September 11, 2011. At 8:46 AM ET, American Airlines Flight 11 crashes into the North Tower of the World Trade Center. Minutes later at 9:03 AM ET, United Airlines Flight 175 crashes into the South Tower of the World Trade Center. Both of these crashes would level the World Trade Center towers and two other airlines that were hijacked would crash in other locations; American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon and then Flight 93 into a field thanks to the heroic passengers who refused to let the plane be a weapon. Nearly 3,000 lives were lost on that day due to a terrorist attack on American soil. 20 years later those responsible were captured or killed and while the U.S. did our best to move on, we would never forget. I could clearly remember where I was 20 years ago when I heard the news of those planes hitting the Twin Towers. And I’d certainly remember where I was 20 years later on Day 3 of the Blue Ridge Rock Festival.
It felt weird to be celebrating a return to normalcy and life on the anniversary of a horrendous tragedy. I personally gave moments of silence that morning in memory of those who were lost after having breakfast and prepped myself for the day. I know many veterans who would be attending the festival would be displaying American colors, proud to have served. And I personally thank those for all who did in support of our country and freedom. I know this day was going to be the best day, with some of the heaviest bands including those on the Metal of the Year Tour on the lineup and then ending with Five Finger Death Punch. This day was going to be a momentous celebration of life.
I was back in the car heading toward Route 29 to the Blue Parking Lot once more. This time as I pulled in, I noticed there were a ton of buses waiting and people were loading up onto them. The parking attendant instead of sending me towards the back of the lot, kept me up front and close. I started to feel my luck was turning around after all the walking for two days straight. It didn’t take me long to get to the bus line, get on a bus, and heading back down Carson Lane. The bus made it all the way down, dropped us off, and I was heading back to Media Will Call as I was photographing for two artists the rest of the weekend and needed to pick up my photo passes for them. But, no one was there. So me and a few others chatted for an hour or so waiting for the Media Will Call to open. One of those people was a rep from Fearless Records and he shared some great stories of people he met in the music industry. I had met him at festivals before, but never formally introduced myself. Once Media Will Call opened, I picked up my passes, heading back through the VIP entrance for a bag check, and off to the media tent.
When I entered the media tent, I noticed two massive fans had been placed there to help keep us cooled down. It was a nice addition, but we still didn’t have many chairs, so let me explain that story I mentioned in my Day 2 review. Over the past few months, I became friends with a member of the Blue Ridge Rock Festival staff named Amanda. You probably know her from the Fan Zone and her insane love for Badflower. I memed a photo I took of Josh to wish her a Happy Birthday in the Fan Zone because that’s how much we had become friends. On Friday evening she had messaged me how my festival was going. I was honest, I was letting the issues take over my enjoyment of the festival and said I didn’t want to message her because I knew she’d be super busy handling things behind the scene. She asked me what were some of the issues. I told her about the buses, which the Blue Ridge Rock Festival team was already working on, and then mentioned the chairs. Amanda explained she personally had taken a bunch of chairs over to the media tent on Friday, which means someone stole our chairs! Well, that explains why we had so few! Site facilities was able to bring us more.
There was a lot on the photo plate today so I started off with one of the Rising Talents I interviewed called GraveBound over at the Liquid Death Stage. You can check out the interview I had with them HERE. They were rocking right off the bat, bouncing on the stage, and getting their crowd pumped up for a show. Kyle was a maniac on the stage and his vocals were on point. James and Joe were truly into their playing. But, their drummer was not the same person I had interviewed, which was unexpected. Still, they were kicking ass and taking names. I always compared their music to I Prevail and look forward to more music from them. Check out their singles of “Tonic” and “Failure By Design” that we shared in the interview.
I was running over to the URW Stage to see and photo for the first time Corrosion of Conformity. This legendary band has been around since 1982 with 10 studio albums released. The moment they hit the stage the crowd was roaring and they looked pleased to see such a big crowd come out to see them. And while they’re known as a heavy metal band, I felt a more blues-rock vibe as they performed. They lived for the moment in their music, in every note, each beat, each lyric. This was truly awesome and loved finally getting to see them perform live.
I was planning to shoot 10 Years next but noticed there was someone playing over at The Clinic Stage so I decided to check them out. This was one of the Rising Talents known as Alyxx out of New York. With her green and purple hair whipping around on stage and an amazing voice with hard rock music supporting her, this was definitely an artist to see. I was truly impressed with their music and glad I got the opportunity to see their performance.
Now it was off to the Monster Energy Stage to see one of my all time favorite bands, 10 Years! If you ever ask me who is a band you should always see live, 10 Years will always be in this list. The hard rock band from Tennessee put out amazing music but always put on a fantastic live performance. Jesse (vocals) comes out on stage wearing a white suit with black splotches (kind of reminded me of a Dalmatian) and his patented black hoodie. But, this time had a white plague doctor bird mask. I loved it. The look was perfect and the message was loud and clear. And when they pulled out songs such as “Shoot It Out” and “Fix Me” during our photo pit time, you’re damn straight I sang every lyric! And their overall setlist was great with “Cut the Cord”, “Beautiful”, and “Wasteland”. Awesome, awesome performance from them and I was thrilled to see they got main stage recognition for this festival. The only sad part was I missed their acoustic performance in the VIP tent immediately after their set.
And then it was time to get heavy. The URW Stage seemed to be the one where stuff was going to get nuts for the day and this time I was finally getting to see Hatebreed. They jumped onto the Metal of the Year Tour when In Flames had to drop out and you couldn’t ask for a better band to be going on tour with Trivium, Lamb of God, and Megadeth. And did they ever take advantage of this opportunity! Right out of the gates we’re getting slammed with “Empty Promises” followed by “Tear It Down” and “This Is Now”. Hatebreed was all over the stage, the fans were crowd surfing and moshing, the dust was flying around in a whirlwind, and everyone was having an awesome time. This set was a thrill ride that included a Slayer cover of “Ghosts of War”, “I Will Be Heard”, and “Destroy Everything”. My blood was pumping after this performance so don’t miss them on tour!
For me, it was time of a change of pace as I was photographing the set for the Rising Talent known as Awesome Ray Ray over at the Liquid Death Stage. He was one of the artists I interviewed and you can find that interview HERE. He is a very talented musician who likes to put in a little bit of soul, a little bit of rock, a little bit of hip hop, and blend it all together to make his performances his own thing. And he is a truly caring and wonderful human being. And the fans were enjoying everything he was putting on the stage for them. He got us all a bit emotional during his song “Therapy”, which we discussed during our interview. And definitely had the crowd moving with his new single “On The Run” (he was excited they got to blow up a car in the video) and I truly love that single. All in all it was a great set from Awesome Ray Ray and I recommend checking out his socials and music.
It was back to the URW Stage for some headbanging with my city’s own awesome metal band in Trivium. Along the way I ran into my friend Danny again and this time finally got to meet my friend Amanda! It was awesome to finally meet her so we did a quick photo and then I headed off. The last time I watched Trivium play a festival, they had a crowd so large there were lines of crowd surfers coming over the pit in waves. It would be no different this time as Trivium was bringing us some new music for headbanging, throwing up horns, and moshing. “In the Court of the Dragon”, the title track from their upcoming album on October 8th, was absolutely amazing live and the circle pits were once again kicking up so much dust it was literally whirlwinds blowing across us. They also performed “Feast of Fire” from the new album. I loved that they performed “Catastrophist”, “What The Dead Men Say”, and one of my favorite singles from them “The Heart From Your Hate”. My only criticism is I felt they should have had a bigger time slot because it’s fucking Trivium. Otherwise, stupendous performance.
I had to run quickly over to the Monster Energy Stage to catch the next artist that I hadn’t seen live since June 8, 1991 on the Building Empires tour with Queensryche. That band is Suicidal Tendencies. Formed back in 1980, the band released 13 studio albums and still touring strong. Though Mike Muir (vocalist) is the only original member after the band broke up in 1995 and came back in 1996, they still have their thrash sound and the energy you expect from Suicidal Tendencies. The moment the band stepped out on the stage the crowd was insane with cheers and they immediately jumped into it. Mike Muir is a madman on the stage, constantly moving as he sang at a tremendously fast pace. It is insane to see that he can keep doing that after all these years. Musically, they sounded fantastic and I was elated to see them perform live. And this performance was historic as bassist Tye Trujillo was playing in the band his father, Robert Trujillo, played. They had a great set that included “You Can’t Bring Me Down”, “Possessed to Skate”, and “Pledge Your Allegiance”. I hope they come back on tour again so I can see them with a full set performance.
From there it was down the hill to the StayLit Stage to see the legendary Cypress Hill! This would be another first for me in getting to photograph and see them perform live. Decorations of cannabis hung from the turntables and the moment “B-Real” stepped out on stage the crowd cheered in approval and the smell of marijuana was very strong in the air. They opened with “Another Body Drops” and partway through the song “Sen Dog” jumped in and made his way on stage which generated another cheer from the crowd. Their performance was great and you could see they both looked happy being back on the stage again. They performed a massive 20 song setlist in a very short time frame giving the crowd a performance to remember. Songs they included were “When the Shit Goes Down”, “Pigs”, “I Wanna Get High”, “Insane in the Brain”, and a House of Pain cover of “Jump Around”. It was great to finally see them perform.
I headed back to media for a refresher because I knew I had to be ready for the next set. It was back over to the last performer at the URW Stage, Lamb of God. The co-headliner of the Metal of the Year Tour with Megadeth was going to be ready to melt the faces off the Blue Ridge Rock Festival attendees. Right before I went in, I finally got to meet up with Kendra, who photos and reviews for my website. We had never met in person even though I had seen her at the EXIT 111 Festival at Lamb of God‘s set. It was only fitting that we’d meet at their set at Blue Ridge Rock Festival. The crowd was packed in super tight for their set and the sun was starting to come down with such beautiful colors. When Lamb of God stepped onto the stage, the mood changed from anticipation to frenzy. It took no time at all for the crowd to get nuts as Lamb of God opened with “Memento Mori”. The crowd surfers were fast and heavy and I could see the dust coming back up onto the stage, which meant the circle pits were running around again. And then, the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen happen during a live performance. Seether was performing on the Monster Energy Stage, which was right around the corner from the URW Stage. They had a big crowd over there, so you could see them to your left if you were facing the URW Stage. Well after Lamb of God performed “Ruin”, Randy (vocals) ran over to the left side of the stage looking at the fans he could see watching Seether. He yelled at that crowd what they were doing over there and to come over to their stage for a real show. I started laughing so hard in the pit. Only Randy would do something like that during his set. As expected, Lamb of God gave the URW Stage a proper closing with a kick-ass performance. Their performance included “Walk With Me in Hell”, “512”, and “Redneck”. If the Metal of the Year Tour is coming to a city near you, do NOT miss it.
Megadeth or Badflower was a tough choice, but I decided on Badflower. The band has been on fire since the release of their debut album OK, I’m Sick and their single “Ghost” and have kept it moving ever since. When I got down to the Liquid Death Stage, Amanda was there asking if she could borrow my phone to take some pics and videos of Badflower because her phone wasn’t charging and almost dead. I laughed and let her borrow it knowing the amount of photos and videos I’d have on there when I went to collect it. She is a massive Badflower fan and I’m sure I was going to regret it. Lou Brutus came out on stage to explain that Josh (vocals) lost his voice during the tour. They could have canceled but decided they wanted to continue their tour and have the fans sing the songs for them. When they came out on stage the crowd was nuts. The band came out smiling and dancing and Rick Rolled the crowd with “Never Gonna Give You Up” playing as they came out. Josh walked up to the microphone where the crowd expected him to play. Instead, he sang. The crowd went insane from every word coming out of his mouth and from that point forward it was game on! Their music, their movements, smiles all around was making photographing Badflower the right choice for me. I was loving it and the crowd did too. Did Josh sound perfect? No. But, he was doing the best he could and for the fans (and me) that was more than enough. It was a great set including “Fukboi”, “30”, “Heroin”, and they closed it with “Ghost” and there were lots of tears flowing during that song. Truly memorable performance from Badflower.
And finally, we got to the end of the day with Five Finger Death Punch. All of the media was excited to photograph them since they always ham up to us with smiles, middle fingers, silly faces too, and fantastic music. 15 minutes before their set, a group of photographers who went over early came back saying the tour manager kicked them out of the pit stating no photographers for Five Finger Death Punch. The festival’s publicist who was with us in the media area, headed over to the Monster Energy Stage to see what was going on because as far as everyone knew all day, we were photographing their set. The publicist came back confirming no photographers for their set. I’ll be honest, I was crushed. I expected this to be a special performance for 9/11 and wanted to have the photographs to remember it.
Five Finger Death Punch did put on a solid set that included pyro, laser lights, and they autographed an American flag to provide to Pittsylvania police officers working in the pit that Ivan gave to them for their office. He even had the crowd salute the officers, which was a nice touch. Ivan led the crowd in singing along with all of their songs and had a 20 song set that included “Wash It All Away”, “Sham Pain”, “Wrong Side of Heaven”, “Burn MF”, and closing it out with “The Bleeding”. A solid way to close out the evening.
My media friends offered me another ride back to the Blue Parking Lot as they were able to park backstage as part of the staff. I got back in my car and drove back to the hotel remembering all the fantastic music and moments that happened that day. Hands down, Saturday was so far the best day of the festival. With some of the issues being resolved, I was energized and excited and ready to take on Sunday.
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