Sun, Sand, Beer And Metal

The 15th anniversary Graspop Metal Meeting was reportedly one of the best, as Belgium’s heaviest rock bash pulled 130,000 across three days.

Organisers say it was a weekend of “sun, sand, beer and metal” as the temperatures soared alongside the guitar licks of acts including Aerosmith, Motörhead, Slayer, Soulfly, Bullet For My Valentine, KISS, Hatebreed and Killswitch Engage.

The event actually started on the Deboeretang festival park site in Dessel (40 km east of Antwerp) in 1985, and ran as a mainstream rock festival for 10 years.

In ’96 founder Peter Van Geel merged it with Bob “Biebob” Schoenmaekers’ Midsummer Festival in Vosselaar to form Graspop Metal Meeting.

The early Graspops pulled about 10,000 per day but it’s grown rapidly in the last ten years, increasing its site capacity to 45,000 per day.

The other acts on the June 25-27 lineup included Stone Temple Pilots, My Dying Bride, Slash, Saxon, and Billy Talent.