The Rock Werchter Festival is a Belgian annual music festival held in the village of Werchter, near Leuven, since 1974. It is one of the five biggest annual rock music festivals in Europe (the other four being Oxegen, Sziget Festival, the Glastonbury Festival and Roskilde Festival). The 2003, 2005, 2006 and 2007 festivals received the Arthur award for best festival in the world at the International Live Music Conference (ILMC). It can host 80,000 guests, of which 69,000 combine all four days, to add up to a total maximum of 113,000 different attendees.
The festival started in 1974 as a one-day event with performances from Banzai and Kandahar, but over the years it has evolved to become Belgium's largest music festival. Originally it was a double-festival, called "Torhout-Werchter", with two festival areas at different sites in Belgium: one in Werchter and one in Torhout. In 1999, the festival dropped the Torhout site and since then has taken place only in Werchter. Since 2003 Werchter has been a 4-day festival, as it was sold by owner Herman Schueremans to American organizers Live Nation. Schueremans however remains the main organiser of the event. The festival is organised every first weekend of the summer vacation in Belgium (last weekend of June or the first of July). Roskilde festival and the Arras Main Square Festival are almost always organised in the same weekend, so they can 'share' bands.
Sometimes, the Glastonbury Festival is organised at the same weekend, but most years it's organised a weekend earlier.Before 1995, when the festival was still a double-festival, it had one stage with 8 or 9 bands performing twice, once in Torhout and once in Werchter. Since 1995 the Main stage was accompanied by a second stage. This stage was an open air stage until 1999 when it was made a tent named 'Pyramid Marquee', with a capacity of 6,000 people. The performers in Pyramid Marquee are usually lesser-known or aimed at a specific audience. Sometimes groups that do well in Pyramid Marquee are expected to have a hard time taking the step to the Main stage, especially when they are seen as an act needing intimate, smaller venues. Sigur Rós is the most famous example of this, when they were programmed on Main Stage in 2008 after their 2006 performance in Pyramid Marquee, but they managed the transition and were hailed as one the best performances of the festival.
The bands presented at Rock Werchter are traditionally a balanced mix of large well known artists, popular crowd-pleasing acts and local Belgian coming acts. Belgian band dEUS in 2008 was the first local band to close the Main Stage on the last day since several years. The days usually start around noon, except for the first day, which starts around 4pm. Most performances last from 30 minutes to an hour and a half. The days end around 1am, but when the last act is a dance act they sometimes last until 3am or later. At the end of the last day there is a big fireworks show.
2012 Lineup:
Thursday
The Cure
Elbow
Blink-182
The All American Rejects
Within Temptation
Justice
Kraantje Pappie
Amon Tobin
Cypress Hill
Netsky Live
Skream ft. Sgt Pokes
Skrillex
Metric
Bombay Bicycle Club
The Maccabees
Garbage
Selah Sue
The Kooks
Friday
Pearl Jam
Deadmau5
Wiz Khalifa
X
Mastodon
Gossip
Jack White
dEUS
Eastern Conference Champions
Perfum Genius
Kreayshawn
Azari & 111
Dj Fresh
Katy B
Birdy Nam Nam
School is cool
Miles Kane
Katzenjammer
The Temper Trap
Lana Del Rey
Bat for Lashes
Beruit
Saturday
Kasabian
Mumford and Sons
Chase and Status
‘f Hof Van Commerce
Black Box Revelation
Wolfmother
The xx
Editors
James Vincent McMorrow
Alabama Shakes
Nneka
Ben Howard
M83
Regina Spektor
Paul Kalkbrenner
Michael Kiwanuka
Noah and the Whale
Simple Minds
My Morning Jacket
Agnes Obel
Incubus
Sunday
The Vaccines
Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds
Snow Patrol
Red Hot Chili Peppers
Florence and the Machine
The Hickey Underworld
Dropkick Murphys
Other Lives
Kitty, Daisy and Lewis
Die Antwoord
Mac Miller
Knife Party
Steve Aoki
Isbells
Anna Calvi
M. Ward
Ed Sheeran
James Morrison
Milow
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