Damnation Festival is still sticking to its motto of “giving a voice to the underground” by putting up awesome bands that nobody else will, year after year. Where else would you find bands like My Dying Bride, Pig Destroyer and Electric Wizard as the main attractions at a festival? Most festivals would maybe risk one such band, on the fifth stage at about half one in the afternoon…if you’re lucky. Not Damnation though, it’s a festival aimed at the extreme end of things, and that’s why it rules!

Kicking off proceedings on the main stage were the not so extreme/underground HAWK EYES. Their slightly more commercial leaning racket still went down a storm and was a perfect way to open up the Jagermeister stage. There was always Hang the Bastard on the other stage for underground purists anyway! Hawk Eyes had a rest from the M1 for the day as they played one of their last festival sets of the year at home in Leeds; “the best city in the world” apparently. The band hit the crowd with a familiar ‘Ideas’ album set with ‘Kiss, Kiss’, ‘Witchhunt’ and ‘Headstrung’ all sounding outstanding as usual.

We caught up with Paul from Hawk Eyes just after the set, which you can read about here!

Lyric Lounge Review headed over to the Terrorizer stage to catch up with WINTERFYLLETH next. Black metallers from the…Peak District! No corpse paint and not a leather suit in sight. This is jeans and t-shirt black metal and it’s still just as effective. Close your eyes and you may be able to picture a more traditional black metal band but when the music is this good, you don’t need the imagery. With cuts from their latest album ‘The Threnody of Triumph’ most familiar to these ears at least, Winterfylleth prove that the UK certainly can compete with Scandinavia in the black metal market.

Dutch metallers TEXTURES probably wouldn’t have been on the top of everyone’s list to catch at the festival. When the band ask the audience who has heard the band before, there are a smattering of hands but nobody gets carried away. By the end however, I dare say they’ve won themselves plenty of new fans. Hitting hard with their mix of simple groove and more techy metal; again with a mixture of clean and roaring vocals, Textures take quite a few by surprise.

Bringing the Thrash to Damnation 2012 were Irish party starters GAMA BOMB. Celebrating their 10^th birthday as a band on the day, there was an air of celebration from the off. No festival would be complete without a sizeable dose of thrash and Gama Bomb provide it by the skip load. ‘OCP’ is as great as ever and the band also throw us a taste of the new album with ‘Backwards Bible’, which was also great! Obviously…

Not to be left out from the birthday messages, PRIMORDIAL announce that they’re 21 this year. The Irish Black Metallers probably have more in common with their Scandinavian brothers than previous band Winterfylleth. They have the corpse paint and the windmilling long hair anyway. They also bring a bit of fun to Black metal though, and that is what sets them apart on the day.

MY DYING BRIDE were a lovely surprise. On record/CD/whatever they’ve always been just OK to me and thus I’ve never been to see them live. Thankfully I turned up in good time to the main stage to watch the Bradford gloom peddlers from start to finish because, quite frankly, they were fantastic. The doomy low end that dominates their music was so powerful on the day it sounded like something that was used to drill out the Channel Tunnel.  The familiar pattern of the soft intros followed by devastating heavy periods made all the more satisfying by the sheer force of the heavy bits. From an early favourite of ‘Like Gods of the Sun’ through to the colossal ‘Dreadful Hours’, My Dying Bride are simply breath-taking.

ELECTRIC WIZARD therefore, were left with quite a task. There’s not many bands that could step up to the plate to follow a set like that, especially when you consider that Electric Wizard operate at pretty much the same pace as My Dying Bride. It’s not like they are going to come running out with screaming solos and over-the-top stage antics to win the day, but they manage it, by just doing what they do. Simple. Minimum fuss from start to finish, Electric Wizard smash Damnation with the sheer force of their Sabbath worshipping riffs. Opening up with monster of a track ‘Supercoven’ set out the stall for what was about to come. Rumbling bass and deep low guitar riffs and Simon Poole’s drum riser elevated against a video screen depicting typical druggy sequences and some old movie footage. Each member pretty much rooted to the spot letting the music take the lead role, and why not…most of the audience have their eyes closed anyway. ‘Witchcult Today’, ‘Black Mass’ and the essential ‘Dopethrone’ all get an airing in an awesome ending to a fantastic day.

Rob W