Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Ozzfest......The Destination Festival??

By Wayne Graham

According to Blabbermouth, rumours abound of Ozzfest making a transition from a single day traveling metal festival to a two-day fest in Dallas this year. As you may recall, last year's go-around was free to attendees, with costs offset by corporate sponsors. That resulted in a pretty strong second stage with a lot of hungry up-and-comers (3 Inches of Blood, Behemoth, Nile) and---with the exception of the show stealing Lamb of God---an extremely lousy mainstage.

Yeah, guess that didn't work. Given the success Rocklahoma had last year, combined with this year's excitement around the upcoming Mayhem Fest with Slipknot, Mastodon, DragonForce and other popular bands that might have participated in an Ozzfest tour, I guess Ozzy and Sharon felt like they wanted to get into the ever-growing stationary festival racket.

None of this is official, so no lineup choices have been released, but we can count on solo Ozzy since Heaven and Hell may be recording soon. And, I dunno, I'm sure Zakk Wylde and The Neverending Pinched Harmonics will probably be there.

2 comments:

Myche said...

Is it just me, or is this the year of the U.S. festival? There are a ton out there. I'm not complaining, I like the concept. I just need one that I can really sink my teeth into. The Rock Fest lineup in Cadott, WI is very disappointing this year. There were two years in a row that the lineups were very strong - and it was a great time, but it has disappointed me as of late. I'm definitely keeping my eye on Rocklahoma - I saw where Kix is a possible add!

Wayne said...

So far, it's looking like a Bonnaroo year. Too many good bands, but the prospect of missing Mastodon's coming out party to a huge audience is hard to think about.