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Pinkpop 2003 - With Queens Of The Stone Age, Deftones and More
[img]http://www.metalrage.com/upload/20030608_pinkpop_2003_180.JPG[/img] [b]The oldest Festival in europe, Pinkpop in the dutch town of Landgraaf, near the German border, had to deal with a terrible ticket sale. Some say it has to do with the fact that The Netherlands has way too many festivals for such a small country such as Lowlands, Noorderslag, Bospop, Dynamo, Fields Of Rock, Arrow and so on. My personal opinion is that Pinkpop had the worst line-up in years. Where near by festivals such as Rock Am Ring (Ger) and Rock Werchter (Bel) had booked bands such as Metallica, Iron Maiden, Marilyn Manson and R.E.M. , Pinkpop had nothing to offer but second rate bands like Lifehouse, Dandy Warhols, Krezip and Anouk. Still there was quite some music to nod and bang your head to, so Metalrage had to check it out.[/b] As I walk onto the Festival fields drunk from a full days camping beer drinking, I hear the retarded disco music of [b]Junior Senior[/b], so childish and plain stupid I won't bother you all with it. Up next came the immortal glam of [b]Placebo[/b], who served the sun dried audience a splendid mixture of the old and new material. After that I moved up to the front of the stage to take a look at a band who have delivered one of the greatest cd's of this year in my opinion, [b]Deftones[/b]. The last time I saw this band perform is well over three years ago, and that was an impressive performence. But today, it was totally diffrent. Opening with a quite decent version of Change In The House Of Flies, the band went downhill with dazeling speed. Chino sang like a sack of shit, the second guitar player fucked up many many times, and the sound man should be hang for the audio-rapism he served us. Every now and then Chino's voice disapeared, the drums where mixed in so loud that it over ruled the other instruments. [img]http://www.metalrage.com/upload/20030607_pinkpop_2003_111_defto[/img] Consequence: a fucked up sound of a badly played set list. Shame on Deftones, three dubble shame on the sound man. The few times the mix turned out quite okay, during songs like My Own Summer and Minerva, the band fucked up their own material enough to leave me with a total dissapointment. To make things worse, Chino arrogantly started a conversation with the guitar player Chi, witch lasted for about five minutes. I don't give a damn, play some fucking music man! It's what you're payed for! The set ended with a shitty version of Head Up, with Chino's vocals reaching a new low. Too bad, I know this band can do much better then this. After this major disapointment, [b]Moby[/b] actually came as a major relief. And as the weird american dance god made me dance the skin off my burnt forehead the sun went under and the first Pinkpop day came to an end. Wake up early damnit! Don't miss the biggest gig one of your favorite bands has ever played! Those who know me a little know who I'm talking about : [b]Peter Pan Speedrock[/b], who else! Before the gig a Pinkpop official warned us for a storm coming up, and the crowd welcome this good news with cheering and applause, for the weather was way to damn hot that day. The band came on stage, mascot Dikke Dennis announced that we shouldn't be afraid of a little bit of rain, and as the band played the instrumental intro off Lucky Bastards, clouds where gathering and it was getting darker and darker. It was great to see the three guys enjoying the big crowd, a big portion of it was swinging and dancing to the music, and about 10 minutes into the set all hell broke lose. Rain, thunder, hailstones, the whole shabang! There I stood, dancing with my shirt off in , hailstones hitting my head with fierce speed, dancing like mad and singing "Go Go Go Satan Go!". This type of weather is made for Peter Pan. The set was as allways near to perfect, great sound, great attitude and perfect atmosphere in the audience. All the classics where there: Ressurection, Big Toy, Motorblock, De Schoppen Aas, Sunny Side Up.. The new material was brought in the same special style as the older stuff, and I seriously enjoyed tracks like Twist Of Fate and Go Satan Go. At the end of the set Peter asked the audience to come and see them in a club, where the band is at their best indeed. Nevertheless, a great experience seeing this band play the big stage. After that [b]Flogging Molly[/b] played their version of Pogues. Nothing more, a bit less actually, but still quite fun to dance to in the mud. Saw them last year on the Lowlands festival, and yes it's a fun band to dance to, but it misses the soul and dedication just a tad, that I see in the eyes of bands such as Dropkick Murphys, when they're playing there folkish punk material. Fun band nonotherless, with a funny version of Tom Jones' Deliliah to top it off. After that the storm took up again and didn't stop throughout the whole day, so I retired to the campsite, seeing a very disapointing Dandy Warhols playing an uninspired setlist. The third and last day started off with the best gig of this weekend. Maybe one of the best I witnessed the whole year so far! [b]Danko Jones[/b], the canadian rock n roll formation played , rocked and won the audience over like never seen before. Since the first time I saw this band, I'm madly in love with the music, the sleazy tones, the totlly perfect attitude and stage performance, something most dutch rock acts can learn from. As I was losing my voice rapidly during epic rock songs like 'Play The Bluess', 'Lovercall' and 'The Mango Kid', the entire crowd jumped up and down, slammed each others guts in in the pit, Crowdsurfed, pogo'ed like a rabied dobermann pincher and danced like there was no other band but Danko Jones. This is a near to perfect band playing near to perfect music, pleasing the crowd and giving all they got. You gotta love 'em!! [b]Queens Of The Stone Age[/b] is another living rock legend that played the festival, and played a nice decent set. Unfortunatly I was totally nackered after Danko Jones, and totally fried in the burning sun, but still I managed to nod my head to great songs such as No One Knows, Song For The Dead, Do It Again, Gonna Leave You and Go With the flow. This is once again one of those bands you've gotta see in a club, and not on a big ass stage. Still it was a nice gig, with Josh advising an asshole in the audience who was picking a fight to 'die', as he dedicated 'A song for the dead' to the prick. A remark that was received with great applause and cheering. After the short break the band came back with the classic Rated R track The Lost Art Of Keeping A Secret. Nice set, nice gig, great sound (exept the sound man's cock up during a song of two), but still I prefer to see the Queens on a small stage in a smokey dark club. After that the Punky gipsy ska music of [b]Manu Chao[/b] closed this weekend down. A weekend with many musical highlights and many more musical b-quality. Thank god for weed and beer!! [img]http://www.metalrage.com/upload/20030607_pinkpop_2003_151_eind_[/img]
Details Written on Saturday Jan 1st, 2005
Writer @Lex

Tags: #Pinkpop 2003