BLOODSTOCK ANNOUNCES FIRST BANDS FOR THE HOPICAL STORM NEW BLOOD STAGE

23rd April 2024 0 By Jon Deaux

The Metal 2 The Masses tour returns in 2024! BLOODSTOCK’s initiative to give emerging bands a step up and also support grassroots venues, kicks off on 10th May, with 30 regions and 6 countries participating. The fun begins in Belfast and rolls down through Dublin and back to England, Scotland, and Wales, taking in Norway and Poland along the way. The tour wraps up in Coventry on 15th July, with all the regional winners from the finals being revealed in due course. Check out the local events below and get along to your nearest event to support the headliners of tomorrow!

BLOODSTOCK is also thrilled to announce a collaboration with Timothy Taylor’s Hopical Storm as the official Metal 2 The Masses sponsor for 2024. Expect to see them on site and lend their name to the Hopical Storm New Blood Stage! To celebrate the new partnership, BLOODSTOCK’s very own S’tan popped by their brewery to greet the team… watch here.

Today also marks the first batch of bands selected to showcase their talent at 2024’s event, outside of the M2TM tour initiative.

2023’s Northern Ireland victors and ‘war-jazz’ thrashers, ACID AGE will open Thursday’s Sophie Lancaster stage. They tell us “We love everything about M2TM. The exposure, photography, stage, lights and friends we made was more than satisfactory, but then we won and got to both attend and play BLOODSTOCK 2023! We couldn’t believe it, BLOODSTOCK is heavy metal Mecca. It’s where everyone comes together with a common goal, HEAVY FUCKING METAL! The sense of community at the festival is undeniable. Now that we have a chance to return and play the Sophie stage, we aim to show everyone why we are the best War-Jazz band in the world and we will do it for Sophie. See you in August.” Check out their video for ‘Slave Girl’ and get up to speed.

Selected from 600 email submissions, on Friday’s Hopical Storm New Blood stage expect to see Scottish thrash squad DISPOSABLE, Leicester’s prog metal outfit FINAL COIL and Scottish rockers SHE BURNS RED.

Saturday’s bill will feature London industrial noiseniks BIOMECHANIMAL, Herts heavyists PRAETORIAN and metalcore squad, LOST TO LIGHT.

Sunday’s lineup includes Brummie rockers STRAIGHT FOR THE SUN, Cambridge metallers AKKADIAN and Yorkshire blackened death outfit, SATHAMEL.

In other 2024 BLOODSTOCK news, OPETH‘s headline set on Friday night will be a fan-voted set! OPETH mainman, Mikael Akerfeldt explains in his inimitable dry humoured way: “This boils down to YOU voting for your favourite OPETH songs, culled from a list that we’ve put together (ie: songs that we know/believe/hope we can play fairly well). There are a few rarities in there, a few ”hits” and a few ”whatever” songs to choose from. Depending on our set length, we’ll put together a nice list of the top-voted songs that adds up to match the stage-time in question. Have fun! Be gentle! Thanks for participating!” Check out OPETH‘s Spotify Playlist to remind yourself of the choices and v ote for your Top 10 picks here. Voting ends 17th May.

From 1st May, you can also utilise BLOODSTOCK‘s ‘click & collect’ service to pre-order your favorites online from the 2024 merchandise range! Pre-purchase your favorite t-shirt or grab the 2024 beer mug without fear of your size or design being already sold out on site. Pre-order here and simply collect at the arena merch stall on the weekend, knowing your item is guaranteed. All ‘click and collect’ items in the store will be clearly marked with a yellow C&C badge. Maybe you want that BOA hoodie for when the sun goes down, so order, then collect from the merch stall to save a trip back to your tent. In a ‘click & collect’ exclusive, if you order over £100 of items via this method, you get 10% off, and over £200 gets 15% off. Mark your calendar and head over on 1st May to grab your swag.

Also, if you’ve not yet checked out BLOODSTOCK’s new podcast, hosted by the inimitable Beez, head over to Spotify or Apple Podcasts and check out the episodes so far, including guests such as Clutch, Sylosis, Green Lung and more! You can also now find some of these episodes on the official BLOODSTOCK YouTube channel.

Lastly, 2024 club nights are rolling out rapidly. Head to one of the following events to meet some other BLOODSTOCK-ers and hear lots of BOA bands old and new, and maybe win a prize! Check locally for more details. There will be a competition at every club night to win a pair of standard weekend festival tickets! If none of these nights are near you, more events will be announced soon for June & July.

Fri 26th April – London – Electrowerkz, Voodoo

Sat 27th April – Stoke-on-Trent – The Sugarmill, Devil’s Night

Sat 27th April – York – Bluebox, Deadbolt

Fri 3rd May – Cardiff – Metros, Doomsday

Sat 4th May – Brighton – Above, Apocalypse

Sat 4th May – Torquay – The Attic, Party Hard!

Fri 10th May – Bristol – The Lanes, PHUCT

Sat 11th May – Isle of Wight – Strings, Apocalypse

Sat 18th May – Nottingham – The Sal, Hexx

Sat 18th May – Newcastle – Think Tank, Grindhouse

Sat 25th May – Southampton – Sobar, Apocalypse

Sat 25th May – Camberley – Agincourt

Sat 25th May – Stoke-on-Trent – The Sugarmill, Devil’s Night

Sat 25th May – Norwich – The Waterfront, Meltdown

Fri 31st May – Warrington – Eden, Asylum

Standard weekend tickets for BLOODSTOCK, priced at £185 (+ booking fee) are available now in the 2024 ticket store. Early Bird, VIP, and campervan tickets are already sold out.

BLOODSTOCK’s 2024 Ronnie James Dio main stage headliners are AMON AMARTH, OPETH, and ARCHITECTS. Across the weekend you can also expect to see CLUTCH, HATEBREED, CARCASS, ENSLAVED, MALEVOLENCE, SATYRICON, ROTTING CHRIST, SYLOSIS, WHITECHAPEL, DEICIDE, GRAND MAGUS, DESERT STORM, THE VINTAGE CARAVAN, SOEN, GREEN LUNG, COMBICHRIST, XENTRIX, EXIST IMMORTAL, ETERNAL CHAMPION, GROVE STREET, MIMI BARKS, CRYPTA, FORBIDDEN, NERVOSA, BEAST IN BLACK, KORPIKLAANI, UNLEASH THE ARCHERS, FLOGGING MOLLY, SEPTIC FLESH, IGORRR, RUIJIN, GROVE STREET, UNPEOPLE, NIGHT FLIGHT ORCHESTRA, HELLRIPPER, INFECTED RAIN, CULTURA TRES, SADUS, LUDOVICO TECHNIQUE, BURNER, RED RUM, EVERGREY, RAISED BY OWLS, TAILGUNNER, SOUTH OF SALEM, and ANKOR with more still to be announced.