Last day of the Jera On Air with a strong program once again: Rise Against, Bullet For My Valentine, Electric Callboy, Frank Carter, Knocked Loose and many. Some surprises, some bad and good shows. Here’s the recap!
Thursday weather was shit. Friday weather was hot. Saturday weather was fuckin’ hot too. But we won’t complain about it. We’ve a long day ahead of us! First show of the day for us: Holding Absence. Lot of expectations and a small disappointment. The sound wasn’t the best, that happened unfortunately. But there wasn’t any energy during the first half of their set. Fortunately, the end of the set was a bit better with their hits Afterlife and Wilt. But won’t save the average feeling of the show. This third day started way more slowly than the Friday. Vein.FM and The Hell didn’t succeed to bring us to their musical world. And sadly, like their show in Tilburg with A Day To Remember, Oceans Ate Alaska didn’t have a good sound at all.
Around 3pm, the level finally won some levels. First good one of the afternoon: Incendiary. It’s really rare to see them in Europe. Like we said in our article in prevision of the Jera On Air, the band only come in Europe for a few very selected shows like Jera On Air, Hellfest, some UK shows and have never made a proper tour so far. The hype is real. Hope they won’t wait too long. Until then, we enjoyed as much as possible their sick set on the Vulture Stage, almost too small for them already! About 40 minutes of mosh-pit, circle-pit and so on. Once again, it’s really sad there isn’t an hardcore stage on the festival – not speaking about the very small Buzzart Stage. Of course, it’s not easy for the security but if it happened in other festivals in US or UK or in Belgium even if the Ieperfest is smaller now, why not at Jera On Air then?!
ELECTRIC CALLBOY: FUTURE HEADLINER?
Right after Incendiary, we had a meeting with one of the most anticipated bands of the festival: the crazy German boys of Electric Callboy! Since the release of their single Hypa Hypa, their success has soared higher than we’ve ever thought it would be! It’s 4pm but the tent is fully packed – seems even more than The Offspring, headliner of the second day – and people are also watching the show from outside. For sure, one of the most packed show of the whole festival. And they proved that they were worth it! From the opening song Pump It until We Got The Moves, the public was on fire. The band changed their clothes more than once during the set but the energy stayed the same with the highlight right in the middle of the show: Hypa Hypa, of course. Even when the show was over, people were still singing the main riff while they’re leaving the tent. If Electric Callboy confirmed it with their upcoming album, they’re on the highway to the top!
For 99% of the bands, it would be hard to play right after them. Too bad for Neck Deep, they were at a much lower level! After their great show at Slam Dunk, we hope to enjoy them again… but hell no. Boring as hell. The band was really tired and the crowd not really in the mood. And the comparaison is even more difficult as they played between Electric Callboy… and Frank Carter, the other big show of the day! Another show where the audience is eating out of hand. During 45 minutes, Frank did the show: jump in the crowd, climb one of the pillars, surf on an inflatable pink flamingo, bring a fan to the stage (after throwing his microphone to the audience). But the audience wasn’t left out either! Jump, sing along, circle-pit outside of the tent… This show was the real definition of a festival show: have fun!
Between Neck Deep and Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes, we made a quick return to the Vulture Stage for the most violent show the whole festival: Knocked Loose. From the first riff, the whole tent goes wild and the security has been busy like never catching the dozens of crowdsurfers going out of the big moshpit. The high voice of Bryan added to the metallic sound of the guitar (Slayer‘s fans for sure) and the powerful drums make the machine Knocked Loose sound heavy as f*ck. Highlight was definitively Counting Worms without any surprises.
Slowly arrive to the end of the day and so the end of the festival but we still have a few great acts to catch. Starting with Terror, the hardcore veterans from California, always good in live. And tonight wasn’t an exception. A few new songs from the new album “Pain In Truth” (Can’t Help But Hate, Pain In Truth, Boundless Contempt) and then the classics Always The Hard Way, Keepers Of The Faith or Stick Tight made this Terror show… a Terror show. Never disappointed. Never any surprises. Always great!
A band that was disappointing but was also way to high on the line-up is Raised Fist. The tent felt very empty for them even if they were in the last 3 bands of the Main Stage. They were in the last bands announced to replace the many cancellations the Jera On Air got: Of Mice And Men, Madball, August Burns Red, Hatebreed and many big bands. In last-minute, it’s not easy to find a band of this size and they did their best. We don’t blame them but it wasn’t helping a band with the higher spot they should have. Anyway. We only watched 2 songs of Raised Fist. Then grab a beer before heading one last time to the Vulture Stage for another hardcore band that never disappoint live: Comeback Kid. Sadly, we’ve been disappointed by their show…. but because of the really bad sound. Left of the stage. Middle. Right. In the back. Nothing helped. We sadly had to leave before the end: it was impossible to enjoy their show.
Sub-headliners, between Raised Fist and Rise Against, Bullet For My Valentine were expected by many people, from the young fans to the old-school fans. The show was nice but nothing more. The British band was in automatic pilot mode: doing their stuff but without any soul. We saw B4MV many times and it wasn’t a show to remember unfortunately. Even the hits like All These Things I Hate or Tears Don’t Fall didn’t hit us as usual. Too tired of a long festival run ? Sad they weren’t headliners anymore? Who knows. The fact is they didn’t give all they got on this show.
Rise Against had the hard job to end the day and so end the festival. A show that everybody will remember. Good or bad. Let’s say it was in between. If you like Rise Against from the last years, you liked their show for sure. If you’re fan of the band since maybe 10-15 years, it was a bit less enjoyable. The audience were really in the mood, singing the major part of the songs and giving a big applause to all the speeches from the frontman Tim. The very last song of the festival was a good one, Savior. But in our opinion doesn’t save the whole show.
The Jera On Air confirmed this year their spot as one of the best metal-hardcore-punk festivals in Europe. A strong line-up for a really decent price. A familial atmosphere. And a good sound in the tents for the major part of the shows. Electric Callboy, Frank Carter, Knocked Loose or Incendiary were the highlights of this last. Looking forward to be back in Ysselsteyn in June 2023!
