Download Festival 2025: A weekend of debut headliners, sunshine, perfectly timed rain, bagpipes and proposals

I’ve been attending Download on and off since 2009 but it’s been eight years since I was last at Donington Park.

We arrived on Friday to beautiful sunshine and it was great to be back. Download is a very special place to me. It’s always felt really welcoming and is a place with no judgement where people are able to be unapologetically themselves.

We spent most of the day at the Apex stage where we saw Jimmy Eat World, who took me back to my younger years with classics such as The Middle, Sweetness and Bleed American.

Next up was Weezer who put on a great show going straight into their set with Hash Pipe, quickly followed by My Name Is Jonas. The set was packed with sing-a-long anthems including Say It Ain’t So, Island In The Sun and Beverley Hills with them finishing off the set with Buddy Holly.

Being from California Weezer were pleasantly surprised with the hot weather and asked the crowd if this was normal for the UK which was met with a resounding ‘no’.

Weezer were great fun and were the perfect choice to get the crowd warmed up for Green Day’s headline slot.

Starting their set with the usual crowd sing-a-long of Bohemian Rhapsody, followed by Hey Ho by The Ramones, Green Day kicked off their debut headline slot with American Idiot.

Their set was filled with classics including Holiday, Basket Case, and When September Ends, and it even started to rain when Billie Jo Armstrong sang the line ‘here comes the rain again’.

The rain was a welcome relief after a stifling day of sunshine and helped cool down the crowd.

I’ve seen Green Day live a few times and I am aware of their tradition of grabbing someone from the crowd and bringing them up on stage.

This year’s lucky fan was a woman who happened to be dressed as a cheerleader (who was covered in blood) as it was Fancy Dress Friday and the theme was Friday the 13th.

Jumping on stage she swapped her pom poms for Billie Joe’s mic and sang her heart out to Know Your Enemy and cheers from the crowd.

They finished their set with a fantastic fireworks display.

Also playing on Friday was CKY, Northlane, Rise Against, and Mcfly, who pulled in a great crowd at the Avalanche Stage. I would have loved to have caught some of their set but unfortunately they were on at the same time as Green Day!

After a much needed sleep we headed back in on Saturday, but after spending all day on our feet and chasing shade we made the decision to equip ourselves with camping chairs – you can tell we are now in our late 30s as it was lovely having the choice to have a sit down!

First up was Hatebreed who were followed by Poppy. I don’t know much about Poppy but she put on a great show and the crowd seemed to be having a great time.

We then headed over to the Opus stage where we caught Polaris, who again I’m unfamiliar with but they had a packed crowd.

Sadly, following Polaris the heavens opened and the tradition of rain at Download was fulfilled but luckily, even though it was a heavy downpour, it didn’t last too long and the sun soon shone again producing a lovely rainbow over the site.

Due to the rain we decided to head to one of the undercover stages and watch Kittie at the Dogtooth Stage.

Kittie revealed that it had been 15 years since their last appearance at the festival and they were thrilled to be back.

The headline act for Saturday was the controversial choice of Sleep Token.

There has been a lot of talk about whether Sleep Token were an appropriate headline act as they are still a relatively new band and their style of music is not the traditional genre for Download goers.

I was already a Sleep Token fan and have seen them live before so I knew to expect a great show and they certainly delivered.

Unfortunately due to some technical difficulties and high winds the curtains to hide their set did fall down on one side before the start, slightly ruining the reveal but other than that the set went off without a hitch.

As Sleep Token do not interact with the crowd their performance is more of a music and light show and they kicked off their set with Look To Windward.

Unlike Green Day, their performance of Rain didn’t summon another downpour but their set did include a waterfall during Emergence.

Ending with a crowd sing-a-long of Take Me Back To Eden they certainly made their debut headline slot count.

Hopefully they proved some of the haters wrong and earned themselves some new fans.

Other bands on Saturday’s lineup included Don Broco, Shinedown, Eagles of Death Metal, The Darkness and Sex Pistols, featurning Frank Carter.

Something I noticed at this year’s festival was the amount of proposals that seemed to be happening around the site.

On Saturday alone I witnessed two, including one during the Sleep Token set, and I heard of many more taking place across the weekend, so if there are any newly engaged couples reading this – congratulations!

By Sunday the weather had cooled down a little but the sun was still shining and everyone was in good spirits.

We started the final day with Meshuggah, who even though they have been around for some time, are a band I’m not too familiar with but still managed to keep me entertained.

We then decided to head over to The Dogtooth Stage to see Charlie Simpson, sorry, I mean President.

There has been a lot of speculation about who is behind the mask, even though we all know who it is right?

But on arrival at the tent it was already full to capacity with the crowd spilling out with no chance of getting anywhere near.

I was disappointed we didn’t manage to see them but I’m sure it won’t be last chance we get.

Following their five song set a helicopter took off from Donington heading to London, where Busted were due to perform later that day – which I’m sure was just a coincidence!

We then saw Spiritbox take to the Apex Stage who put on a great show. And was another of the female led acts that featured on this year’s line up.

Next up was Bullet For My Valentine who are celebrating 20 years since the release of their debut album, The Poison, which they played in full.

The album includes Tears Don’t Fall and All These Things I Hate (Revolve Around Me) which had the crowd singing along.

This was a continuation of their tour earlier this year, which was cut short, so this was a great chance for them to finish what they started and you could tell they were very honoured and pleased to be up on the stage.

Following the run through of the album the band left the stage, with some believing the set was over, however my husband, who’d seen them on the tour earlier this year, informed me that they would be back.

And they indeed did return to finish their set with Knives and Waking The Demon.

Now it’s time for the final headline slot of the weekend, Korn.

This headline slot has been a long time coming with Korn being a regular on the Download line up but never getting the coveted top spot.

They opened their set with Blind which really got the crowd going and it was non stop hits from there including Falling Away From Me, Twisted Transistor, Twist and Did My Time – the set even had a bagpipe solo by Jonathan Davis.

The performance felt like a tribute to the fans who have waited for this for so long and you could tell how much it meant to them as well.

Ending the set with Freak on a Leash it was truly a great way to see Download 2025 off in style.

Other bands who performed on Sunday were Steel Panther, Lorna Shore, Alien Ant Farm and Airbourne.

We had such a brilliant time across the whole weekend and we’ll be making sure we don’t leave it another eight years before we’re back!