The sound of summer
Germany is a music lover's paradise during the summer months. There's hardly a weekend without a major music festival happening, from reggae to pop to hip-hop.
Season for music
For music fans in Germany, summer means one thing: Grab a six-pack (and maybe your toothbrush) and hit the road for the annual non-stop series of major festivals. From Rock am Ring to Wacken, the mass music events showcase local German bands, but also draw some of the biggest international names. DW reviews some of Germany's most important summer music festivals.
Wacken Open Air
Are you a metal head like these guys? Then head to the Wacken Open Air festival in the tiny German village of Wacken. What started small in 1990 has since become an international highlight for lovers of every sub-genre of metal. This year, it's set to take place from July 31 to August 2, with headliners like English metal rock band Motörhead and US heavy metal band W.A.S.P.
Summerjam
Jamaican beats come to the Rhineland every year in early July for the Summerjam festival. The biggest international names in the reggae scene show up for the event, which takes place on Fühlinger Lake near Cologne. This year, Jamaican reggae musician Jimmy Cliff, American hip hop group Dilated Peoples, and German bands Seeed, Maxim, and Marteria topped the lineup.
Rock am Ring
The legendary Nürburgring racetrack in central-western Germany shut down this June for the last time for Rock am Ring. In 2015, the major festival will be moved to a former military base in Mönchengladbach. The 2014 event drew international names like Metallica, Linkin Park, Kings of Leon and Mando Diao. A parallel festival, Rock am Park, always takes place simultaneously in Nuremberg.
c/o pop
Taking place every June in Cologne, c/o pop is not your typical music festival. On the one hand, it's a major trade fair with conferences and networking for the music industry. On the other, it's a concert series presenting artists both on big stages and in unusual locations. Last year, German band Apparat dazzled. This year, Get Well Soon and Weekend are among those performing from August 20-24.
Melt!
Ferropolis, the "city of iron," is an open-air industrial museum in eastern Germany and the site of the annual Melt! Festival (July 18 to 20). Billed as "electro meets rock," a number of top DJs, like Boyz Noize, Modeselektor, and Monika Kruse are sharing the stage with British indie rock band Bombay Bicycle Club and US indie pop band Future Islands this year.
Splash!
One of Germany's biggest reggae and hip hop festivals, Splash! started in 1998 in downtown Chemnitz in eastern Germany. Due to financial difficulties, it moved around a bit and now takes place on the Pouch peninsula in Bitterfeld. This year's lineup from July 11 to 13 featured German rapper Cro, English singer M.I.A., and the US hip-hop duo Outkast.
Hurricane
Both mainstream and alternative acts make their way to the Hurricane Festival, held every June in Scheessel near Bremen in northwestern Germany. The event dates all the way back to 1973. This year from June 20-22, some big names in the music industry from Germany and abroad played, including Arcade Fire, Macklemore, Fettes Brot, Lykke Li, The Kooks, and James Blake.
Bochum Total
With up to one million visitors each year, Bochum Total in the Ruhr Valley region - Germany's industrial heartland - is one of the country's largest free music festivals. For that reason, it doesn't draw the chart-toppers, but it is a place to discover promising new sounds. This year from July 3-6, Austrian bands Bilderbuch and OneFourSix, and the German band The Intersphere were on the program.