The very first band I got to see this day was Wolfmother. A band that by now does not need an introduction anymore. They have worked themselves up real fast and people all over the world seem to appreciate their music. So without knowing even one of their songs, I anxiously started looking at their show. And damn! What a show it was! I highly enjoyed myself watching these three Aussies play and judging from what I saw around me, I wasn’t the only one doing so. The band played some real kick-ass songs of which I unfortunately don’t know the names except from the song ‘Woman’ (thanks to Guitar Hero II). Sometimes the band reminded me of The Hives but to be honest I gotta say I prefer Wolfmother more. All in all the band definitely convinced me of their qualities and I gotta say that the vocalist’s  haircut only contributed to the entertaining factor. It’s almost three times the size of his own head, funny to see! A must see for everybody!

 

Next band up was Roadrunner’s Stone Sour. Since I have seen this band a couple of times before I wasn’t that excited about seeing them but I sure wanted to witness their entire show. But to be honest, the sound was just plain crap. It could have been the angle between me and the sound system but the vocals hardly came through. A true bummer! Luckily the sound improved somewhat during the show so they still gave away a nice and energetic show filled with fucks and motherfuckers by the one and only Corey Taylor. Songs that were played were of course opener ‘30/30-150’, ‘Hell And Consequences’, ‘Through Glass’ and others. The band closed with the explosive ‘Get Inside’. All in all a below average show due to the crappy sound.

 

Who doesn’t know this band by now? And who doesn’t call the singer a fag because of his extremely high vocals? Well, I guess everybody does. But the fact is, that it’s those vocals that give this band a face of their own. Little did I know about the bands repertoire but it turned out that they had very enjoyable and danceable songs for us. I think this is one of those typical festival bands. This isn’t something to look at for hours, but in between some other great bands, the Scissor Sisters did just fine. Of course getting everyone’s attention during ‘Don’t Feel Like Dancing’.

 

I had never heard of this band before but because one of my friends wanted to see this band I decided to stay with him. We witnessed a nice show of a large band that included a saxophone, an electric violin and other instruments that you won’t get to see often during a festival show. We enjoyed some happy tunes but after a couple of songs we got a little bored. Probably a matter of taste. We decided to head over to the John Peel Stage to join our other friends who were watching Maria Mena.

 

Again, this is a band I hardly knew. Yeah, I knew their radio hit ‘Just Hold Me’ but I had no idea what to expect from such a gentile sounding female. To be honest it was that one radio hit I actually wanted to hear but it turned out I had to wait for a couple of songs to get to hear that so I decided to do so. What I heard were quite nice songs that actually had somewhat of a rock vibe to them. Though, the most funny thing of this performance must have been the part in which Maria Mena introduced her band to the audience. On drums we have Kjetil Knäckebrød Steensæns, on guitar we have Bjarne Knäckebrød Gustavsen and so on. Actually, that’s just what me and my friend made of it. It just sounded a little weird hearing all these typically Norwegian names with in the middle of it Maria Mena. Wow, how Norwegian does that sound?! Anyway, they gave away a nice show with a good sound which was highly appreciated by everybody in the tent.

 

It must seem like I hardly knew any bands playing Pinkpop this day because again, I didn’t know shit about this band. I’d heard some tunes somewhere in the recent past but nothing that actually managed to stick in my head for a while. I was therefore very pleasantly surprised to witness a very powerful and convincing show by the Arctic Monkeys. The drummer hit his drums like a maniac but with great care nevertheless and the other guys in the band stood next to him to gave away a great show. I must admit that the guys in the band didn’t always move that much on stage which I personally find a pity but I can’t deny the fact that these guys rocked the hell out of everybody that was watching. Definitely a great show!

 

Finally I got to see Korn again. And this time they even brought one of my favourite drummers with them: Joey Jordison. In fact, they had 3 percussionist during the show. Since I had quite some beers by now I can’t remember that much song titles except from ‘Here To Stay’ and ‘Shoots And Ladders’, which is always a cool song because of Jon Davis’ bagpipe solo. I considered the sound to be quite okay and even Jon’s vocals came out reasonable. I think it’s a well-known fact he’s always having a bit of a problem to really get his vocals stand out during a show but I can’t say I had a bad time watching Korn, contrarily to what people at home told me the next day. They had witnessed Korn’s show on TV and told me the sound was crap. Must have been the TV then!

 

After 40 minutes of Korn I rushed over to the Main Stage again to get a good spot in front of the stage where Linkin Park was about to play. Ever since I got into rock, which I actually started by listening to Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park, I wanted to see these guys live so I was very excited about doing so. Still, I was a little afraid the show would turn out not to be that good because no matter how much I try, I just don’t think LP’s new album is that good. There are only a couple of songs that do attract me, the rest is just not LP anymore.
 

Back to the show then. They played all their hits like ‘One Step Closer’, ‘Faint’, ‘What I’ve Done’ etc. Fortunately the show contained a great balance between all their releases and the crowd seemed to enjoy every single second of the show. And so did I! I finally got to see them and I hope they’ll come over more often. Great band, great show!

 

After a stunning live performance of Linkin Park I thought it was a nice idea to check out some songs of Evanescence but to be honest they couldn’t really get to me. The only song I can recall was their first radio hit, ‘Bring Me To Life’ which was of course done without the male vocals it used to have. What really bothered me about the song was that the band didn’t fill in those parts at all, leaving kind of empty spots in the song. Too bad! Nevertheless the band gave away a nice show but to be honest I can’t remember enough of it to tell you more about it.

 

After Evanescence it was time for the headliner of the festival, The Smashing Pumpkins. I have no idea whether there were a lot fans of the band but it was great to see that most people stayed to watch the entire show nevertheless. The only song I knew was ‘Bullet With Butterfly Wings’ and it sure rocked! I guess they played a combination of old and new songs judging from the crowd’s reaction and from the difference between the particular songs. One time they played some nice energetic rock, the next song was a very long and instrumental song. The latter leaving me with mixed feelings. What the hell, these old men proved to be still worthy of playing live and everybody seemed to agree with me on that. Although that might just be because of the damn fine lady playing bass.

 

This way Pinkpop 2007 came to an end. I had a good time watching all the bands and I can only hope to be there next year again! I’d like to apologize for not being able to do a complete Pinkpop 2007 review but hopefully it’ll be here next year!