This year I was accompanied by my good friend Mr. Stone, and also 2 of his mates who were shooting photos for a French Metal magazine called MetalObs. We left early from Nantes to be able to see the very first band playing at Hellfest, and here already comes the hard choice of choosing which band you’re going to see, and which one you’re going to miss. We decided to start with the high-energy Rock’n’Roll of LA-based The Shrine who were playing on the main stage. Monolord was playing under The Valley, but we felt we wanted to appreciate the front row of the main stage while the major part of the metalheads were still sleeping in the camping…

Mr Stone : It was a tough choice, right at the beginning of the festival, but since we saw both bands three weeks earlier at the Freak Valley Festival, we wanted to see The Shrine on one of the biggest stage we’ve ever seen, not to mention that we’d rather get a nice kick in the ass to start the fest on the right tracks, instead of being doomed beneath the ground by Monolord’s crushing riffs

But before that, we had to get our press passes. Yep we were lucky enough to be among the “VIPs” of the Festival mouhahaha Well at least that’s what we thought in the beginning… Because yeah, we did get our press passes, but I (Mr. Fuzz) didn’t get a photo pass, even if I asked for it. Argh. Hopefully, it got sorted very quickly, and I got my photo pass. So big thanks to Roger for his kindness & professionalism, we can now fully enjoy our trip in Hell !