While we’d like to be in Germany at the Wacken Open Air Festival, unfortunately, we have a blog to run and couldn’t make it over. Fortunately, our publicist buddy Jon Freeman from Freeman Promotions offered to do some guest blogging for us. As you can tell from the picture, Jon likes to drink, so while his day one thoughts are pretty lucid, we’re not going to guarantee that by the end of the fest, his posts will be anything more than grunts. At any rate, here’s his take.
Wacken: Day 1ish
So we got here yesterday to a crowded campground full of people. The Wacken Metal Battle was going on, on the WET Stage, so we went and checked out a band or two. Then I found out our tent was missing an important part, you know that part that covers rain…? FUCK! Luckily the fine folks at the Wacken Merch tent were able to supply an official Wacken tent for the low low price of 30 Euro. Purchase completed, we finally had a tent set up and were ready to enjoy Wacken.
One of the best things about Wacken is the people. We met up with a cool group of locals that were here camping out, so we hung out with them drank some of their beer (german beer is much better by the way) and got some insight on what we should do for the next few days. Being that I have been here before, I didn’t think I was going to hear about stuff I didn’t know, but they did in fact share some good information.
After numerous beers, some sort of liquor and whatever else, we decided to call it an early night and went back to the new tent to sleep. Guess what? Of course there was a small leak, so the lady’s stuff was all wet. Thanks new tent! But this brings me back to the locals we met. They have a giant tent thing, so we were able to move our tent under theirs. Freeman’s Festival tip #1: make friends with the locals.
So after a night of rain and sleeping on the dirt, I awoke today ready to tackle the world. Which actually meant wake up find the press tent, use their wifi and answer emails. Not glamorous, but it needed to be done. Had breakfast at the Wacken Supermarket, a pretty good sandwich, then we met up with the band Suidakra. We hung out with Suidakra, had some beers, some Jack, and then they started grilling. We had brats, steaks, chicken, all sorts of stuff. These Germans can grill, that’s for sure. Drinking that much definitely makes you have to pee. It sucks to break the seal at 11 am in the morning, but hey its FUCKING WACKEN. Anyway they have these piss troughs here that are pretty strange. They are outside in the middle of the field and they are partitioned in 4 sections, each with their own hole. The holes funnel piss into the main reservoir, which with any luck will overflow by the end of tonight or first thing tomorrow.
Speaking of pissing, I wandered over into the artist village and stopped to pee yet again and I look to my left and realized holy shit, I am standing next to U.D.O. and peeing. I didn’t say anything, just did my thing and went over to the sink. There was no paper towel, and of course I run into U.D.O. again as he was looking for paper towel. Then he walks out with three pieces of paper towel stuck to each shoe. Balls to the wall and paper towel on the shoes…
Spoke to Doro for a minute and then headed over to the wrestling tent to check out Kvelertak. I was introduced to this band at SXSW and they were fucking amazing. They were today as well. It is really weird though seeing a band play behind a wrestling ring. I will check out one of the wrestling shows later and will report back.
Now I think it is time for more beer and more music. Blind Guardian, Helloween and Ozzy still to come tonight. Hopefully Ozzy brings his A Game. I saw him last year in the states and he was great, so here’s hoping for a repeat performance. Big Brother fans, check out my t-shirt.
Until tomorrow,
-Drunken Freeman at Wacken
