Nova Rock 2025: Festival Kick-off with Moment of Silence for Graz and Korn as Headliner

Immediately afterwards, the nu-metal legends Korn provided a loud finale to the concert series on Wednesday.

Nova Rock 2025: Restraint and Unity

A lively rock festival is naturally a difficult undertaking after the events in the Styrian capital. A certain degree of restraint could certainly be felt among the visitors on the Pannonia Fields, but the joy of enjoying music together, the pleasant summer weather, and a smooth organization so far were also clearly noticeable. With performances by bands like Dead Poet Society, The Warning, or Seven Hours After Violet, the Nova Rock started this year's edition with a powerful and varied lineup.

It was not hard to guess who held the headliner position: Already during the day, the density of Korn band shirts was enormous, and shortly before midnight, the wait for the fans finally came to an end. Jonathan Davis and company did not hold back and unleashed their pent-up energy in a flawless best-of set, ranging from early classics like "Blind" or "Clown" to newer material like "Cold." There was a sing-along not only with "Falling Away From Me," but also the explicit "A.D.I.D.A.S." was shouted from thousands of throats.

While guitarists James "Munky" Shaffer and James "Head" Welch exchanged riffs and provided eerie undertones with their signature sound, Davis played the berserker at the microphone in his usual manner, but also did not deny his melancholic side and demonstrated with "Shoots and Ladders" how to turn nursery rhymes into a compelling metal song - bagpipe intro included. Hardly any singer of the harder genre has such a wide range, although the lyrics about teenage angst and loneliness were quite hard to digest given the circumstances.

Spiritbox Hard and Polarizing

Spiritbox delivered a solid, thoroughly hard, albeit polarizing performance. The band, led by singer Courtney LaPlante and her husband Mike Stringer on guitar, snagged Grammy nominations in the Best Metal Performance category in both 2024 and 2025. Their performance at Nova Rock underscored this accolade: Theatrically staged with disturbing visuals, the Canadians took metalcore to a new dimension - angry, captivating, and uncompromisingly entertaining. LaPlante roared her heart out, with the occasional clean vocals and melodic excursions amidst the guitar storm making the overall impression all the more intense - if one was willing to engage with it.

Another form of modern hardness was served by Knocked Loose: The group led by screamer Bryan Garris, coming from hardcore, plowed through an intense set full of crisp two-minute tracks, in which they made short work. Bone-dry drumming met powerful riffs, with fans kicking up a lot of dust - admittedly: no difficulty at Nova Rock. Yet the relentlessness with which Knocked Loose executed their program, while always remaining tangible, was truly astonishing.

Red Bull Stage Revamped at Nova Rock 2025

Over the years, the Red Bull Stage has evolved from a converted van to a venue on par with the main stages, this year further enhanced in design, yet still maintaining a club-like atmosphere. On Wednesday, Amira Elefkey made her Austrian debut there. Google lists the American as an "internet personality." In the rock scene, there is currently a certain hype around the singer with her mix of nu-metal and ambient elements. She only partially lived up to this at Nova Rock. For only rarely did Elefkey - with a hood pulled over a baseball cap - and her band break through the formula of intro-melodramatic singing-hard grooves. At least the singles "Forever Overdose" and "Will You Love Me When I'm Dead" still ignited. It only got truly fiery when the flamethrowers on the roof of the stage shot columns of fire into the air.

As the opener on the Red Bull, the Salzburg formation The Fleur was allowed to perform, having earned this appearance as part of a competition. Following them was another local formation, The Vandans, who scored with hearty post-hardcore. Boston Manor concluded the lineup. The punk, post-hardcore, and grunge band from northern England challenged the fans' spirits once more at a late hour: "Jump!" was the call with the first number, followed by the immediately executed commands "Moshpit!" and "Crowdsurf!" The highly entertaining and musically appealing performance was almost thwarted by a doctor's advice. "We had to cancel a show recently because I had voice problems," singer Henry Cox recounted. "He said we shouldn't perform today either. But hey, we couldn't miss Nova Rock."

Overall, it was a successful first day of the festival. Those who hadn't had enough of the musical offerings could let loose in the roller disco or get spooked in the horror labyrinth.

(By Christoph Griessner and Wolfgang Hauptmann/APA)

Everything about Nova Rock 2025

(APA/Red)

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