Hradec Králové

The night from Friday to Saturday foreshadowed how many people will attract to the main stage. By morning, most of the stages were already silent, except for the steel tower located next to the big logo Rock for People aggressive guitar music blared. Two disc jockeys played well-known compositions of the nu metal and rap metal genres, hits of bands such as Rage Against the Machine or Korn.

A few hundred people were milling around. They danced, ran around, shouted lyrics in each other’s faces and held each other’s shoulders. Fatigue doesn’t seem to exist in this space. The joy of wildness and the echo of the first half of the 90s of the last century sparkled through the cold air.

At the Rock for People editing event, in other words, it was predictable that The 1975, a radical pop band from Manchester, England, would not have the same response as rap metal veterans. But on paper, the main stars of the day and one of the most fundamental pop bodies of today are expected to be met by an estimated ten times smaller crowd than the one that jumped at Papa Roach on Saturday night. A cluster of people surrounds only a short catwalk leading from the stage. In the first row, screaming female fans and fans look out for the thirty-four-year-old singer Matt Healy.

He comes with a wobbly step shortly after half past twelve. He’s wearing a doctor’s coat, sloppy stubble on his face, and giant headphones. On the second song Happiness he lights a cigarette and places a bottle of red wine on the piano. Meanwhile, the basic four members of The 1975 are expanded by other musicians: Jamie Squire and Polly Money, who take turns on piano and guitar, as well as a drummer plus one saxophone and keyboard player.

Perfect Pop

Matt Healy settles into a green cushioned retro chair, sips from a bottle and watches a funky guitar solo, which is replaced by a dreamy saxophone. Everything takes place on a simple stage, the intimacy is enhanced by decorations in the form of movie spotlights. It looks like a sitcom about unrequited love. Starring Healy, the Friends theme song plays in the subconscious.

The sound of The 1975 is perfect. The rhythm section led by drummer George Daniel sounds like a whole and beating organism, the percussion adds pleasant contours. Choral singing is provided by more than half of the musicians, it sounds like playback, but it is not. The 1975 have constructed the perfect machine for modern pop with all the necessary references to history. But the Czech audience is probably not ready for it yet.

Healy continues his acting studies as a doctor who cures a broken heart with alcohol. He has pens carefully laid out in his breast pocket, otherwise he tends to stagger around the stage. He looks disoriented, and when he picks up the guitar, it’s as if he’s remembering the chords. It’s clear from the start that he’s overdubbing to amplify the bittersweet lyrics and harmonies.

After a few songs, the frontman’s headphones are retired. It’s probably not part of the show, although it fits the concept. In a forced pause, the singer pulls new wires under his shirt to replace the wiretap.

The bottle of wine is replaced by a flatbread, which is already turning into itself with gusto. With his back to the audience, he suffers into the camera and the large screen conveys his grief in detail. His voice is embedded deep into the set’s sound, which is as soft as fluffy duvets.

But the number of people under the stage is not increasing. Someone leaves, others come, the core of fans lets themselves be blissfully macerated in a bath of fluffy pop. A few hours earlier, it turned out differently at the same place.

Grateful die-hards

The sun is rushing towards the horizon, a modestly worn punk with high clear is walking through the crowd. He has the initials RfP painted on his shaved skull, passing a bearded man dressed as a nun. A child sits on the ground and shovels sand in the drainage separating the grass and the asphalt. They’re all here for Papa Roach.

The American quartet was formed in 1993 and within the rap metal wave of that time belonged to the second league. This Saturday, it made its way to the first, at least according to the reactions of the audience.

At Hradec Hradec Airport, where the event takes place, Papa Roach’s guitars sound like an airplane taking off, the clatter of the bass resembles the snapping of a chain on concrete. It is quite possibly the loudest concert of the festival. From the stage, singer Jacoby Shaddix has a view of the sun setting behind the observation wheel, which dominates the grounds for the second year.

No other band has drawn as many fans to Rock for People this year. Papa Roach additionally heckles them to a furious performance. During the concert, the audience relentlessly threatens with clenched fists with raised index finger and little finger up to the places where the sound engineer’s station is located.

“In the last year, humanity has been tested so terribly that I am extremely grateful every time I stand on stage and can connect with souls all over the world,” reminds the tattooed singer Shaddix that he hides a lot of humility behind the hard crust of his music.

“Any fans out there who’ve been in this with us since the beginning? Wanna hear the old stuff? There’s one condition, make an aisle in the cauldron from here to the sound engineer,” he introduces on the third track Blood Brothersalready made famous by the video game Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2.

Jacoby Shaddix, lead singer of Papa Roach, had a view of the sun setting behind the Ferris wheel, which dominates the grounds for the second year running, from the stage. | Photo: Petr Klapper

An entire generation grew up with this 2000 PC skateboarding simulator, and its soundtrack shaped the tastes of a lot of people born in the latter half of the 80s. There are thousands more at the festival.

However, the crowd at Rock for People did not pass the punk test. A place called wall of death, when the audience is divided into two halves, which run towards each other on instructions and bump into each other, spinning the circle pit or dancing in a circle. Moreover, much before the singer instructs them. Of course – rock concerts tend to be better when they don’t follow the guidelines.

The main circle spins under the stage, the smaller one around the entire festival area, the air smells of marijuana. It’s not just a joyous run around. Papa Roach manages to get people dancing. Their riffs are hard, but they also rock, and you can feel a strange mix of joy and aggression in the air.

Sometime in the middle of the performance, guitarists Jerry Horton and Anthony Esperance put on a familiar riff that deviates with subtlety. It is an instrumental version of the song Lullaby by The Cure. While the band spins a melancholic harmony, the hyped-up audience gropes slightly and singer Shaddix hugs the front rows at the cover. Meanwhile, other listeners are “surfing” on the hands of the crowd, which the mass of people pass to each other and send towards the stage. There, the protective service takes them over and returns them to “circulation”.

A cover version of the song has been successful Firestarter by The Prodigy as a tribute to their singer Keith Flint, who died in March 2019. Papa Roach ends with greatest hits. The audience is tired and satisfied.

Papa Roach had success at Rock for People with, among other things, a cover of Firestarter by The Prodigy. Photo: Petr Klapper Video: Ganzak09

Rap meditation from London

For those who found the sounds of the first half of the 90s too fierce, on Saturday they could go to the stage of the ČT art station, where at the time London’s Lazy Habits. Between songs, singer James Collins recalls how he blindly emailed festival director Michal Thomes, who eventually invited them. “If you’re doing something you’re passionate about, keep going. If you send out a hundred emails, 99 will go unanswered. But one will,” Collins says as Thomes watches him in the crowd.

Lazy Habits don’t play anything groundbreaking. Collins raps and sings to cloudy beats, he grafts elements of jazz or reggae to the trip hop genre with his bandmates. However, the line-up consisting of a bass player and synthesizers, a drummer, a trombonist and a trumpet player can create a monumental sound that soon gets under the skin. At the beginning, several dozen people watch their performance, by the end it’s a few hundred.

The concert reminds with elegance that Rock for People is far from only about well-known bands that build on proven hits. Few people know many names in the program. They will either disappear or grow over time. But the idea of ​​a world in which Lazy Habits would one day switch stages with Papa Roach is strangely appealing.

The third day of the festival ends when Zdenek Svěrák and Jaroslav Uhlíř’s hit: the composition Pramen zdraví z Posázaví is played on the Táborák stage by the fireplace.