Exclusive | Primal Fear Summer Festival Run-this week Wacken Open Air!

By Dutch bassist Alex Jansen

Our Summer Festival run is slowly coming to an end. We still have two to go. Wacken and a festival in the Czech Republic. First we hit Wacken though.

WACKEN OPEN AIR

I have played here 3 times already and I used to be a yearly visitor of this festival. Honestly it has been 10 years since I have been here, playing shows myself or too lazy to travel there. There is always an excuse not to go.

My journey starts Thursday afternoon as I hit the road to get to Tom’s place. I am crashing there for the night. I don’t want to get up at 2 in the night, deep in the night as we say in Primal Fear’s words, to get to an airport. We have diner and a few drinks with Carsten our buddy. We hit the bed and get up at 5 to get ready for our trip to the airport. Ralf and Carsten join us for the cab ride. Check in, get the guitars to bulky luggage, get a quick bite and board our plane for Hamburg.

Alex Beyrodt is flying from Frankfurt, Aaron and Cedric from Zürich, Michael is already there and Arnt and Martin are coming from Hamburg. It is a short flight but saves us a lot time. As we arrive in Hamburg we get the gear and by surprise we meet up with Basi, our magic man behind the scenes. He is arriving in Hamburg to mix another band and he got us a bit confused there haha. 

ARTIST SHUTTLE

The shuttles to bring us to Wacken are waiting already. As soon as Alex B arrives and the manager from Watain, who will ride with us, we hit the road. We arrive at 1 pm at the festival ground and man, has it changed a lot over the years. It looks very nice. A barbershop, massage parlor for musicians, everything is there. We check in and catch up with Martin Müller who is our lighting director and he is here with Avantasia. We check the dressing room, small but good enough, there are so many bands playing that it is a lot of work to accommodate them all. I catch up with Markus Herzog. He was our drumtech during the UDO tour and he is a dear friend of mine. He just played here with Cherie Currie and is about to hit the road for his next gig.

We catch up with Bodo and Dagmar, who brought us gear for the show. We also meet up with Yumi and Yama from Japan who apologize to us. They tell us that they now know how long the flight from Tokyo to Germany is. We laugh and say it is long but hey we are happy to play Japan.

GOD OF THUNDER

The catering is really great and we walk around a bit. We take our headquarters at a table and catch up with so many people we meet at the festivals or on the road. We catch up with our record label, other crews too many to mention. The best moment of the day is when Gene Simmons arrives, when he walks to his dressing room it is almost like a god walking through. Well he is the God of thunder. He takes some time to take pictures, not a lot though. I understand it as he wouldn’t be able to walk here 1 meter without being grabbed. When he gets back from an interview, he passes us again. His tour manager is a friend of mine and he gives me the opportunity to take a quick picture. Gene is very nice and he jokes around.

SHOWTIME

Now it is slowly time to get dressed. The crew went to the stage at 5 and has been setting up, tuning and cleaning guitars and preparing the stage for us. Our shuttle arrives at 7:30 pm to drive us to the stage. A quick line check to see if my set up is like I want it, of course Cedric did a perfect job. 8 pm our show starts and the field is full, people as far as the eyes can see. It is a pretty awesome view, you never get used to it, it is such a beautiful view. I see some familiar faces in the crowd.

As with all shows, time goes by so fast. My Dean brother Ira Black watches the show from the side of the stage and has a great time. Seeing him smile is priceless. After the show we get in the shuttle again to our dressing room. We have a drink and some food. We have nice talks with friends, bookers, labels and just friends in general.

HOMEWARD

First shuttle leaves with Alex B and Carsten. Unfortunately, after that shuttle is gone, they cancel our second shuttle and now we have a problem. As the gear wasn’t in the first shuttle, it is still all here. We divide it over two cars, a lot of stuff in Michael’s car and the rest in Bodo’s car. I can tell you the way back later that night was adventurous. Sitting with Tom and Ralf in the back, a guitar case in our laps and a trolley on top of it. A 50-minute drive to our hotel in Hamburg.

We made it though. We arrive with Blind Guardian. After chatting a bit we get to our rooms. We are talking 2:30 am and we have to get up at 5:30 am to catch our flight home. Romantics of the road. The sleep is short but good. We hit the airport and our flight home. It marks the end of a great weekend with my Primal Fear brothers again. In two weeks we hit the Czech Republic. See you then!

All photos provided by Alex Jansen