Super Mega Big Review : Bloodstock Festival on August 8th 2025

This weekend is blessed by the Norse gods of weather and crowd size. Because of the sold-out nature of the event, no bands play to poor attendance. Ofnus kick off in the Sophie Lancaster at the very un-rock and roll time of 10.30 and attract an impressively vocal bunch of inquisitive souls. They trade in atmospheric black metal, and there it is all very cinematic and anthemic. What they do particularly well is make it all feel rather accessible. The riffs soar rather than jar, and those who would never dream of donning corpse paint can find something to enjoy. 

Shrapnel have been kicking around for a good while now and are veritable Bloodstock veterans, having won the London metal to the masses way back in 2010. They have a cacophony of Sophie and New Blood appearances behind them, but this is their big stage debut. Daniel Moran is the new face on vocals and bass, and if he has any jitters about this final ascension, then they don’t show. He is a commanding presence marshalling forth the highly impressive thrashing. He is a chatty soul, continually bantering with the early bird crowd and thanking the patron saint of New Blood, Simon Hall, for the opportunity. Overall, they make a fine account of themselves and prove the brilliance of last year’s “In Gravity” wasn’t a flash in the pan.

Turin are already a bit of a Merseyside institution. They have lost the “This is” tag and from the look of it vocalist Darryl Jones. His position has been taken by Joe Mortimer of fellow Liverpudlian metalheads Crepitation. Whether it is down to the inclusion of Joe or whether it is just a general shift in their sound, but they are a hell of a lot heavier than they have ever been. The tent shakes as the riffs come smashing down and Joe's shrill cries give the whole thing loads of resonance.

Back on the Ronnie James Dio stage yet another Bloodstock alumni are filling our musical boots. Famyne play a version of doom that is fragile and emotive. Quarter to twelve may seem a tiny bit early for dark introspection, but their ethereal tortured tones work a treat. Everything feels deliberately underbaked. They brood rather than bark, but the result is still a thoroughly engaging forty minutes.

Lock Horns are excellent. Aggressive prog with a booty-shaking groove. Hailing from Belfast, they forge a well-worn path in a stunningly inventive way. They are brutal enough to feel energising, but there is also a seam of ingenuity that feels challenging enough to keep the mind engaged. Startlingly good. 

Konvent are odd but not in a particularly good way. Screeched vocals are not in themselves a bad thing, but when they are married with music that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, it just comes across as pointless. The whole thing seems to be an exercise in impenetrability for impenetrability's sake and no matter the virtuoso abilities of the musicians involved it just feels tired and lifeless. First disappointment of the day.

Back on Sophie, My Diligence are being anything but disappointing. They are introspective and insular, conjuring up a contoured cinematic blizzard of noise that feels like the soundtrack to a film yet to be made. It is dense with ideas and shifts in shape as the clouds of music drift across the stage. It feels potent with ideas and the air fizzles with ingenuity. Wonderfully evocative. 

Flotsam & Jetsam are the first name band of the day and pull an impressive crowd looking to indulge themselves in thrash nostalgia. Eric Knutson was always considered one of the great voices of eighties thrash nostalgia, and he still has the swagger-filled charisma. He burns off the stage as he parades around like a peacock on heat. He apologises for Flotsam & Jetsam's tardiness in returning to this country (this is still only their seventh UK show since their eighties hey-day) and he eulogise about how glad he is to return to Bloodstock after ten years. ‘She Took An Axe’ and ‘No Place For Disgrace’ both remind us just how life affirming thrash can be. Spine-tinglingly wonderful.

Rough Justice are flying the flag for UK hardcore. They are angry about everything and in that cauldron of indignation, they manage to sculpt some pretty decent tunes. Yes, they stomp and proclaim, but it is saved from feeling repetitive by their ability to slide in some pretty chantable choruses. But for all their charm, there is still a mass exodus as everyone is heading to the Paleface Swiss party.

The days of being able to glide around the arena watching a band from numerous angles are gone. The attendees for these Swiss troubadours stretches as far as the eye can see and then some. It is massive and eclipses any headline crowd previously seen at the festival. The appeal is instantly understandable as they capture that raw power that made early Slipknot so exciting. This is primal metal; fast, furious and bustling with flavour. Metal depends on its entry-level bands, those that provide that initial illicit taste. Paleface Swiss aren’t doing anything we haven’t heard before, but they do it in a way that feels raw and exciting. They may well be a flash in the pan, but right now they feel like the most vital band on earth.

Shade Empire have been haunting the Finnish scene for decades. They have slowly transcended from a run-of-the-mill industrial outfit to being a rather fine purveyor of melodic death metal. Everything feels smooth and expansive, and new boy Henry Hämäläinen handles himself well as he beckons the attention of a rapidly filling tent.

But back on the main stage, we have a wake to attend. Orange Goblin are dead, long live Orange Goblin. They have been a dependable constant in British Heavy Metal for over thirty years. But now the end beckons. They have had a symbiotic relationship with Bloodstock since the festival's inception. If they are going to say goodbye to the UK festival circuit, this feels like the most appropriate place. Ben Ward’s flowing locks are MIA, but he is still a foreboding presence holding court as they rattle through a veritable best of set. As always, it is meaty chunky riff after meaty chunky riff. There is something reassuring about Metal this simple but also this delicious. There is no pretention nor agendas, just gigantic tune following gigantic tune. They will be missed.

Eihwar are a stripped-down version of Heilung and Wardruna. Asrunn looks like a vengaboy gone feral in a cowgirl bikini and a sheep skull hat. Mark goes for the medieval executioner aesthetic. Together, they beat out a traditional tribal refrain that brings to mind long boats and Nordic mythology. It is about as authentic as a Gucci bag bought from a market stall, but it is entrancing enough to keep the tent’s attention as they bide time until they wander off to see Lacuna Coil.

The crowd the Italian goth metallers pull is astonishing, it rivals Paleface Swiss and underlines their recent career rejuvenation. For years, they have been also-runs ploughing a field of ethereal atmospheric metal. This is the moment they ascend, and they do so with panache and professionalism. The staging is a layered kaleidoscope of confetti cannons and as the third song ‘Hosting the Shadow’ reaches a heightened conclusion the world collection of streamers are unleashed into the air. They are immediately caught by a freak gust of wind and blown back toward the stage, encapturing the camera arm and the stage right screen structure. It gives the impression that the world's largest spider has just unleashed an italian tricoloured web and just adds to the theatrical and otherworld feel of the set.

There are of course the obligatory call out to Ozzy with Cristina Scabbia going as far as attributing the band's initial breakthrough in the early noughties as being down to their inclusion on the Ozzfest. ‘Enjoy the Silence’ is dedicated to the great man and is drenched with significance and sophistication. In fact sophisticated is a word that encapsulates the whole performance. This is Lacuna Coil reaching another level. They are moving, insightful and stunningly evocative. The partnership between Christina and Andrea Ferro just shimmers with intensity. They play off each other impressively, their juxtaposing styles merging to create a fantastic whole. Whilst they have been on the margins for years, Lacuna Coil may finally be within reach of metal’s big league.

Back in Sophie, it's pure pop o’clock. Now this may seem a rather facile comment for something as far from the mainstream as Bloodstock, but High Parasite are an explosion in a Haribo factory channelled through prime time goth. Yes, they feature the former frontman of Misery Goblins My Dying Bride but they are the counterweight to moroseness and despair. This is ecstatic happy goth with a big fat smile on its face and it's thoroughly wonderful in being so.

Emperor may be the cult bands band, but the vast majority of Lacuna Coil’s faithful seem to have buggered off to either queue to be served by the legendary Spudman, and to secure a berth for Nailbomb. It is what can only be described as a select crowd that faces Ishan and friends as they wander out. This is a crying shame as they prove once again why they are still considered one if not the greatest, black metal band ever. Previous visits to these very fields have been to showcase specific albums, but this evening we get a veritable best of that encapsulates all four of their releases. Ishan has made it implicitly clear that he has no plans for the band to ever record new material so this instead is a rollercoaster ride through the unfurling insanity that captured the imagination of the black metal hordes in the late nineties. What is evident is that their sound is timeless. It bypasses Black Metal's usual penchant to be insular and underproduced and instead provides wave after wave of bombastic cinematic intensity. The sound is astonishingly crisp and you can hear every euphoric vibration. Jørgen Munkeby of the Norwegian variant of Shining has been drafted in on keys and provides a stupendous layer of symphonic wonderfulness. The crowd may thin during the show as more and more people creep off in curiosity to see what all the fuss is about Nailbomb, but the truth is, there is no band like Emperor and despite the select appeal, they are still the greatest black metal act of them all.

Speaking of Nailbomb, by the time Emperor’s set comes to an end, you are more likely to be proclaimed King of Norway than get into the Sophie stage. Where there was once a fairground, there is now a swarm of people stretching out from the tent as far as the eye can see. Given that this is their seventh gig ever and given that they only ever released one record 30 years ago, the evangelical response to their set is frankly astonishing. If we are going to boil this down, Nailbomb is Max Cavalera going industrial. As they plough through the set, made up of most of that one record and a couple of punk covers, it becomes very clear how much it was influenced by the rise of industrial metal in the early 90s. ‘World of shit’ and ‘Religious Cancer’ have a voluminous intensity to them, but could well have been made by Ministry or the Butthole Surfers. It's all rather enjoyable, but there is still a question mark about how much of this is hype and how much this is actual musical integrity. Whilst nobody seems to walk away disappointed, the jury is potentially still out.

The secret of a good festival set is to make the audience feel like it has been curated just for them. Trivium tonight are unassailably imperialistic. For an hour and a half, they are unarguably the greatest heavy metal band in the world. They come bearing a unique concert experience that will never be repeated anywhere. Fuelled by insatiable confidence and a mind-blowing who's who of guests, Trivium give every doubter the finger and write themselves into the Bloodstock history book. As the curtain obscuring the stage comes down, Matt is already stripped to the waist and just frizzling with kinetic energy. He has always been an astonishingly, charismatic frontman but tonight he deftly and with true genuineness communicates with those at every corner of the rammed performance space.

The standout moments come thick and fast. Rob from Machine Head is beckoned on stage to cover ‘Symptom of the Universe’ as yet another nod to the Prince of Darkness. Then III of Sleep Token is ushered forth to help end the argument about whether they are metal or not (spoiler the answer seems to be that in fact, they are). Then we get, for the first time since 2008, their faithful cover of ‘Master of Puppets’. And at this point, we are still within the first forty minutes of the show. ‘A Gunshot to the Head of Trepidation’ heralds the unveiling of a massive inflatable incarnation of the figure on the “Ascendancy” cover. What initially had been a sparse staging is now transformed into an astonishing spectacle.

When ‘In Waves’ crashes in just after the hour mark, Matt has to reassure us that it is not yet the end of the show. Instead, we get an ultra-rare cameo appearance from his good mate Ishan who runs on, screams “In Waves” (when he eventually gets the cue right) and then scarpers off again. And then before we can draw breath, out comes Josh Baines from Malevolence for ‘The Deceived’. Matt throws down the gauntlet of wanting to create a bigger mosh pit than Josh’s band did twelve months ok, and a circular space spanning from the stage to the mixing desk opens up on his command. The final furlong of ‘The Heart From Your Hate, ‘Down From the Sky’ and unexpected closer ‘The Sin and the Sentence’ bring no further special guests, but Trivium have already proven their ascendancy (pun intended). This is an incredible show that banishes all memories of their rather lacklustre appearance 10 years ago. Matt rather cheekily erases Bullet for My Valentine from any involvement in their start-of-the-year arena shows next year, but the point is, Trivium are the victors. With this show, they have grabbed the crown and self-inaugurated themselves as kings of the world. Similarly extraordinary.

Canadian death metal royalty Kataklysm, provide an interesting dessert platter to Trivium’s main course. They come across as rather pleased to be back at Bloodstock, in fact, to be back in the UK at all. There were a few London appearances before the pandemic, but this is their first substantial UK visit in 10 years.  They still trade in a muscular but also highly technical version of death metal. The riffs are crisp and concise as opposed to being murky and malevolent. It all seems to have a depth to it that the genre usually forgoes. The guitars drive with brutal precision as you would expect, but underneath it, there is a lot more going on as the rhythm section undertakes a rather complex waltz with each other. A very appreciated return that very effectively caps off an astonishing first day proper.

Check the “In The Flesh” page for more photos!
Kataklysm + Trivium + Nailbomb + Emperor + High Parasite + Lacuna Coil + Eihwar + Orange Goblin + Shade Empire + Paleface Swiss + Rough Justice + Flotsam & Jetsam + My Diligence + Kovent + Lock Horns + Famyne + Turin + Shrapnel + Ofnus