Download Festival 2024 – Sunday. Avenged Sevenfold. The big round-up of the weekend with headliner Avenged Sevenfold brought open waves of intense emotion.
Sure, the sentimentality of another year coming to a close was there, but I am talking about the incredulous juggernaut of a last stand that Avenged Sevenfold brought to us as a festival close.
What felt like every one hundred thousandth person stood cascaded down the rolling hill, facing the Apex, ready to give it every lyric scream and twin-handed horn they could.
The stage set reined supreme with a flaming waterfall struck behind them and a metaled decor that sends the crowd into a blasting cheer. Hats off to the design team as we stand before a light show that thrashes and awes with a mind-altering simulation.
Being one of the bands who have headlined Download festival the most, they seem blissfully at ease with the event’s enormity. Frontman M. Shadows even has a sit-down during an instrumental intro to Game Over. 
Their set features heavily songs from their 2023 album Life Is But A Dream…, and why shouldn’t it?
For a band that has been around for over twenty years and has played these stages many times, it creates a continuous fresh set for their audience to enjoy.
Big-time favourites like Hail To The King, Afterlife, Nightmare, and A Little Piece Of Heaven play hugely. It is modern hard rock meets Metal with a new contemporary twist, chucking in some strikingly good additions to the already well-known music. 
Teasing us with whether or not they will return to tour the UK in 2025, the show ends in the only way Download headliners do: a mighty bang-wallop, and the sky is filled with light as the stage looks almost set to blow right up into the sky.
Knowing their Download history, my guess is that they will be back, but if they are not, then tonight has certainly quenched our thirst for a while to come.
Download Festival 2024
MetalTalk Download 2024 coverage can be found at MetalTalk.net/tag/download-2024.
Download Festival 2024 will mark the second year of the festival selling out, with weekend, day and camping tickets now completely gone. The festival will reunite its incredible community of fans for a jam-packed five-day event (June 12-16).
This year’s MetalTalk team is:
Photography:
For Download 2023 coverage, visit MetalTalk.net/tag/download-2023.
For Download 2022 coverage, visit MetalTalk.net/tag/download-2022.
