#sjock

The Monsters on a little mini tour, please suport the clubs the bookers and the Rock'n'Roll Comunite and come to the shows

The Monsters - Live on stage 2021: 12.8 DE - Karlsruhe, Alte hackerei, Toujours Kultur 13.8 BE - Sjock Festival, Poeyelheide – Girlie 14.8 CH - Rock Altitude Festival, Le Locle #themonsters #voodoorhythmrecords #sjock #altehackkerei #rockaltitude #pojpoj

For their 41st edition, Sjock starts off with the weather god in their odds. This Rock n’ Roll and Rockabilly festival in the small town of Gierle, Belgium, is getting bigger and bigger every year, receiving almost 5000 visitors, this year. People can go to Sjock for many different reasons: you can dress up and show your fancy outfit and gorgeous tattoos, get a hair of beard cut, enjoy the music or sit in the shadows beneath the trees and relax. I won’t judge you if you did al of these. There is something cozy about this festival. It’s almost a family festival judging by the many children I saw. Good Atmosphere, food and music.

Saturday

In the morning of saturday, when the sun was getting hotter and hotter, the first band, Fuzzy Vox entered the stage to shake everyone awake. While everyone is still rubbing the sleep out of their eyes, Fuzzy Vox blasts them away with an energetic show. The longer they play, the more people start to enjoy the band. At the end and a strong applause, they successfully made everyone ready for a whole day of rock n’ roll! The next band is a very young one, a local band called Equal Idiots. One big ball of energy, humor and sound. Two crazy young dudes blasting their own songs and covers while they win the hearts of many people. I noticed the last time I saw them, maybe two weeks ago, they weren’t as convincing as now. Maybe they needed a bigger crowd and stage like this one. Peter Pan Speedrock. Do I need to say more? They where loud, heavy and made sure that the first moshpits of Sjock arrived. Sand, sweat, beer and people flew through the air. Loved and enjoyed by many, it makes even the pain harder when they announced about quitting in september. So they made sure they gave everyone a great time! Its hard for any band to surpass this legend, though next on stage, as replacement for Flat Duo Jets, Double Veterans. But with their energetic rock and roll they manage to get the audience lose and dancing like crazy. It could also be the heat and/or the alcohol but all by all, the manage to get an ace performance on this bloody warm afternoon. Kid Congo and the pink monkey birds. What a name. They are a legend among the rockabilly crowd but don’t feel bad if you didn’t know them because I didn’t either. They have their own sound of rock, a more calm one, to enjoy yourself while sitting in the grass or enjoying your beer. They really had a show including special costumes and props, something many people won’t forget. The Nomads was a band of pure old school rock n’ roll. They managed to get more motion in the crowd and let them sing along the catchy tunes. They almost sounded like a form of heavy metal, giving the harder riffs on the guitar. Radio Birdman is for many a must see on this festival and now I know why. If I close my eyes I imagine a 6 young punkers in a band, but when I open them I see 6 badass older men rocking the stage! This is what experience does with a band. An active performance and a show I would never thought to see elder men doing. It prepares the audience perfect for this evenings headliner. Danko Jones. Sassy, sexy and pure entertainment. There wasn’t a moment of this performance where you could get bored. Only three people on the stage and they played for ten. The catchy and straightforward riffs where the ideal combination for an evening rocking and singing your on top of your lungs. They absolutely deserved the MainStage and headliner.

Sunday

As the heat of the sun wakes everyone out of their tents, The Agitators are ready to wake up everyone even more with a big portion of Punk. They show us what it is to start day three of Sjock. Los Blancos is a band that truly belongs here at Sjock. A small lady as front woman shows with her incredible voice that she is more that just a pretty face. A performance worthy of the MainStage as they play at the hottest hour of the day. Kudos to that. The Offenders set the mood for the beginning of this summer. The cheerful ska-punk is an ideal genre for hot summer days like these. They enjoyed themselves and we enjoyed them, they where more as welcome to this festival. Supersuckers gave us the full old school rock n’ roll experience. Even the first moshpits of the day where sighted and everybody was having a good time. From here on, every thing went from hard, to harder. Starting with the Turbo AC’s. Heavy, hard and beer flew through the air. This punk band gave everything they had to make sure everyone in the crowd was in motion. They didn’t care if if was dancing, moshing or jumping aslong you moved. Once more, this band prepared you for whats next. In all the years I’ve been doing concerts and seen many crowds, is always fun to see which crowd goes craziest by which band. And I can say in all my experience that the crowd during The Bronx was the craziest crowd on this festival. Two, no, Three crowd surfers at a time wasn’t unusual and the moshpits got bigger and bigger every second. The funny thing about this band was that they produced such loud, heavy punk, yet the dynamics and show was missing in their performances. The musicians where standing on the stage with easy, yet the audience went crazy during every song. It was most entertaining to see when the lead singer joined the crowd in the moshpits which wasn’t very clever without a wireless microphone. But the security did their job well and protected everyone and everything. The band I personally was looking most forward too. Flogging Molly. Flogging F***** Molly! Do I need to say more? Of course not! Everyone knows these crazy American-Irish punk-folk dudes! So I do not have to tell you that this was the most worthy headliner and that even, if the security wasn’t picking crowd surfers out of the sky, they couldn’t stand still. A good mix of active and calm songs, a pint of Guinness, and some kickass punkfolk that none could resist. Even I could help but to jump into the crowd and mosh/crowdsurf for myself. It was the perfect ending for this 41st edition of Sjock. For Sjock 2017, they confirmed The Hellacopters, which we absolutely look forward to.

Suzan McLee – Shutterwall Magazine

Established in 1976… That’s 40 years ago. 41 editions, counting the 2016 edition. That’s even longer then I’m around. Not by much, but give me this one, will you?

Located at the well known site, just outside of the picturesque village of Gierle, amidst woodlands and meadows, this edition of SJOCK is promising to be one to remember. The slogan for this festival is “Your rock ‘n roll highlight of…

12.07.15 Crowd shot video of The Hives performing ‘I’m Alive’ at Sjock Festival 2015.