Five months after Bring Me The Horizon, Slipknot and a double dose of Metallica rocked Download’s 20th edition, we finally know who’s going to be topping the bill at Donington in 2024. Fall Out Boy, Queens Of The Stone Age and Avenged Sevenfold are the holy trinity topping UK rock ’n’ roll’s most sacred spot next year – and the response to that news has been, let’s say, “mixed”. However, to complain about pop-punks and stoner rockers being the main event of a “metal” festival is to actually miss the full picture.
Cards on the table: I am as fierce a metalhead as you can get. Ever since I saw Metallica headline at Donington in 2012, I’ve been a devoted acolyte in the cult of heavy music. Try as I may to broaden my palate and dabble in sugary pop or snooty jazz, I always end up returning to the face-scrunching riffery of Gojira or Cult Of Luna within minutes. And the freak metalhead in me (which is all of me) is actually incredibly satisfied with the lineup for Download 2024.
