With a full capacity of around 85,000 people and a festival site that stretches over 240 hectares, as well as links to nearby villages (including the one that the festival takes its name from), Wacken's proclamation to be the world's biggest heavy metal festival has an undeniable truth to it. Add in line-ups that cover rock and metal in all of its diverse glory, and you're looking at one of the finest weekends any metalhead could hope for, helpfully set up in a field in Germany each August.
With 2024's headliners including Scorpions, Korn and Amon Amarth, as well as a stacked line-up featuring everyone from Testament to Cradle Of Filth, Opeth to Accept, this year's edition was truly a bumper event for the books. But which bands ruled the fields? These are the 10 bands who utterly conquered the masses at Wacken 2024.
Die Habinichtse
A medieval folk band singing entirely in German (as far as we could tell, at least). Alright, granted, it's hardly Mayhem (or any of the other spectacular underground bands on the 2024 line-up), but if you're looking for something that defines the weird and wonderful charm of Wacken, it'd be Die Habinichtse.
Playing amidst Wacken's own Middle Ages themed village Wackinger - where you can buy necklaces, ocarinas and miscellaneous other nick-nacks, grab a glass of mead or participate in games like hammering nails with axes, knocking each other off logs with straw pillows - the band sell a level of authenticity and fun that shows just how different Wacken is to every other festival, cementing a sense of quiet German pride that can be felt everywhere from the official Wacken merch stand at Hamburg Airport to the signs that say "WELCOME METALHEADS" as you arrive on-site. Truly, communal spirit.
KK's Priest
It's been a little over a year since K.K. Downing made his live debut with KK's Priest, proving there's more to the heavy metal legend than just bleating about past glories. With frontman Tim "Ripper" Owens and a flame-chucking stageshow that leans more towards the Maiden school of stagecraft than Priest, KK and co. have refined their set into a truly formidable trad metal force. You know you're onto a winner when, on the hottest day of the festival, the beer sellers in the crowd are struggling to get any attention as thousands of metalheads sing along to Breaking The Law.
Accept
With a line-up including Sweet, Armored Saint, KK's Priest, Axel Rudi Pell, Rage and Scorpions, its fair to say trad metal ruled the roost on the Thursday. But for Teutonic titans Accept, it must've felt like an extra special homecoming. Clearly invigorated by the success of latest album Humanoid, there's an almost thrashy sensibility to that album's title-track, while unsurprisingly the massive anthem Balls To The Wall has the whole field erupting in a mass sing-along, the band even bringing out KK's Priest howler Ripper for the track.
Massive Wagons
Lovable champions of the New Wave Of Classic Rock, you could have forgiven Massive Wagons if their set had been met with a lukewarm reception. Playing at midday well into the festival - the music had started on Wednesday in earnest, but some fans had arrived as early as the previous Sunday - it turned out that hangovers and festival fatigue can't compete with fired up Lancashiremen, frontman Baz Mills leading the crowd like a rock'n'roll R. Lee Ermey.
It doesn't hurt the band have some of the catchiest, canniest britrock songs this side of The Wildhearts, the likes of Fuck The Haters, House Of Noise and Bangin In Your Stereo quickly seeing the crowd balloon on a Saturday morning.
Blues Pills
When it comes down to it, aren't festivals made for riffs and sunshine? Swedish psychedelic rockers Blues Pills were well and truly in their element then, strutting forth with the kind of self-assured confidence that comes from knowing you've got some absolute bangers in the tank. Vocalist Elin Larsson beamed with a cocksure grin and magnetic stage presence that demands this band become absolute stars.
Spiritbox
Having already played their first UK show - at Download - and first UK headline shows, it's easy to forget sometimes just how new Spiritbox are - and how many 'firsts' they still have to complete. The band made their Wacken debut with a show of force however, feeling less like aspirant newcomers and more like hungry contenders, songs like Rotoscope, Circle With Me and Holy Roller undeniably iconic even at this early stage.
Feuerschwanz
Flamethrowers, flutes and chainmail, oh my! Germany's Feuerschwanz have been knocking around for almost 20 years now, but since 2020's signing to Napalm the band have experienced a serious nitro-boost to both their sound and profile. Folk metal with all the trimmings, their show feels like a collision between Amon Amarth, Manowar and Korpiklaani, utterly joyous with massive choruses for days and stage props that include full flamethrowers and witchy pagan druids banging cauldrons. It has to be seen to be fully explained, and even then you leave feeling like you've no idea what the hell just happened.
Korn
How has it taken this long to see Korn top festival bills in Europe? The nu metal godfathers are certainly no strangers to the fields of Europe, but it feels like we've spent an eternity watching them fill Special Guest and sub-headline spots when the plain truth is they've always had it in them to rule the roost. Wacken well and truly proved that, their Friday night headline set packed with the kinds of anthems festival-goers are desperate for, transcending language barriers to get the whole crowd roaring along to everything from Coming Undone and Falling Away From Me to Y'All Want A Single and Freak On A Leash. The failing is entirely ours, lads.
Bury Tomorrow
Architects might have been the closers of Wacken's Main Stage on Saturday, but it was fellow British metalcore heroes Bury Tomorrow who seemed to enjoy one of the biggest surprise successes of the weekend. A massive, fire-blasting stage show helped show just how much the band have come on since releasing last year's excellent The Seventh Sun and that album's beefy ragers dominated the set, while new single Villain Arc added extra fuel to the bonfire. The result was an absolute triumph, BT pulling a massive crowd that showed Britain is still producing world-class talent.
Mayhem
How do you follow up the most epic Amon Amarth set of all time? By watching black metal's most notorious band playing until the appropriately infernal time of midnight, of course. Mayhem kicked things off with the demonic spirituals of Malum from 2019's Daemon before steadily clawing their way back through 40 years of black metal filth.
It's telling that the earlier part of the set is notably more theatrical and grandiose, costume changes and demonic imagery beamed onto the screens behind the band lending a sense of the passage of time right up to their most notorious years, around the release of De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, where much of their most iconic imagery is beamed up in grainy, found-footage horror style vignettes. Joined by original drummer Manheim and vocalist Messiah for a closing run of Deathcrush, Necrolust and Pure Fucking Armageddon, it feels like an appropriately apocalyptic close to a massive weekend of heavy metal.
Wacken Festival 2025 tickets are on-sale now.
