First just meant to be an anniversary event for the 20th birthday of the famous German rock- and metal magazine Rock Hard, the ROCK HARD FESTIVAL took place in Gelsenkirchen, Germany for the second time now. Again the Rock Hard team spared no pains to organise a nice event with lots of good bands and even set sails to new terrains: this year they even sold camping tickets (which were strictly limited) so that travellers didn't have to rely on youth hostels or hotels and could join the party, too.

Amongst them I arrived with my friends somewhen during the Friday evening, so I missed all the bands which played that evening for we had to put up our tents and prepared our barbeque. Of course we could hear the bands while we arranged ourselves for the upcoming festival days - I really regret that I didn't see Metal Inquisitor, which was the first band playing and who seemed to blow the speakers, preparing the crowd for the following. Generally the organisers set store by a nice mix of music, because the next band was a local thrash band called Delirious, who were followed by the rock 'n' rolling Electric Eel Shock from Japan. The most striking performance displayed the evening's headliner Honigdieb (which actually means 'honey thief'); sort of a fun rock band with an unconventional line-up consisting of a violin, a guitar, drums and percussion, a transverse flute, a contrabass and finally mastermind and voice Sir Hannes Smith with his blinking nipple piercing. He was able to convince his audience by his crazy show and jokes, which was worth seeing, but for quite a few people hard to endure more than 10 minutes.

That evening being more of a warm-up and nice preparing for the "real" festival, the opening band for Saturday was Thunderstorm, which maybe was a bit unfortunate because their doom metal didn't fit well in a hot and sunny afternoon and so they had some problems to awaken the crowd. But it also might be that the average festival attendant was still busy in having breakfast, be it at home or on the camping ground, because the band did a nice job and the sound was okay, too.

After a rest during the following Dead Soul Tribe I saw the show of the Swedish black metal heroes Naglfar, which had to face some sound problems the first songs but the technicians seemed to be competent and solved them quite quickly. Afterwards they offered a nice show, too - at least all black metal fans seemed to be satisfied. For all those 'happy metal' fans who had to take a rest during the first bands Gluecifer followed - they presented their merry rock good humoured as usual and bared the audience from falling into a hot-sunny-day-laziness. Generally the Rock Hard guys seemed to have bribed the weather god - the weather forecast said it should have been raining, but actually the sun burned all us pale metalheads who left their bunkers for the first time this year: indeed not before the very last band, Machine Head, the weather had been changing. In the therefore warmed up arena of the Amphitheatre Gelsenkirchen the Thrash Metal legends Destruction entered the stage about 6 o'clock - normally it would have been time for Marduk, but they cancelled their show due to (for me) unknown reasons. Well, the crowd didn't seem to care because after being asked most of the people shouted their compliancy and hardly a guy seemed to be disappointed of Marduk's absence. Their show was indeed nice - the guys gave a lot to kick our asses. The next band, Krokus, again was a break for me, so I returned to see the next Thrashers, Exodus. Unfortunately Thrash Metal isn't really my profession - but also those guys presented a nice show. The following band was more of my taste: happy Gamma Ray! Although I still have problems with the …unique voice of axeman and singer Kai Hansen, I enjoyed their gig quite well. After their "Skeletons in the Closet"-Tour, in which they played rare or seldom heard songs, they now again chose some of their classics like Rebellion in Dreamland, which the audience enthusiastically assimilated. Indeed the best show of the evening, because even with their huge stage-buildup and fire as far as eyes can see In Extremo, the most famous band of all middle-ages metallers, couldn't beat them. Of course they also presented a great show with lots of their greatest hits like Herr Mannelig, Spielmannsfluch or Vollmond, but I got the impression that In Extremo was more about the show than about the music - indeed the burning gallows and all the other stuff was nice to look at and the music wasn't bad at all, but maybe it was just too much of it all.

Well, successful we survived the first evening of the Rock Hard Open Air and could return to our tents satisfied. About the camping: Unfortunately the city of Gelsenkirchen forbade the visitors to bring glass bottles to the camping area and the Rock Hard team forgot to announce it well timed, so all beer bottles (and they have been several, I bet) were condemned to stay in the trunks which caused grumblings among the campers - especially because the cars had to stay on the parking lots quite far away from the camping area. Also there was quite little space because in the middle of the area there was a huge boulder field where no tents could be built up - but because the camping tickets were strictly limited and as many people as possible should get the chance to stay over night near the festival area, we guys moved together willingly. Indeed the sanitary equipment was great: water-closets and showers were free and always impeccably clean - thumbs up for that!

Another demerit were some security-guys: between some bands they announced that crowd-surfing was unwanted, but of course not all visitors noticed it because there haven't been any information boards and they even didn't repeat it - nevertheless the security-guys have been quite rude to the surfers and someone told me they even cut the wristband of some guy who surfed the fourth time; there the organisers disagreed and gave him a new one. Well, back to the music now.

On Sunday we skipped the band to have a nice breakfast and afterwards went to the festival area to see the Canadian proggies Into Eternity from the huge rostrum that builds the amphitheatre. I didn't know the band, but they played a solid gig and for me it was a nice prelude to the rest of the day - on Sunday a hell lot of bands of my interest should play. Actually Malevolent Creation should play next, but also their show was cancelled and instead the Danish Illdisposed entered the stage. Personally I didn't see them, but a friend was totally sold on their gig and also on the sympathetic appearances of the five guys, who entertained their audience not only by death metal all the way but also by German announcements in funny Danish accent.

Enough death metal for now - the merry hard rock/melodic metal-guys of Pink Cream 69 presented one of the best shows this evening. Strangely most people preferred to see their show from the rostrum so the area in front of the stage was a bit empty, but they managed to wake up all people who were more into those melodic kinds of metal and took a break during Illdisposed - the first rows before the stage banged their necks sore. Afterwards Metal Church was another opportunity for tea-time or a short nap for us. I wanted to spend that time letting Stratovarius sign something, but the guys were a bit late, so it almost collided with Dark Tranquillity, who were next - I wanted to see them at any rate. Fortunately everything fitted somehow, so I hardly missed a part of their show: I think I would have regretted it immensely for in my opinion they played the best show of the festival: full of energy, with a nice setlist and great sound. Especially Mikael Stanne, their sympathetic vocalist, interacted a lot with the audience and growled the shit out of his lungs - without forgetting that he has a great singing-voice, too, as all the metalheads could assure for themselves during their beyond-average song ThereIn.

No time for recovery afterwards - after the obligatory half an hour for reconstruction it was time for Rage then, who are well-known in Gelsenkirchen because their hometown Herne isn't far away. Thus they had sort of a home game, but in a way they gave the impression to be just the support of the following Stratovarius, who probably will have played their last show in Germany that evening. In a way that situation fell short of them - their show was quite solid. Now the time was come for maybe the most expected gig of the night: Stratovarius. Having had some quite strange problems among the members during the last months, it was very unclear if they'd play that gig at all - and if, it should one of the very last ones. Also the show itself was - after the incidents of Piorno Rock at the beginning of the year - curiously expected. This day, however, Stratovarius again behaved more like a band - they played their songs solidly but a bit rigid due to well-known reasons. After all chef Timo Tolkki wasn't totally drunk on stage again so that he did an acceptable job on his guitar; and also Timo Kotipelto presented himself well. Again they played their beautiful ballad Forever together, and nothing spectacular happened in the meantime - seems that they also had a serious talk to Jens Johansson, their keyboarder. After all one could notice that this band really might better be split - the gig was nice and well-played, but had absolutely no power any more. Well, it was quite remarkable that they even managed to bow together after the gig and Timo Kotipelto didn't have had to leave the stage before. Nevertheless not really a worthy co-headliner, there just have been too many problems.

For some people it wasn't really understandable why Machine Head were the long-announced headliners of the day - but anyway they lurked a huge following to the stage, which didn't mind the rain, that started to fall immediately after Stratovarius. I can't say much about Machine Head - it's not my kind of music and after three songs I left because of the nasty rain.

Thus the festival ended - the weather was nice until the very last band, which of course was quite annoying for all campers. Nevertheless all should have had a nice weekend with a hell lot of good bands, who all presented a nice show - I already look forward to the next Rock Hard Festival which hopefully will take place next year again.