After Children Of Bodom, the turn had come to Volbeat, who entered the Black Stage at what would have been dusk if the Swedish summer hadn’t given us such an incredibly good weather for the day.

That the Danish rock’n’roll’ers have hit well on this side of the water as well was clear to see as not only the festival ground, but also the bridge running parallel to it was completely filled with spectators for the concert. The band was almost impossible to see through the forest of arms raised in greetings as they entered!

And what did we get to see?
Well, apart from the now more or less classic Guitar Gangsters & Cadillac Blood speaker-rack, we were given a very barren show. Michael Poulsen had reverted from his stylish shirt and vest outfit to an old wifebeater, Thomas Bredahl stayed on the stage floor for almost all the show (a first for him), and most surprisingly, there were absolutely no guest appearances! Not even Christian, who is more or less mandatory on acoustic guitars, showed up…

And still this was the show which really put me in a festival-mood here at Metaltown, but why?
Simply put, because of their more than usual metallic approach to their setlist, in which they also managed to find a place for more humour and surprises than I believe I have ever heard from them before.
A short outtake of Boa was played, as well as the Misfits cover Angelfuck; a wall of death (or wall of love as Poulsen renamed it, where everyone should hug in the middle instead of bashing into each other) was performed as Volbeat played a short Cannibal Corpse improvisation, and later they let the opening bars of Slayer’s Raining Blood introduce their Dusty Springfield cover I Only Wanna Be With You.
No new songs were played, but we all got to try out our voices in joint singing in We, which rounded up the concert in a perfect way.

A very inspiring Volbeat concert, which was quickly dubbed the best experience at the festival so far by yours truly.

Setlist:

Guitar Gangsters & Cadillac Blood
Hallelujah Goat
Radio Girl
Sad Man’s Tongue
Mr. & Mrs. Ness
Pool Of Booze, Booze, Booza
Angelfuck (Misfits cover)
The Human Instrument
The Garden’s Tale
Boa (outtake)
Broken Man And The Dawn
(Cannibal Corpse cover outtake)
Still Counting
Raining Blood (Slayer cover)/ I Only Wanna Be With You
We