Graspop – “metal meeting” – takes place each year in Dessel, Belgium. The event was not originally a heavy metal festival. The first edition of Graspop was organized in 1986 as a local pop festival with mainly local acts. Two decades later, Graspop has evolved from a small-scale family affair to a major and internationally acclaimed metal event. This obviously didn’t happen overnight. In 1995, the headliners billed were Joe Cocker and Simple Minds. Founder Peter Van Geel realized that mainstream rock music wasn't the ticket. He reflected on the most memorable acts of the preceding years: Motörhead, Ramones, Paradise Lost, Biohazard and so forth. He also considered his own musical preferences and that started him thinking about a drastic reorientation.

 

The first Graspop Metal Meeting was scheduled for 30 June 1996 and immediately the change of course proved to be roaring success. Over 10,000 metalheads got to see fifteen bands on two stages with Iron Maiden and Type O Negative as headliners. The marquee concept was also a slam dunk.

The next year the event threatened to be a washout due to unseasonably bad weather, but the true heavy metal fans were not to be deterred. In spite of the deluge, the turn-out was even better than the year before and the metal masses banged their heads to, amongst others, Tiamat, Megadeth and Alice Cooper. GMM opted for three stages, with the introduction of the ‘skate stage’, and it was becoming increasingly obvious that the site at ‘De Witte Berg’ was not only too wet, but also too small.

 

For the 1998 edition, the festival relocated to the much larger Boeretang site and Peter Van Geel and his team booked an even bigger act to conclude the festivities. Headliners Black Sabbath played their show under a – once again – threatening sky, but they did draw quite a crowd as attendance numbers slowly but surely crept towards the 20,000 mark.

The bill for the 1999 edition may have been slightly less impressive with closers Manowar, Danzig and Cradle Of Filth, but by now the Graspop Metal Meeting had built a solid fan base and the festival was also starting to make a name for itself abroad.

The 2000 edition marked the triumphant return of Iron Maiden and together with the likes of Machine Head, Cro-Mags and My Dying Bride, they turned GMM 2000 into a true metalfest.

 

 

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