all at once, very little overlap and clash's and a lot of nothing going on at the same time all over. This is noticeable across the whole of the weekend. Though it looks like we have a fairly constant wave of music going on we actually don't. An while this little questionable bit here is not just part of Friday it is generally the feel of the whole thing. Annoyingly you can't then go back and check the app as soon as Monday lunch hits the app is cleared and we await the next year. I think it might get cleared as soon as the last act in the village happens on Monday morning.

So I am unable to show my examples of these gaps.

Right shall we talk about Friday?

Due the heat I remember very little of it. Actually that's the same about most of the weekend. 

We did have rain but due to the heat it was evaporating so quickly. 

AGHATS! With myself I did not take no where near as many photos or videos as I normally do but my phone is in that beginning of a downward spiral or battery death. So What did I see?

Boston Manor. Yeah I saw them they were okay.

Rise Against. Yeah saw them also all good.

Jimmy Eat World. Yep sat and watched all of that set as well was fine. 

Weezer. Did get a couple f videos and photos first time seeing them enjoyed., 

Green Day, Did get a couple of videos, only sharing one as I was more interested in watching them and enjoying them myself over filming this year, trying to hold the moment in my mind without needing the record of them playing. Also I was positioned further back and the filming is not great it was to warm to want to go flying deep into the crowd like normal to get better shots. 

I have done that for years and now a day it is more about me enjoying myself at the festival than just using it to write or promote. 

 Here be picks and videos for Friday:

Saturday, Saturday Saturday!

Still warm but later start, wanted to go down for Hatebreed, went down for Poppy. 
Now this is a thing that was being banded around by the group about Poppy, Jinjer and Spiritbox. All saying Spirit Box was better than the previous 2 and yeah okay I will admit they have slightly more well thought out and constructed songs but in general I struggled to tell the difference. I don't know if it is my age or my mind and growing up on story based songs and less repetition within songs but that is just my thoughts. I have zero negative about any of them enjoyed all 3 but I just don't see a difference. 

Anyway who did I see well.

Poppy of course was enjoyable enough nothing ground breaking but still a perfectly find set.

Palaye royal caught a bit of them, didn't really stand out. 

Don Bronco. Never been a fan, still aren't but they did what they do and I can't hold anything against them. 

Mothica, caught the back end of this in the tent and WOW one to watch out for down the road.

I saw some of Smash into piece, potential is there but you know needed to be at main stage for Shinedown. An as always Shinedown blew me away. 

Lets talk about the elephant in the room. Sleep Token as already said they bored me to tears the first time I saw them, I have tried to listen to them I do not think they are any thing exciting. They are actually quiet dull. They come across to me as a boy band that would be fine as a boy band but hiding behind the masks gives them edge. An just becasue you are wearing a mask don't mean you have to be a metal band. They are a gateway band, like busted, like mc fly, They play their instruments, write their songs and perform on a stage that takes bottle and they do it and for that hats off. Are they my thing no not at all and I tried. The biggest put off was hearing the use of Autotune in one of their tracks and the fact they added this 30 second screamer piece towards the end of the song that didn't need to be there and ruined the song. Also the fact the scream was autotuned! Yeah just made me go not for me. 

Here come the photos and the vids. 

Sunday, we should talk about Sunday!

Well yeah we should but we are only here for Bullet and Korn right? Right!
yes but I did also go see...

Nothing more. Was an in passing thing but they need to be looked into more. 

The Ghost Inside. Yeah They seemed okay I don't remember they didn't stand out that much to me.

Municipal Waste. Was in the merch tents shopping could hear them sounded like they always do.

Alien Ant Farm. Could not get near the stage. Seriously total sea of humans was awesome to see.

Jinjer: Completely missed them.

Meshuggah, I used to like them they played well, but yeah the heat is really getting to me. 

Spiritbox... So what makes them better than Poppy and Jinjer? 

Bullet For My Valentine. Doing Venom, due to early morning rain everyone had started late today and all times had been moved but we will talk about that at the end. Still awesome set should be headlining look forward to the day they do.

Korn, once more should have headlined years ago were tremendous as always wish they had played coming undone but bah that awesome set so much energy and that fed back into the camp siter after the show. 

Photos and video time. 

All in all was happy to see new headliners and new bands being given the chance to do it even if I do not agree with all said bands I do still think new blood is what keeps festivals alive. So lets talk about what we think should have happened.

Green Day was always the Friday this is how it was always was and was always going to be. 

Saturday. That was meant to be Maiden. How do we know this? Well Bruce let it slip a few days after 2024 that they would be headlining Download 2025. Shinedown are the Top Support. Yet no Maiden!

Sunday. That was meant to be Slipknot. Korn have been underneath Slipknot on all the tours and festival shows. Clown let it slip that Slipknot would be headlining Download in 2025 for the 25 years tour and the delay on the Sunday left a time slot for Korn that was exactly the same amount of Time as Slipknot had been playing  for on the 25 years tour. 

So don't get me wrong I am glad we got the different bands and someone else got to shine and we weren't in the revolving acts of maiden, tallica, lilnkin park, slipknot, soad, muse. It was great seeing fresh, I say fresh I mean new no no most of these bands should have been headlining years ago. But still was nice to have new headliners. 

Roll on 2026. Let us see if we can have something new on the top. I heard rumour it might be Blink. I can live with that, but how about we start rolling on a whole new run of main stage headliners, and really shake up the applecart.There are a fair few bands out there that could have headlined should have headlined and need to headling. Will be ever see the Foos, Blink, Nickleback, to name but a few?

See you in 2026.

Dave.