Diary from the final day: life is too short to chase everything

Fourth and final day, and the heat today is pure mugginess, the kind that sticks to you and drains your willpower. And maybe it was exactly the heat that gave me the thread for today, because it forced me to choose.
Not chasing after every stage, not ticking off every name from the schedule like a grocery list, but fully experiencing just a few things, leaving room for chatting, drinks, and people.
The quality of fun over quantity. It’s the ultimate festival lesson, and today I gave myself a full refresher. So much so that I kicked things off by skipping a gig.
I wanted to see Trollfest, dressed up as pink flamingos, but the heat just wouldn’t put me in the right mood, so screw it. I went to grab something typically Danish instead: stegt flæsk med persillesovs—crispy pork belly with parsley sauce and potatoes, the national dish.

[Stefano] I agree with Davide: life is too short and the lineup is too thin to drag my camera around for more festival miles. I’m dropping everything and dedicating myself to friends, so the photos only celebrate friends and the Copenhell family. Before he arrives, I catch a pleasant set by Social Distortion, which I can completely summarize using Mike Ness’s own words on stage: “Three chords, a good lyric, nothing else. That’s all you get for the price of your ticket.”

The Portuguese-Italian camp of the Copenhell hill friends

Katla: and the trap of expectation

The first band I really wanted to hear was Katla, and this is where I hit my first disappointment.
Nice stage, shaped like a castle, them inside it with the drummer pulling double duty on vocals. But to be completely honest, I found them boring. Four songs in and I was fed up. And there’s more to it, because I felt a bit cheated here. From the festival’s description, with all the volcano metaphors, I had envisioned a mystical, massive Icelandic band.
Instead, Katla are Danish, from Copenhagen, neighbors, basically. The funny part is that another eponymous band actually exists, Katla. with a dot, and that one is indeed Icelandic, featuring a drummer who comes from Sólstafir.
Two groups with the exact same name, and while I was waiting for the ice of Iceland, I found myself with the local kids from the neighborhood. Cool guys, sure, the Danish scene is beyond dispute, but betrayed expectations carry weight. So I did the right thing for day four: I walked away from the stage and headed to the tequila bar with Stefano and the Copenhagen crew, and we camped out on the terrace to chat and drink some excellent cocktails.

Alestorm: and the pit that never ends

You can’t watch Alestorm sober, it’s strictly a matter of methodology: with all those drinking anthems, you need to be at least in the first stage of drunkenness, otherwise it just doesn’t work. And thanks to the tequila, I got there just fine. A pirate band, deeply ironic, complete with beach bums and inflatable ducks—and I perfectly understand why a lot of people don’t give them the time of day because it’s so lighthearted. But damn, their show is overwhelming. In fact, it was the exact spectacle I expected from the festival, the one with non-stop crowdsurfing, continuous waves of it. We all sat down on the ground to row like on a ship—my abs still hurt now—and then back up again to dance. And I did one of the things I love most: launching young metalheads onto their very first trip over the crowd, crowdsurfing. After an hour and a quarter, we walked out in a bath of sweat and joy, with muscles aching in places I didn’t even know I had them. And yes, before you ask: they are Scottish, from Perth, not Swedish. Metal geography, even today.

[Stefano] Maybe I felt a bit guilty, or simply inspired by Bruce Dickinson’s self-sacrifice, but I decided to pull off a stunt with Davide in the pit. I slipped into a green-screen bodysuit and went wild with crowdsurfing and dancing. Here is a shot where you can easily cut out my green silhouette to photoshop yourself next to Davide “Don Laido” and Liv.

(personal note: spandex makes you sweat like a fountain)

Patrician rest among Saxon, vikings, and ancient romans

After Alestorm, a well-deserved rest was in order, and I took it on the hill, with Saxon drifting in from afar as my soundtrack. I needed to stand still more than I needed another concert, and that’s perfectly fine. Then off to the Viking village, with Viking drinks like mjød (mead) in the middle of a small grove, surrounded by volunteers from some Viking association dressed to the nines.

And after all this time spent on manicures, barbers, and noble idleness, a serious question crosses my mind: why doesn’t anyone do the same thing with the ancient Romans? As a lifestyle, let’s face it, it wasn’t bad at all. Digression closed. We stayed there chatting with some Greek metalheads: deep, beautiful conversations, laughing and having a great time for a long while. And that’s how I missed Volbeat on purpose. I’ll be honest about Volbeat, and I hope the director who adores them won’t take it personally: I had a bad first impression of them. I was left with a bad taste from years ago in a very nice local metal venue in Copenhagen that no longer exists today, and I’ve never been able to warm up to them since. To me, some of their stuff sounds like the track a villain band would play in a cartoon. Personal taste, obviously, and they’ve become world-famous in the meantime, so I must be the one who’s wrong. But life is too short to waste time on a band that does nothing for me, and that’s also the beauty of a festival: you choose. And I chose the conversation, the good times, the human network of international metal, which remains one of the finest things of all.

Volbeat: poison

[stefano]

Zero reticence, and carrying all the fatigue of someone who has just lost five liters of sweat, I lie down on the now-withered grass of the hill and listen.
Volbeat, in their homeland, are a divisive name: loved by casual listeners (a bit “butt rock”), viewed with suspicion by the local metal community (e.g., Davide), and not just due to musical genre.
In short, the well is poisoned.

The show is boastful an Americanized European band gig: Johnny Cash at Eurovision.
Indulgent, catchy, accommodating. It pleases exactly that way, and let’s admit it, Michael Poulsen’s voice is unique.
Yet, The start is crippled. The bluesy rockabilly fails to ignite the masses after four days of fire; the people are tired, hot, and I myself am dozing off, though the pit moves regardless.

Technically rock-solid, completely confident: these are the export-ready Volbeat in headliner format. The high-profile guests gift the soul of this performance. Martin Leth Andersen (Strychnos) delivers a glimpse of memorability. The performance of “For Evigt” alongside Johan Olsen (Magtens Korridorer), a national hero of the underground, awakens true, albeit melancholic, emotions. Unfortunately, the intense passion lasts only as long as the song.

Perhaps I drank from that poisoned well too, but it leaves a bittersweet aftertaste in my mouth. I loved those two tracks with Martin and Johan, but they inevitably emphasized my sense of detachment for the rest of the concert: self-referential.
The lump in the throat isn’t for their performance, which was otherwise excellent and faithful to their identity (for better or worse); it’s that their headline slot arrived at a moment where the band doesn’t seem capable of embodying the spirit of Copenhell. Too big to be just one of many names rotating through the stages, too much of an outsider to command the main slot.
Volbeat are Davide’s patrician treatment: pleasantly indulgent, comfortable, and exclusive, but to my nose, they don’t smell enough of spilled beer among the stories of the Biergarten.

Evidently, even the Norse metal gods got annoyed. Or perhaps they showed mercy. Persistent and violent lightning strikes, and the concert is suspended just a step away from the grand finale. Paradoxically, the most magical, cathartic, and memorable moment of their entire performance.
Call it karma.
I must have done something bad myself: in the middle of the downpour, I suddenly remember leaving the windows of my apartment wide open. Terrified for the parquet floor, I launch into a desperate bike retreat under the cloudburst. My festival is over.
From here, I leave you alone with that madman Davide.

Blood Fire Death: the true tribute and the storm

Then came the right moment for Blood Fire Death, and here is a clarification for anyone who grew up on a diet of black metal like me. This isn’t just any tribute band, and those tracks aren’t “just covers.” Bathory was essentially a one-man project by Quorthon, who never played a single live gig in his life and passed away in 2004. That repertoire live, from the original band, has never been seen and never will be. So what I have in front of me is the elite of the scene that Bathory generated, bringing back to life an otherwise impossible legacy.

This goes way beyond a tribute: it is an act of love. And the surprise is who takes the stage to sing. A procession of black metal heroes taking turns at the microphone, from Gaahl to Grutle Kjellson of Enslaved, all the way to Attila from Mayhem, backed by a war machine lining up “A Fine Day to Die,” “Call From the Grave,” and “Woman of Dark Desires.” For someone like me, it’s a daydream. Except right while we are standing in front of Pandemonium waiting for them, one of the last gigs of the festival, the evacuation announcement drops.

A storm is coming: lightning, unbelievable rain. And right there, Copenhell proves it’s organized even in an emergency, because a plan actually existed: everyone inside one of the massive halls, the B&W Hallerne, the old shipyard warehouse where they even held Eurovision when it was in Copenhagen. I found shelter under a bar counter thanks to the volunteers, and we stayed there for about forty-five, fifty minutes. Then it passed, and they announced the show would resume.

The finale at the Biergarten, and the return home

Copenhell cannot close without its ritual: the Biergarten. Dancing, pitting, crowdsurfing, people standing on tables, the place packed to the brim, the DJ blasting Rage Against the Machine, Prodigy, Metallica, and all the classics: the more you want, the more he’s got. The energy of a true finale, the closing celebration of this year too. And this year too, we head home happy. With the feeling of having learned something, of having broken the molds, of having watched prejudices fall before our own eyes, and of having bonded with so many beautiful people, both new faces and the usual ones.

Four days where the sacred mixed with the profane, where I made peace with my age and the passing of time, where metal took me halfway around the world while standing still in a forest, and where I chose quality over quantity without regretting a thing. See you next year. And if I really have to say it all, as I wrote on day one, Copenhell is like Christmas. Actually no, scratch that: it beats Christmas ten to zero.