Thousands of hard rock fans filled Metropolitan Park in Jacksonville, Florida for Monster Energy’s annual two day festival, ‘Welcome to Rockville 2016’, which featured three stages awaiting over 25 kickass acts drawing massive crowds full of human beings from all around the world. This year’s lineup was a sheer masterpiece highlighting all of the multifaceted elements of rock and roll along with and audiovisual extravaganza for concertgoers old and new. Organizer, Danny Wimmer, of Right Arm Entertainment in Los Angeles, has tied Welcome to Rockville into Jacksonville culture with buzzing stage activity, a great history of bands and highlight acts that have reached both national and international status to fulfill the musical cravings of a diverse array of culture donning their black, heavily worn faded t-shirts representing their favorite band of the evening. If you missed the 2016 festival, let’s take a walk and recap Saturday and Sunday’s lineup abounding with big-league acts such as Shinedown, Disturbed, Collective Soul, Bring Me The Horizon, 3 Doors Down, Rob Zombie, Megadeth, Lamb of God, Five Finger Death Punch, Pennywise, Sevendust, Clutch, Yelawolf, Asking Alexandria and more…
Megadeth’s Brazilian guitarist, Kiko Loureiro, held it down alongside fellow speed metal pioneers that blazed through a technically precise execution of signature tracks such as “Peace Sells” and “Sympathy Of Destruction”.
American heavy metal band kicking ass and taking names out of Las Vegas, Five Finger Death Punch, delivered a punch in the gut performance and tore through hits as five men on stage had the time of their life displaying power while carving themselves a name for themselves within the world of Rock and Roll.
To rile the masses further, the seasoned performers of Disturbed rocked the masses while frontman, David Draiman, delivered golden oldies and his ingenious ability to shift from heavy metal master to soft, ballad-ready teddy bear vocals.
The animated freaks of nature out of Sweden, Avatar, laid down a deep groove that crosses multiple genres including metal, progressive rock, punk and hard rock.
Sevendust came out to a large and warm welcome and made a special appearance that had festival goers banging their heads and screaming their lungs out as the gang riled up the crowd with classic hits such as “Pieces” and “Face to Face”.
The American hip-hop group that has long represented the will of the people, Cypress Hill, rocked the house and hyped up the crowd with hits that have sold over 18 million records worldwide.
The powerhouse of a band, Sixx:A.M, roared into the heart of Jacksonville, Florida with lead singer, James Michael’s crisp vocals and Motley Crue’s, Nikki Sixx, shredding bass.
One of our favorite bands from our tween years, 3 Doors Down, who are known to bear the standard of regular guy rock, held down the stage playing oldies such as their hit single, “Kryptonite”.
Trivium ignited blazing hearts awaiting the Orlando-based metal god’s and Matt Heafy’s growing vocal range which Heafy considers to be difficult, as screaming is the easy part.
The amps hum, the crowd’s energy goes wild and I see literally see RED as American heavy metal Supergroup, HELLYEAH’s, combination of bass guitar and bass kick drums smashes fans in the chest.
Lamb of God rolled into Jacksonville with one of the best rhythm sections in metal that has filled the void of the unfortunate demise of bands such as Pantera.
Written by Jessica Golich on behalf of ROCKwell UnScene.
