T O P

  • By -

Cpt_Cymru

We’ve just left North. Horrendous queues for everything all day, getting between the Dickies and and Amazon stages was like running the gauntlet through the food queues. Good luck to all you souls in the shuttle queue later. Use the loo before you leave


ch0411

Waited nearly 2 hours for a fucking burger only to join another huge line for the collection. It was horrendous😭


craigwright1990

We waited 3 and they had no bacon left nor did they have dirty frys was a right disappointment of a burger for £10


Which_Butterscotch44

This happened to us too! Tenner for a burnt plain hot dog ffs 😑


Shyrianz

I just wanted chips and they’d run out after we got there after 2 hours. Had to get a burger, heard them saying they had almost run out of buns too.


endangeredpenguin

I was lucky and got one of the Big Green Coaches home. I saw the shuttle bus queues I was so pleased I didn't have to wait for one.


[deleted]

[удалено]


[deleted]

[удалено]


Which_Butterscotch44

What happened? Left offspring to watch shikari instead, they sounded much louder and better


[deleted]

Literally leaving the stage for like 5-10 minutes wanting the crowd to chant for them to come back on. They also chatted too much, like just play the songs!


JohnnyBaggels

What was the encore ?


nuttymayo

The blue balls Shikari and the horrors of poor security on entry resonated with me. Thank you for posting this


yumyumhelen

Thoroughly enjoyed reading this on my drive home from slam dunk north, thanks for taking the time to recount your experience 😝 hard agree on the enter Shikari blue balls. Give us our claps 👏👏👏


thegamingbacklog

Pretty solid write up of my experience too, although I have to make one minor correction, I was from Gloucester not Glasgow was still a 5 hour drive thanks to the parking though glad you enjoyed the Queue DJ set while we waited to get in. I saw the guy move the cones and considered following, although we still got lucky in that out of nowhere they decided to tell us to use both lanes and filters. They have been doing the remix version of sorry you're not a winner a lot more now and I'm with you on the clapping blue balls, it's much better when they start the quick fire round with it instead of putting the remix at the end. Additional notes from your excellent write up, getting into some of the stage tents were a nightmare especially the kerrang left and right stage, although it was worth the squeeze to watch yellowcard. The burrito van gave the tiniest amount of meat ever, they grab a portion with the tongs then put the portion back down and gave half of it, saw it happen to 3-4 people while I waited, the burrito was good though but they were being very stringent. Also the queues for water were horrific.


[deleted]

[удалено]


thegamingbacklog

Haha I think a lot of people this year have been on Reddit to jump in on the complaints, I've been going since 2008 when they were running the festival from Leeds university and this was by far the worst year I've been at, I've seen some people trying to defend it by claiming they are still an independent group but if that's the case then they need to hire some people with large festival experience, as I go to download most years and it's never been this bad. I stumbled across the right stage for yellowcard but I know some people complained that the map on the app was wrong. Glad you all got home safe, I got home about 2am took me the entirety of "take this to your grave" and half of "from under the cork tree" before I got out of the carpark. Free free to drop me a DM so we can hangout next year I'll be going if the line up is decent I'll just be leaving 2 hours earlier next year so I don't miss zebrahead and wargame. I always enjoy making new friends and only bailed at the gate because I didn't want to crash you and your friends day :) I'm at download this year too if you need a drinking buddy.


IKnowPlace425

So that car that had been abandoned on the verge? Thought the same that they'd given up. Turns out they broke down and had left it to go on site to get help due to lack of signal, only to then be told the police had beaten them to it!


NursexElle

North. Oversold to fuck. Never seen it like that before and we’ve been going for years. Massively increased the amount of people but absolutely no increase in facilities. We wanted to bring our kid next year but not a chance if it’s gonna be like this year. Really disappointed tbh.


loosewire95

We went last year and it was so chill, never queued longer than 5 minutes for bar, food maybe 10 minutes. Bands were great and crowds great. Saw loads of people with pushchairs and thought it would be cool to bring ours this year. It was so different and a nightmare to do anything. Will have to think about it harder next year and if they make any changes


Foreign_Profession96

I've been to every slam dunk ever. This was the first year I've brought a child. A 12 week old one, because hey, its a "family friendly festival" and many have done so in the past. My anxiety was through the roof. Needless to say after spending hours battling to get in , we didn't stay long or get to see the bands we came for! Total waste of money. I'm just glad we were safe in the end.


rezonansmagnetyczny

There were a decrease in facilities. Last time I went was 21 and there was a far greater amount of catering.


Itstimefordancing

I actually think there were fewer facilities. There were fewer food options for sure!


samtylers

I'd never been to SD North before Sunday and I will not be going again lmao, it was such a shitshow 🙃


Shyrianz

Queue simulator 2023 I worked slam dunk north as a runner in 2017 in the second to last year it was in the city center. It was ridiculously overcrowded then, and behind the scene everyone was stressing out. Organisers were panicking because bands didn’t have food, drinks, etc. pubs were overcrowded, couldn’t walk between sets etc. and because most people working there were volunteers from music colleges nearby, nobody had a clue what they were doing. It was also not long after the Manchester bombing so security wouldn’t even let people with AAA badges through some gates causing more staff and bands having to push through the crowds. That was the last time I’ve seen it be this bad, until yesterday. I’ve done EVERY slam dunk north since then as a paying guest. The first year in temple newsam, other than the shuttle bus fiasco, was actually okay. Last year, other than 30+ minute queues for the toilet, was okay. What happened this year? The organisers haven’t learnt that unpaid work causes people to lack at their job. The organisers didn’t learn about the queues from last year and there was at least double the people there this year. I can only imagine what it was like behind the scenes. If 2017 was insane behind the scenes, I can only imagine the scenes this weekend. We actually got there at 3pm, we missed an early train in and we decided to get there much later. We arrived okay via taxi from the city Center. When we arrived, there was no signpost to the entrance. Luckily, we’ve been before so we just assumed the entrance would be in the same place and luckily it was. Didn’t get my pockets checked even after trying to take things out. (In comparison, in 2017 every time I r entered or left the First Direct arena from aaa entrance, I was fully patted down and searched even if it was the same guard) . My partner got his bag checked but didn’t check underneath anything. Drug smuggling isn’t the issue, it’s weapons I’m more concerned about. Trying to get into the tent for Boston Manor was really intense. Everyone was bottle necked in the exit/entrance. Once you got inside the tent there was ample room, but no one was moving forward. We left during four year strong to get some food before Escape the Fate….. big mistake. We looked at the food stands and picked a queue that sold chips. I just wanted some chips. We were queueing for over and hour and half. When we arrived at the vendor they had run out of everything, chips etc except burger. We resigned to paying £10 each for a burger as we were so hungry at this point and we’d queued for so long. The burger was mediocre. I heard the lady behind the counter say they would run out of buns soon. What we’re they gunna do? Just sell burger patties? Once we got our burger we rushed over to the tent to see escape the fate only to just get to see the end of them play One for The Money and they left stage. We then saw creeper which was surprisingly easy to get a good spot for as we got there while The Academy Is was still playing. Creeper smashed it out the park as always. Getting out the tent was a different issue. Took us forever to get out the tent. When we did I decided to join the queues for the toilet. Surprisingly got in within 5 minutes. The state within though was disgusting. The flush wasn’t powerful enough so the paper wouldn’t go down, causing it to overflow. We caught a bit of Bowling for Soup, which they sounded great tbh. Then we headed over to catch Shikari. I’ve seen Shikari plenty of times now to know they will put on a good show. And that they did. A few technical issues with the microphone cutting out at points but they still sounded amazing. Leaving was a nightmare, the bottleneck out the exit was intense. Once we had made it through, we had a decision to make. Either join the Shuttle bus queue to get back to the city Center and then chance an Uber Home (no trains that late). Or chance a taxi directly from temple newsam. We weighed up the options and the taxi queue didn’t look too bad so we decided to join that while attempting an Uber. Uber didn’t work due to signal and the busyness of the drivers. So we stayed in the taxi queue. There was only maybe 50 people ahead of us so we weren’t too worried. Boy were we wrong. We started that queue just after 10:25 . We didn’t leAve the queue until 00:10 . I was freezing. Luckily the couple in front of us were nice to chat to for the awkwardly long queue. It was their first time and they also said it would their last. The taxi ended up costing us £65 for an 9 mile journey / 25 min which we resigned to pay because we just wanted to get home at that point . The driver also was ranting how his taxi company was forcing him to work till 5am in the morning without any prior warning. He said as there was an event on in the city centre that ended at 2am he would just go there instead because he earns double time instead of basic pay. I was just glad to be home after playing queue simulator 2023 Alll in all it was shambles. The bands did amazingly with what they were given. Can’t fault them for that. Really feel for the volunteers as there are most likely 16-18 year old college students who thought it would be a good opportunity. Just like I did in 2017. If you’ve stayed this far I appreciate you reading my rambling thoughts! Much love


billhelmscream

You've hit the nail on the head there - the bands and the volunteers were let down by piss poor management. I am glad you got home okay!


janedoem16

Slam Dunk has been poorly organised long before then. They deserve to be shut down.


TomWales

Went to South. My first Slam Dunk, but been to plenty of festivals over the years. Luckily I didn't drive, so was spared the traffic/parking issues. My biggest surprise was the food/water/toilets situation. Seemed to be nowhere near enough facilities for the number of people there. 15 minute + queue times for food is not good enough for a music festival. Also totally crazy to put most of the food stalls right in the middle of the main thoroughfare between the two biggest stages.


burnoutx

South. Security were unreliable at best. I saw more photographers helping crowdsurfers and people who needed assistance in the crowd. Some of us tried to draw their attention to a drunken fight in a crowd later on and they just shrugged. Great to see how much these guys prioritised our safety this year.


[deleted]

[удалено]


amityriot

I had to ask the guy if he wanted to check it and he just shrugged


Jordno

Guy didn’t even check my girlfriends just took her word for it. Could have had anything


carrotparrotcarrot

Yeah, he looked in my handbag and said “got any food”? And I said no, tried to take stuff out to show him, and he just waved me in. Wish I had tried to sneak stuff in 😭


snowballchocola

At least you got yours checked lol.. really reassuring that people just walked in after having their ticket scanned and then hardly any security about we are all lucky things didn't get bad because there would have been no crowd management if it did


AgileReplacement6911

Managed to get a bottle of booze in but the bloke poured my unopened water straight on the ground and briefly checked my bag. My mate arrived later and said she didn’t even get checked she just walked straight in. Obviously not complaining i got my drink in but fuck knows what people could have taken in


burnoutx

My bag had three zips on it and he only looked in the first, tiniest one. They’re so unreliable.


nuttymayo

Genuinely scary to think what people could bring in


dontknowwhattowrite_

The guy that let us in didn’t even ask to check my bag, just scanned our tickets, popped our wristbands on and sent us in! It wasn’t even busy when we arrived.


burnoutx

They just checked the smallest pocket on my bag and that was it! It’s like 2021, when it was the first panny d slammy d and they didn’t want to touch anyone’s belongings. I’ve seen multiple people say they didn’t even check or scan their tickets too, just whacked a wristband on them and called it a day.


X_Trisarahtops_X

One of the security at the entrance made a joke that the litter I was holding might be a bomb. I thought he was being funny. But he took it and wouldn't give it back to me ha. I guess joking about terror events at festivals is fine now.


burnoutx

Yet when someone is actually kicking off in the crowd and squaring up it doesn’t matter to them. I genuinely think somebody is going to get seriously hurt next year if slam dunk don’t sort it out.


X_Trisarahtops_X

Fully agree. I saw several incidents where there could have been serious injury - to name a few: - In one of the flogging molly pits, someone was just being violent. A friend pointed him out as a chap who had been being violent in pits at other stages earlier in the day. I'm sure he wasn't the only one - I tend to stay away from most pits at festivals if it feels a bit like a tinder box of emotion because I don't want to get injured, so I don't know what the majority of pits were like - but i'm willing to bet he wasn't the sole perpetrator of poor pit etiquette. Luckily, no security nearby or paying attention so he could carry on enjoying his day. - Someone we were with caught a guys hand in her pocket trying to take her phone. She called him out, got thumped in the face and he ran off with the guy who was clearly working with him - security nowhere to be seen. - Massive pits that had a lot of potential to get out of hand at the drop of a hat - again, no security in sight. - No lighting in the part of the car park we were in - really unsettling as a woman (actually - for anyone, I imagine). Also major trip hazard, especially given the amount of alcohol and lack of access to water a lot of people had - Literally zero space for emergency services to get through - or even for people to abandon vehicles and get out by foot on the way out since it was just a mass of cars bumper to bumper in every direction should an emergency or injury happen. - Tons of bottle necks throughout the day which could have easily led to injury, or worse, a crush incident. - Lack of any staff, literally, any staff in the parking area where we were for 3 hours. People were angry, tired, lots of people drunk from all day drinking and limited water access - definitely could have been dangerous. And those are just the specific things I saw that jump to my head. There was almost no security anywhere that I could see, and the ones that were there - half of them didn't seem to know anything and behaved like this was their first security job (or at least, their first festival security). It was not well catered for from a safety point of view, from what I could see. But. I'm also not in security for work so I could be wrong.


endangeredpenguin

I did and always do feel for security and the men and women at the front. I don't wanna spoil someones good time but whenever I saw crowd surfers I start to panic and feel for the security who have to catch them. At the north even when ZebraHead was playing there was a woman on some kind of inflatable. It looked legitimately dangerous and in the end she feel off it backwards like a scuba diver would. Thankfully there was pit etiquette and someone caught her but again I was really worried for her safety.


X_Trisarahtops_X

If something got out if hand at South, shit would have hit the fan. It was tinder box dry, people were understandably drunk and dehydrated and some of the pits felt on a knife edge between fun and dangerous and the security clearly had no idea how to crowd control effectively at many of the shows (and there were way less staff than there should have been for an event that size). Any number of things could have gone very wrong and I didn't feel reassured by the security presence. I did feel very sorry for them. Many of them were clearly barely adults themselves. It must have been overwhelming. But SD shouldn't have ever allowed the situation to be that way.


endangeredpenguin

Agreed, on the Dickes stage there one bloke keeping an eye on things on the stage and maybe four people who were watching over everything on the ground.


burnoutx

See Tickets asked me to review the event so I did. SDF organisers seem to have listened to things we’ve casually moaned about online in the past, so I can only hope that they take this extremely seriously. It’s my fifth year of slam dunk and security have never been this bad. Entrance checks are always shoddy at best though.


X_Trisarahtops_X

We've been a few times now too and are regulars at shows, big events and festivals. I've never seen such shoddy entrance security. My husband came in with a backpack that wasn't checked. My step son had cargo trousers on with 5 or 6 deep pockets. Not checked. I had a bum bag, which I was asked to open a zip on. It was clearly full of glasses cases and such and none of them were opened, none of the other zips opened. Pockets not checked. Between us we could have bought so many dangerous things in. Date rape drugs. Sharp objects. Explosive components. Literally anything. Yet on the way back from parking mid afternoon, they had the audacity to take my litter (that i was taking through to a bin so i didnt litter all over my friends car) very seriously making jokes about bombs. Ridiculous.


pugdrop

I remember going to slam dunk just after the manchester arena bombing and security was obviously ramped up which was great. it’s a shame people seem to have very fickle memories and no longer care about safety at big events.


archielongshanks

Just coming back from the north one. Bands were phenomenal no complaints there, Enter Shikari really blew it out of the park. However, Organisation was a fucking shambles, event was oversubscribed and I felt like cattle for the majority of the day I queued to: Get on a shuttle bus 1h:30 Use the toilet 0:30 Get in 0:30 Buy a drink 0:30 Buy some food 2h:30 (yes fucking 2 hours 30) Buy another drink 0:30 Leave the event 1h:00 So all in all I spent about 7 hours in queues today, I was only there 10 hours total...


Which_Butterscotch44

This! Felt like I only managed to see bands for a very small window of the time i was there


rolfeadog

The organisation was an absolute fucking joke. Can't fault the bands for the shows they put on, that's the one positive I would say. No yellow road signs anywhere near the site, I think I saw one that said "Hatfield House Events" and it was about 200 meters from the car park entrance off the main road. It was like the event didn't even exist. The postcode given was to the Pick Up/Drop Off area. The marshal posted there directed us to a closed road. Luckily I had a friend who had already dealt with the traffic said to make sure to get West bound on the A414 and not East otherwise we would have been stuck for hours. Nobody was checking car parking passes. Once in the car park it seemed as if they were running out of space and just parking anywhere there was a gap. There were about 8 taps across the whole site for refilling water bottles which is made considering the website says that bringing in food and drink is prohibited. The main walkway between the stages had food vendors either side of it so the queues intersected and blocked a lot of the area. 20 odd minute queues just to get food/drink/the toilets/anything. The bar and a lot of vendors had sold out water around mid-afternoon. The sound across the stages seemed to dip in and out a lot or just be missing parts completely. You would think that after a few years at the Hatfield House site they would have had their shit together. I went the year they first moved it there from the uni and it was in no way as bad as this year.


Jordno

I’m glad I’m not the only one. That noticed no car park pass check and ended up in staff parking. The sound was awful too


aprendo23

20 minutes for food? I wish! :( We waited more than 2 hours (from roughly 5pm-7pm) at a burger/wings/loaded fries place, only to be told that they weren't doing wings, had sold out of fries, and didn't have any bacon for the burgers, so we waited 2 hours and paid ~£37 for 3 cheeseburgers. Meanwhile, £7 pints aren't horrific in the scheme of things, but I bought 2 double gin/lemonades (£23 total) and there's not a cats chance in Hell that they actually put 2 shots in each cup, genuinely less than 1 shot. Plus they sold out of the Slam Dunk IPA insanely quickly, so we didn't get to try it. Generally, the organisation was an absolute wreck. For the cost of the tickets, I am absolutely dumbfounded as to why they didn't have more toilets, more barriers/better signage and crowd organisation, more merch, more food vendors etc.


Asum_chum

Set off for south at 6am. I’d decided from the start to sleep in my van so I found a housing area a mile away and walked. Luckily that meant I didn’t any queuing issues. The sound for millencolin was so bassy. I didn’t really understand because saw Mille Maunders and the sound was great. Not sure what happened. Due to getting in about 11:30 meant I got food and beer straight away but I remember wandering around about 4 and my friend commented how crazy busy the village had become. I bought most of my beers from the craft tent and never had to queue more than a minute in there. I loved it. I’ve not been to a big festival for about 15 years and realised I much prefer smaller ones but still really enjoyed it. Got to the front for Flogging Molly and Less Than Jake so I was ecstatic. Still buzzing to be honest. Festivals have always meant queues so it didn’t bother me too much. I mostly enjoyed skipping the toilet waits and peeing in the grassy area near the dickies stage (we christened it The Secret Garden). Would I go back? Not sure. The line up would have to be really good, which it generally is. Maybe.


Emitime

Thought Millencolin was really bassy at north too! Must be a choice...


Arphrial

The rock scene stage had horrifically strong bass at North. Thought it was just the first band but all of the acts had it, made it nearly impossible to hear anything but the bass.


dibbster46

North was an absolute belter. 10/10 to the bands, stage crews, sound guys and security. But to those who decided not to empty the urinals, to have less than half the adequate number of portaloos and nowhere near enough food vendors, fuck you. You fucking money grabbing prices of fucking shit


[deleted]

[удалено]


PointlessSemicircle

Tbf we didn’t have any issues with parking (North) and got in pretty fast (we arrived at about half 1). They didn’t check our parking ticket tho


janedoem16

I went to Slam Dunk once in 2012 and never returned. It was that awful.


[deleted]

[удалено]


CardinalCopiaIV

Got any evidence they oversold their allocation? If that’s the case they’ll get fined by H and S for breaching licensing etc. Or is it just an expanded capacity because their licensing was changed to allow it?


atomic_mermaid

Yeah I agree with this, I think there's a slim to zero chance they genuinely oversold capacity for the event. It's far more likely they were (somehow) ill equipped to deal with the event actually being sold at capacity.


ido50

In North right now. Three hour queue for parking because they haven't checked tickets and car park was full. Sent 15 minute drive away to another car park. Finally made it in 30 minutes ago and have been queueing for a cup of coffee ever since. All in all it was worth it to come all the way from Israel for this. Edit: and I missed Millencolin, so that's just great.


PointlessSemicircle

That’s so shit. We had no issues or queue at 1-1:30ish but they didn’t check our parking ticket (prepaid) so I’m not surprised.


endangeredpenguin

I gotta be honest. I really don't think you missed much with Millencolin. No audience interaction, just stood and played. In comparison to people like LTJ, BFS and Flogging Molly it screamed of "we are being paid to play and that is what we will do". And the really annoying thing is they were one of the main bands I went for. I was so disappointed.


ido50

Sucks to hear that. I actually saw them in Slam Dunk South a few years ago and they were great and not at all like this. Did you go to North or South? I heard their South performance had technical issues and was cut short.


Pat2424

Traffic getting to North sucked and the queues for food are so long it’s not worth it, but I’ve had a fab time so far otherwise.


fray3k

North. Bands were great but the queues were insane. 50+ minutes for a burger. 30+ minutes for my wife to get through the toilet queues each time. Ran out of soft drinks on two of the bars. Urinals over flowing by 4pm. There just weren't enough facilities for the volume of people there. There will be people that had a different experience because they got lucky with their timings etc but the majority seemed to spend the whole time queueing, we certainly did and everyone we spoke to did. We did at least get lucky with the car park in both directions though. Only about 30 minutes queue to get out (we got to the car around 11pm).


Greybunnies

I’ve been going to festivals for 15 years, but this was my first Slam Dunk (at North)! Does anyone here think it felt kinda dangerous at times, with the amount of people compared lack of staff and crowd control? I had to warn my friend about crowd crush safety and to keep her distance between people at times if she could etc… it just seemed really irresponsible, I can’t imagine if there was a major accident or attack or something during some of those crowds between stages and at the end of the night. I thought festivals were becoming way more thorough with these kinds controls since like Astroworld etc…


carrotparrotcarrot

I felt unsafe at times in crowds and left. I read once that once you feel people pressing against you on four “sides” of your body, you’re too crammed in. So I missed some bands because I was too worried about it


rezonansmagnetyczny

I'm a big strong man who bounces around mosh pits with the other big men and I felt unsafe in the general crowd


ido50

Good for you for being safety conscious, many people don't realize the danger that they're in or refuse to miss out. I used to be deep in the pits, now I mostly stay in the fringes if I feel the crowd is too big and roudy.


Wonderful_Formal_274

The Kerrang tent was worst. Because of the two stages they had one band starting as soon as the other finished, which meant people leaving after one band at the same time everyone was trying to get in to see the next band. I was caught in a crush for a couple of minutes, but amazed if no-one suffered serious injury.


williamthebloody1880

Why they set up the ~~Scott Pilgrim~~ Kerrang stage like that is beyond me. They should have had the other side of the tent open


Sambothebassist

The weirdest thing as well was If you went to the back it was totally empty, because you could only enter on one side


soverytiiiired

I’ve been going to festivals for years and I have NEVER seen one so crowded. Venue was far too small for that amount of people


janedoem16

I went to Slam Dunk North once (2012). Worst festival I ever attended and have refused to go back ever since.


[deleted]

So why come to this specific reddit page 11 years later to moan about it?


janedoem16

To prove the point that Slam Dunk is shit and nothing has changed.


[deleted]

Pretty pathetic to still be so bitter about a festival you went to over a decade ago. Get over it.


janedoem16

Someone's feeling salty about someone telling the truth about the shitshow that's Slam Dunk and its piss poor organisation. Also, you're pretty pathetic for reporting my comment to Reddit Care Resources. Get a life you absolute wetwipe.


[deleted]

"Telling the truth" about a festival you admit you haven't been to in a decade. Imagine whining about the same thing for over a decade and then telling somebody else to get a life. Classic.


janedoem16

What I said is the truth because I hear the same complaints every year about it. Slam Dunk is crap and organisers don't care about health and safety or providing a good service. I'm telling you to get a life because you reported me to Reddit Care Resources for no real reason. If anything, you're abusing that service for those who genuinely need it. Get a life you silly cunt.


NursexElle

Absolutely agree. If something had happened then it would have been a disaster. I’m shocked they managed to get approval to host that many people. I really hope they learn from this year and either expand next year or cut back on tickets to their normal levels.


HawkAsAWeapon

North was super crowded. Food queues were the worst for any festival I've been to. Navigating stages through these queues was annoying. We were staying nearby so didn't have any traffic complaints, but leaving the festival was just downright dangerous.Thousands of people cramming into a funnel-shaped exit with a small opening that people were cramming up by lingering is a recipe for disaster if there was the slightest bit of panic for whatever reason. Every other festival I've been to opens up new exits at the end but not this time.


soverytiiiired

North. Jesus fucking Christ the queues! Took us two hours to get in and two hours to get out! The food queues were so insane that we just decided to go hungry. No merch left at all. Had to go to the toilet during bands I wanted to see as it wasn’t even worth thinking about going between sets. I did enjoy the music. Can’t fault the bands at all. But it felt as though they had sold a few thousand more tickets than they should have. Far far far too packed


BlatantFix

Honestly not sure I'll be going back unless they announce serious changes. Amazing lineup, but I just didn't really enjoy myself I was so stressed about timing. Started off my day with a 20 minute delay on the overcrowded Manchester - Leeds train because of course. Transpennine never seem to have any idea this festival is on. From joining the queue to the shuttle bus it took 2 hours 10 minutes to get into the site, last time I was there this took maybe an hour, I missed Vukovi completely thanks to it and was late for SeeYouSpaceCowboy. Queued for some lunch, thought it was a bit bad at the time at 20 mins (again going by previous experiences), turns out I probably had one of the shortest food queues of anyone. Despite having 30 mins between Wargasm and Boston Manor we barely got into the tent for the latter between navigating past the food queues and the tent queue itself, it was miserable. Missed Pvris to stand in the queue for a burger, after half an hour someone came from the front saying the queue was expected to be an hour, gave up and went to watch We Came As Romans who started early according to the week old schedule I had on my phone. Had originally planned to watch the end of Creeper after them, but knew there was no way I was gonna get in that tent so just didn't bother and watched a bit of Billy Talent. Watched the second half of them from the queue for a shit pizza from the van next to the Knotfest stage, since during bands was the only time getting food seemed to be viable. Watched the first half of Shikari, then made the switch to Offspring because they decided to completely overlap them this year instead of staggering like every other year. Saw the last train to Manchester had been cancelled so left Offspring before the encore to catch the 10:56. Missed it by two minutes even with leaving early because everyone else was doing the same. Sat in Leeds station for 45 minutes trying to figure out how the fuck to get home until one random person called out for Huddersfield and Manchester Victoria. Again this was not a station announcement, just a random employee shouting one single time for it, and ended up being taken back over the Pennines in a dodgy dark minivan I'm still not convinced was legit. While we were getting on some of the people on it mentioned they had friends still stuck at the site. Ironically this was one of the more entertaining parts of the day just chatting shit with random strangers about how bad the organisation of everything was. The whole day just felt like I was too busy improvising a schedule around the shit organisation to enjoy myself, they were easily 20% or more over the realistic capacity of the site. Very thankful I'm not a woman too, the urinals might have been rank post 5pm, but at least you could get into them, my friends were having to miss bands just so they cut their toilet queues to only 20 minutes.


rezonansmagnetyczny

I'm definitely waiting for the apology before I buy my ticket


indigovioletginge

Just got back from the North one. Honestly wasn’t as bad as I’d prepared myself for after reading how much of a disaster Hatfield seemed to be. Took about an hour and a half in the car park queue, and we were in the arena by about half 1. We left at 9.30pm and got out within ten minutes. Queues for food and drink were insane. Definitely seems like they oversold it, and I think in general the event has gotten too big for where it’s held now. Boston Manor 100% needed a bigger stage, it was overcrowded to fuck.


ido50

They most definitely oversold it. Urinals were overflowing by the time I got there around 5. Most food vendors were out of many items by then too. This is the classic greed that destroys pretty much most festivals as they become more popular.


AgileReplacement6911

Queued for an hour to get chips, whole time i was watching the people making the burgers etc at a leisurely pace while the queue was going across the whole food court


soverytiiiired

I absolutely hate complaining about people who serve food or drinks having spent many years doing it myself, but did you notice there was an absolute lack of urgency with the members of staff? Everywhere I queued everyone seemed to be working at the slowest pace they possibly could


AgileReplacement6911

Yeah, as someone who has worked in hospitality and experienced food service a lot, I’ve seen people serving a half empty pub with more urgency. This guy was just slowly handing burgers over then going on his phone for a minute before calling the next customer while the queue was easily 40 metres long


DaveFerg47

North. Absolute shambles. They increased capacity by 8,000 this year and had the same setup as last year, with less security. Band lineup was faultless, but guessing that took all the budget. Queues were massive, loads of dickheads pushing in, toilets were overflowing by 5pm. Drugs everywhere, pickpockets seemed pretty calm to rob people all over site. Will not be returning, which is a shame as we’ve loved our times there


notliam

> Queues were massive, loads of dickheads pushing in When me and my partner made it to the front of the toilet line a couple popped up and pretended to know us so they could push in. Insanely cheeky, we didn't want to make a scene so played along but not nice to put people in that sort of position.


DaveFerg47

We waited 45m for churros, CHURROS! and once we hit the front some guy pushed in. I challenged him & got back “that’s what you’ve got to do”. Had a big dude behind me who just moved him out the way, but I was gobsmacked.


Eww_Porcelain

Having done both days this year. I've seen the complaints about south... Hooo boy wait till the north ones come in...


shinjinrui

North was a fucking joke. 2 hours in a queue to get the worst burger I’ve ever had. 30 minutes every time I needed to pee (which fortunately wasn’t that often because the bars were a shambles too). Way too many tickets sold as it was massively busier than I’ve ever seen any festival be. Would have been a 1/10 experience if Shikari hadn’t been amazing. Won’t be going again though unless the venue changes.


callumjm95

Was at North yesterday. They need a bigger venue or they need to sell less tickets. I’ve never seen anywhere so crowded in my life. Food and bar queues were a joke for the most part, and I didn’t appreciate having to wade through a pissy bog by mid-afternoon. And to the cunt that was crowd killing at Malevolence, fuck you


SurelyTheEnd

Crowd-killing? Was that someone misbehaving in the pit or a security person being overzealous?


callumjm95

Someone in the pit. Comes with territory with a hardcore band, but like, read the room. You’re at a pop-punk festival.


Think_Doughnut628

Amen to this brother


X_Trisarahtops_X

I mean. It took us so long to get out that it was getting light by the time we got home even with a clear m25. This is after being up at 6.30am sat morning to get there early (and was still late enough to miss a few bands). But at least the toilets were clea...oh. Well. At least the food was alri..hmm. I guess the sound was goo..ah. At least there was cider.


Asum_chum

To cider 🍻


GingerSmurf1983

North yesterday - first time Site size needs expanding (without increasing attendance) food stalls need moving and additional toilets installed. Constantly having to manoeuvre between people queuing and people sat down was a chore. Other than that the bands were excellent


Jordno

Queue to get in I’ve not had previously but it took about an hour to get in which sounds short compared to some I’ve heard. It was so much more packed, massive queues constantly and toilets were awful. The sound may just be me but on main stage I found it awful we even moved around a fair bit with no luck.


LesterHorseman

North one, had a pretty great time honestly but it was very obviously just too full the queue for food was an absolute joke we had to queue for around 40 mins just to get a hot dog. We did the shuttle which was pretty great honestly the queue after for the shuttle has always been horrendous but was obviously equally as bad this time too. Bands were incredible though I honestly feel like with the sell outs they need to be thinking about bigger venues and bands now maybe for 2025.


ProperDip

Feel that. We queued for an hour to get just a coffee, to then order and be put in another queue to go round again before we could get said coffee. (Which at this point was barely warm) Organisation was a mess, thankfully the acts where spectacular so win some lose some/


Rikib008

Went to North - Waited in queues on the road and dirt road for 3 hours to be told the car parl was full and to follow the car in front. We drove a few miles following the cars ahead to be told there isn't a car park there and they don't know why we were sent there. We then were sent around to the collection drop off point and finally got parked up. The food queues were a bit shit - Around 30 mins when I went. Bands were great.


Sambothebassist

Why the fuck did I pay for the car park if no one was there to scan my ticket and I had to queue for two hours to get out?


YourMumsPal

Hey folks! My wife and I went to North and were first-timers. I had real difficulty figuring out if I was just too old and grumbly for festivals now or if SD North really was just a fucking shambles. I told myself it was the former but reading everybody's opinion here has shown me that there really were issues. I thought that my impatience and disappointment was just a sign that at 35 I was too old for it all but it looks like everybody here feels the same! The layout and festival infrastructure was so very poor. The main entrance bleeds into the edge of the Dickies stage causing a huge build up of people at that side. You also have to wade through 2-3 huge snaking queues for Slam Dunk merchandise - why not have 5-6 stalls dotted around the grounds? People were happy to wait hours to spend their money so offer more! Just have barrier queuing like the booze tents. Barrier queuing and more staff present would have solved a lot of issues even with the seemingly larger number of people present. The fact that there were next to no staff attempting to guide, support or control from anywhere inside the festival grounds was just crazy to me. There needed to be just a bit of crowd control. Food Vendors were in the middle of the grounds snaking up a big slope, splitting through the stages. Why? Why not put them out of the way and get some serious barriers up? Stage crowds were weirdly boxed in so they would form a kind of strange right-angle triangle shape. You could only really get out of one side of each main stage. You couldn't move for people, basically. And you couldn't get to the most basic amenities because of people. That's not right at all. Thankfully peoplewere chilled and I good spirits. And the bands we saw were all awesome.


InvestigatorNo4802

I went VIP which I know sold out pretty quickly. Only towards the end of the day at around 6pm did I notice any long queues. Maybe I’m in the minority but I thought it was pretty well run. Try going to Reading Festival then you’ll really see gets chaos looks like. On the parking thing, once me and my partner parked up I told her we were going to leave early as it was clear as day it would be a nightmare leaving. So we left after The Academy Is. Same again, try and leave Glasto after the headliner finishes. You’ll be lucky to get on the M5 within 3 hours. It’s a massive festival. Plan ahead. I’m not defending the organisers but some people are saying all kinds of silly shit like they want a ‘part refund’. If it’s the same organisers as what it was way back when then their learning as time goes on. At the punters expense I know but it’s a MASSIVE festival.


safety_mouse

You're entitled to your opinion but I imagine it's nice to have the good fortune to be able to pay extra for VIP and feel like you've gotten your moneys worth leaving before even the second headliner. It sounds like you're a festival regular too, for some folks this would have been a big day out and a rare opportunity, so would have wanted more for their money than what they got... which was a poorly organised event by a team that has many years of experience and are the ones that should have planned ahead for the increased capacity this year. Edit: futuresound has been around for a long time, but I'm not sure how long


InvestigatorNo4802

I’m very lucky, I don’t take any of it for granted. I feel for you, iv gotten standard tickets for most other festivals and it’s shitty. Especially when you’ve waited all year for it. It was actually the toilet facilities experience at other events that made me spend the extra money on VIP. How your supposed to have a good drink if you can’t freely take a leak I don’t know. TRNMT is also pretty good if you can VIP it. They used to do payment instalments, used it a few years ago. Their lineups aren’t similar I know but they are slowly becoming more diverse with their genres.


safety_mouse

hmu if there's a spare seat in your Glasto helicopter taxi ;)


[deleted]

[удалено]


InvestigatorNo4802

Yeah poor comparison on my part. Thinking about 2000 trees fest. Heard that’s pretty good. I think it might be similarly sized too? Not read too much into it. Mate went a few years back and said it ‘set the bar’.???


[deleted]

[удалено]


InvestigatorNo4802

Fuck, just noticed The Wonder Years are playing and The Bronx. Wow! A lot of cash has been spent on gigs this year! Pretty sure the wife would destroy me if I bought a day ticket 😳😳


_scott_m_

Just an outsider perspective. I came to South this year from the United States and I had a great time. Granted, I travelled by train/shuttle from London and didn't have to deal with the car park fiasco. Yes the crowds did feel a bit denser than it needed to be later in the afternoon, but it never felt like a major problem to me. Never waited longer than 10 minutes for a toilet or water station. And we ate when we first got there when crowds were light so never really had to deal with food queues. Overall a fantastic experience and we are already talking about maybe coming back over for it again next year. EDIT: Also want to add, there really aren't any good pop punk/emo festivals in the states of this caliber. Slam Dunk felt very reminiscent of Warped Tour for us. And there really isn't anything in the states that can scratch that itch. So that perspective may be inflating our opinions of it a bit.


PointlessSemicircle

I did Riot Fest last year and felt that that was organised better tbh


ChinaCatKieran

Samesies! But I thought the food lines at Riot were fucked. Like 40 mins for a drink in that heat? Mad. Still though, I’ll be chronically dehydrated all day long for The Misfits…


PointlessSemicircle

The lines for food were defo shorter at RF though, we only ever waited about 15 minutes for food. Same with the bar but we did VIP


ChinaCatKieran

Glad you had a good time! Come back next year and I’ll buy ya a beer.


jesod

I went to the North. Been to Slam Dunk before and been going to similar and larger festivals for the last 20 years (including Warped Tour for at least 10 years). I set off from my place at 1130. I live 10 miles out. I got in the car queue at noon. There was no management of the queues. You just had to assume this long ass line was it. It expanded to include 3 roundabouts which only one was blocked off, so lots of cars were merging into this already massive queue. I, apparently, got the short end of the stick on this one. I pre-booked. No one checked your ticket. I had to drive around the whole car park twice before they found me parking. It was right before they opened the last overflow lot. You had to walk around the entire festival grounds to get in from the car park I was in. Security and entrance was quick. I got into the venue at 4pm. I already missed 3 bands I wanted to see, and I was not going to miss Underoath at 4:10. Except I had to pee. Thought it would be smart to go to the Amazon stage toilets since it was away from the front mess. Had to navigate my way through the shit show that was food queue alley. Who thought squeezing 20 food trucks with 2 hours queues facing 30 meters away from each other for thousands of people to be the pathway for a main state was a good idea? The toilets were packed. Didn't have time to pee now. The water station was at least quick to get to for me each time. Needed to go to the Kent Stage Left after this. Not an easy find on the map. Still didn't have time to pee because the next band started as this band ended on the other side of food queue alley. Who squeezes two stages under a tent facing each other with only one side of the tent to get it? It was tight. Couldn't get in at all. Could barely hear anything. Decided it wasn't worth it and went to the Dickies stage for Flogging Molly. Great show. You could only hear if you were closer, otherwise sounded like an echo. After Flogging Molly, I finally tried to pee. Took about 15 minutes thankfully. Cleaner than I expected. My daughter wanted food but the line were insane. We went for a quick ice cream instead got some calories and sugar but it was not satiating of course. We just didn't want to miss the bands we can't to see. We eventually got into a food queue line about an half an hour before Bowling Soup figuring we could eat and make it to them. Ha! We picked the wrong food truck. The burgers/wings/loaded fries place was probably the worst line. We were in the queue for an hour and probably had about an hour and a half ahead of us. Missed bowling for soup but headed towards yellowcard 10 minutes early knowing the Kent tent was hell to get into. It was packed like a can of sardines and started 10 minutes late because of sounds issues. After that, headed to Offspring. It was great expect the crowd surge was intense. At one point 30-40 people fell on top of each other all at once. The worst I've seen. Everyone had to hold the crowd back in hopes to get people standing quick enough again. All the bands were great, no doubt about that. Just wish I could pee and eat during a 12 hour day and not miss the lineup. I expect a half hour queue for things, but 2 just to eat? And we couldn't even bring food in ourselves? To leave, we decided to hold back after and grab food. Still a 20 minutes wait. 😂 But it was nice to get something in knowing the car park was going to be at a standstill. We attempted to buy some Slam Dunk merch as it was my daughter's first big festival. Nope. Not a chance. It was sold out ages ago, so unless you stayed in a 2 hour queue for merch early in the day, you weren't getting anything. Eventually left to my car at 11pm. It was indeed a standstill. None of the cars started moving until around 1215. Didn't get out until 1245. This was an overcrowded, mismanaged festival. Not enough signs, not enough space, no understanding on how to do traffic and car park management, not enough food trucks, poor layout. Great bands though. 👌


Otherwise-Bag3357

We went to the north yesterday. Got an uber from Leeds City center. Took 30 mins but the guy was really nice and warned us it might be hard to get a taxi later. The bar and loos werent too bad for queuing, 10 mins early in the day, 30 for later, but the food. Wow. We hadn't eaten all day (just drinking extortionate beer) and by 6pm the queues were over 2 hours long. We asked a few people how long they were waiting for and what they were waiting for and lots didn't even know. They just queued... The bands were great, on time, energetic etc. Managed to get to the front of billy talent but so many people got pulled out due to idiots pushing and crushing people into the barrier. We left after ten mins of the offspring and got to the front of the taxi queue in ten mins. Back in Leeds by 11.30. My friend had been the last few years and said he had never seen it this busy. Layout was much the same, same number of toilets and food stalls it seemed but so so many more people. 5/10 would not recommend.


I_am_chili_beef

North. We got an Uber somewhere closeish and walked, so avoided the car park/shuttle bus chaos others have reported. Bands were amazing, especially Billy Talent and the Offspring. Festival organisation was shambolic. Like many other comments I’ve read, we gave up on getting any food because we weren’t willing to wait 2 hours and miss all the bands, so just went hungry. Didn’t have to use a portaloo but the queues for those looked insane too. Unless the organisers address the problems, we won’t be going back.


mygngcz

North was ridiculous. Pre booked the shuttle, started queuing for it at 12 and didn’t get on the bus until 2pm. They cut the line off about 40 people behind us and told them they had to sort other transport out, as the busses that were supposed to be for Slam Dunk were then gonna start taking football fans to Elland Road instead. Never had my bag searched, wish I would have known they weren’t doing it properly as would have stashed a few sarnies and some snacks since the food vendors were an absolute nightmare. Managed to wait 50 minutes for some noodles that were cold and tasted of absolutely nothing for £12. Kerrang tent for FYS was a shit show, unless you were already in for Boston Manor before, there was no chance of you actually getting into the tent. Definitely think majority of bands in there could have been swapped with some of the bands playing earlier in the day on the main stages. To top it off, was in the mother of all queues for the shuttle bus back home. Left straight after Shikari at 10:15, got into the queue by 10:30 and didn’t get onto the bus until about 1am. Was just an endless queue of thousands of people, no communication with the staff as to how long we were gonna be in there, we didn’t actually get back to our hotel until 2:30am. Literally 4 hours after leaving the festival. Honestly, it was a shit show from start to finish because of the poor planning, the bands were fantastic but I doubt I’ll go back next year unless serious changes are made.


tokkul

Enjoyed the day overall at North, the bands were great. Thankfully didn’t drive so avoided the parking issues. But the queues for food were so long and the bottlenecks - particularly at the the Kerrang tent - were at times dangerous. Compared to previous years, it just felt like far too many people.


CoolNefariousness668

Took me six hours to get to South, last three hours of that was 3.7 miles to get in to the site. Planned to get there about 12:30, got in just in time to see Underoath at 4:10 (I think). Left at 21:30 to avoid the almost guaranteed cluster fuck of getting out (and sounds like had it been about 15 mins more then almost certainly another 3 hours of queuing.) Queuing for food, queuing for toilets (absolutely rank by around 6pm, didn’t see any of them getting cleaned)… queuing for everything really. Love a festival on paper, in reality they fuckin suck and this was some serious dogshit. Security was an absolute joke, whoever designed the site layout needs shooting, all in all it was just a bit weird.


AromaticContract7536

It was my first slam dunk experience and generally I thought it was good as I saw the majority of the bands I wanted to see but the crowds and queue and organisation was just mind blowing for such a long standing and big festival like slam dunk, the highlight of my day was waiting nearly an hour in a queue to be told we don’t have anymore vegan chicken (at 1pm) but there’s samosas on the stall next door 😅


Danmanchester

They're a bunch of money grabbing wankers. It was the same when it was in Leeds Centre, couldn't get between stages etc, wank organisation. The first year at Temple Newsham went really smoothly for me so I had high hopes, gone steadily downhill since. This year was an absolute joke. Queues for food are one thing but for them to not have enough toilets is disgusting, having women queue an hour for a piss is a joke and they need to be held accountable.


llb_robith

Look, I came by train, so having been in a car park shit show before (Glastonbury 07) those involved have my massive sympathies. And I don't want to defend it cos it was bad, but I feel like people are getting into a cycle of working themselves up about it. Maybe that's unjustified, I'll accept if you say that back to me. Talk of refunds is far fetched - didn't get a refund for the first Field Day, an event that made this look like a military operation. Personally, the issues were logistical than malevolent. Firstly, I very much doubt the event was oversold - especially with the current discussions around Brixton Academy. Not really worth prison/never running an event again for a few K. However, they made a load of choices in the layout that were pretty dumb. And when an event is at max cap, your margin for error becomes much smaller, and tends to have a domino effect. So everything really stems from 3 issues - water points, the location of the food and the location of the toilets. All 3 created huge queues. which eat into the space and make everyone stressed. In particular water seems to be something that is catching so many festivals out these days. People are way more likely to have a water bottle now and love staying hydrated. I don't know why fest organisers aren't putting more and more in. They clearly didn't have enough food capacity (and why in the name of god did you have queue twice, unreal dumbness), and placing them in that thoroughfare made for a fairly bleak day all told. Constantly weaving through a load of very pissed off people didn't give me the good vibes. I was weaving back and forth because the craft bar was way quicker than the other ones, and for some reason there were an insane amount of toilets on the Amazon side vs the Dickies side. Having so far bogs by your main stage, again absolutely baffling. The token 2 urinals made me laugh every time I saw them. The set up in the Kerrang stage, yeah absolutely deranged. Having to fight to get into a tent that then was half full, and having to listen to a soundcheck over the band you were watching. Sound on the Dickies stage was unacceptable, and made us leave early, thankfully as I feel if we'd left later the train would've been a shitshow. I think they were quite lucky that they had a good vibe, could've ended up worse. Overall I had a fun day, but that was probably luck, effort (walking to the other side of the site to queue less for beer isn't an option for everyone I appreciate) and Spanish Love Songs. I'd be nervous about going back though


llb_robith

Also wanted this as a seperate comment as I didn't want to appear to be blaming anyone. But two things with the crowd \- Unreal amounts of "crowd crust". The amount of times the edges felt packed, but a little bit of effort and further in was deserted was crazy \- This is a societal thing but since covid people start forming queues in places where queues aren't needed, in particular at bars. At the craft tent I would just go to the side and be served straight away, but someone would start queuing behind you even though there was someone at the bar waiting to serve them! Mad


ido50

There were sections of the Kerrang tent (I think) in North that were empty because the ground took a sudden dip that made it impossible to see the stage. At least that's what happened on the NOFX day, I didn't dare go in on Slam Dunk day.


Mariapocalypse

My first Slam Dunk... Actually seemed alright until about halfway through. When after leaving Movements, it's like we moved further and further from the stage but still were in the middle of a crowd. It started getting claustrophobic. And the queues. I mean there's not a lot I can say about them that hasn't already been said. It all seemed to calm itself as it came to the last few bands, but yeah. They really needed more space than there was.


Rachkt1

North - The only complaint I’ve got is I thought there would be more in the Village area before going into the arena. We got there at 9am as soon as it opened due to the issues yesterday so we were extra prepared.. got in by 9:20 and there was one burger stall (nothing for veggies), one bar and the merch. I was just expecting a bit more. Other than that, yes the toilet/ food queues looked long but didn’t wait more than 10/15 minutes for either. Toilets were clean. Used the taxi point to get home, no issues there and no traffic. Overall pretty good experience for my first Slam Dunk.


LiamJ968

Just been to North today and ended up leaving early because mine and my friend's phones got stolen. Speaking to other people and we count 8 instances just at the Rock Scene stage. I know it's not something the organisers had control over but it ruined the day.


X_Trisarahtops_X

Our friend had a phone stolen at Dickies at Hatfield. Seems lots of people had phones go missing during the Gogol Bordello set. They festival can't prevent it but they sure as hell could have had more security measures in place to minimise the issue. Slam Dunk always seems to have an issue with phone thefts - or - it seems to have had more of an issue than other festivals i've been to pretty reliably for a few years now. If it's already a hot spot for it, put more security measures in place.


ch0411

Someone said they oversold by 30%👀insane!!!


[deleted]

There are always baseless rumours like that flying around at festivals. The reality is that they will have a strict safety limit for the number of people allowed on site and if they were over it by that much the whole thing would have got shut down by the authorities and they would struggle to ever get an event license ever again. The simple fact is that this is the first year they have ever sold up to the maximum capacity. Honestly aside from having to cut through queues in a few areas I never thought it felt that busy compared to a lot of other festivals and concerts I have been too.


[deleted]

had a decent time but they clearly oversold it, doubt they'll acknowledge it though.


[deleted]

Went to the North. Had been reading all the issues with the South organisation in the morning train so decided to leave as Offspring came on stage so I didn’t get stuck in shuttlebus queues. I genuinely think this will be my last SlamDunk. I told a friend while we were in the queue for food, imagine if it was still in the city centre. If there was 50% less people it would have probably been the sweet spot. Unless they announce changes for next year (maybe even a bigger site) I’ll not be going.


Jimmehbob

South. Been at them all at Hatfield. We usually Big Green Coach it but this year as we had NOFX the day after we stayed in Stevenage and trained to and from Hatfield. My only complaint is the toilets, there seemed less this year and not serviced and there wasn't people picking up litter all day like there normally is. Other than this it was great. The PA was the right size albeit some variation between bands and stages (kick was too loud on punk stage and a bit quiet on main). There were a few on stage fuckups, cutting bands short which was a shame but these things happen. We didn't queue, just get your timing right and you're fine. Interestingly NOFX was if anything under sold. Toilets all moved, no queuing, most of the food stalls, people cleaning up... It was magic! Overall a great weekend, sorry for those that got shafted by parking as this sounds like it was hellish. Happy for Hatfield to enter punk rock history - Assuming that NOFX don't come back to the UK (although it sounds like they might be considering it). Well done to all the bands, everyone smashed it from start to finish! See you all in the pit next year.


ido50

I was in North, and saw NOFX and the rest as well two days before that. It was much much better than the actual festival. Sound quality was shit, but the number of attendees was just right, the bends were fantastic and really enjoyed themselves, the crowd was great, there were a few food stalls open, toilets were great. Getting out of the car park took almost an hour, but all in all I enjoyed it so much more than the festival. All the time during the festival I kept thinking how just two nights earlier I was in the same exact place having a wonderful time.


billhelmscream

I will say that the lineup this year is what made me buy my ticket, against my better judgement. I won't let bands tempt me into attending again unless management are replaced and they fix all the shit they broke. They don't give a shit about the attendees. It's all about the profit. It's soooo great to pay eye-watering prices for entry/parking/food/beer after queuing for more time than you spend in the arena! And what is more punk than enduring the poor sound quality at the "Amazon Music" stage!! /s


ShoddyAd3219

Went to North and my experience was slightly different to most it seems. Car park queue was expected, arrived at 10:45am and was parked and in the arena by 11:45am. No problems getting into the arena and through security - again no queues. Had a wander round, got food and a drink, no queues at all as there was hardly anyone in the arena. I went to the bar next to the Key Club stages at 5pm, no queues and got served straight away. Then leaving, we decided to stay for DJ Fresh to let most people leave, got back to the car at 11:15pm and was on the M1 by 11:30pm. However, I get people’s complaints. One of my mates who we met there had a VIP ticket and it took him about an hour to queue for food in the VIP section. Getting through the crowds of people queueing for food was a joke and could have been dangerous. Was talking to a couple before Shikari who got the Shuttlebus in from Leeds centre and said it took them 2 hours to get on a bus. It seems as though the arena is far too small for the amount of people there. Their needs to be a dedicated food village off to the side and far, far more toilets and water fill up points. The Kerrang tent was stupid and unpleasant, it needs making bigger and an entrance side and exit side putting in. Security are getting a bit of flack but I have to give kudos to the guys working the Key Club stage. The supervisor was on it with crowd surfers directing his staff where to be and they all looked as though they were enjoying it. I will be back next year, I just hope improvements are made.


[deleted]

Have to say I didn't see any problems with security all day and they generally seemed to be doing their job and having a good time themselves. They took it with good humour when my 18stone bulk came crowdsurfing on into them anyway!


Mcachead

I thought security in the Kerrang tent for Four Year Strong were amazing aswell (north). I walked in and wondered why they were all dripping with sweat. I soon found out.


badbadprettaygood

Interesting about the Key Club security. I’d imagine South’s incident where Scene Queen’s singer got dropped on her head by security was high on the supervisors (and lawyers) minds


poppunk_snowwhite

I went to South, and the queue for the band merch tent was so long, even near the end of the day. I had to keep going back in because some of the merch for the bands I wanted still hadn't been put out yet so I swear I stood in that line for about 2 hours all together. Also, my last one was 2019, so I know I can't really compare the two (especially since I went to North then and South this time), but it was just *so* much more noticeably crowded and busy this time around. I know most festivals are, but I definitely noticed it with all the queues this time around ​ EDIT: Whilst waiting in yet another queue, I got chatting to a someone who said they had set off early, been stuck in traffic for ages and had basically just arrived. At 6pm. Other than that, the bands I wanted to see were incredible, and I did have fun...well, when I wasn't stuck in a queue.


rezonansmagnetyczny

Oversold


Bluecup182

I'm not sure why people are complaining on Reddit for. I'm sure Citizens Advice/Trading Standards would like to hear about how you where told to pay for parking but on the day they were giving it away for free. That sounds like being mis-sold something to me. [https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/changed-your-mind/if-you-were-misled-or-pressured-into-buying-something-you-didnt-want/](https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/changed-your-mind/if-you-were-misled-or-pressured-into-buying-something-you-didnt-want/) I'm sure local councils/police know about the traffic issues, but maybe they would also like to hear about how vigorous the bag checks were, or if you saw any illegal activities on site, or if the facilities were up to standard.


[deleted]

I got really lucky and somehow managed to avoid all of the queues at Slam Dunk North. Went for a Pizza at about 2.40pm at the stall next to the Old J Rum Bar and the Craft Ale Bar and there was about 8 people in front of me. Got served really quickly but when I turned around an enormous queue had built up behind me with 100+ people in it. Being male meant I was able to use the urinals so never had to queue for the toilets but the queues for the cubicles looked ridiculous. Beer queue was obviously busy between bands but even then I never waited more than about 5 mins for a drink (and I drank a **LOT**). To me the site didn't feel that much busier this year but I did find myself having to navigate through queues a lot more. I know this was the first year they sold out but I think the queuing may have had more to do with the way they scheduled the sets than the volume of people. In previous years the two biggest stages had their set times far more staggered through the day. But this year they were almost perfectly synced up meaning that you had the two biggest portions of the crowd all leaving to grab food/drink or use the toilet at the same time. Stagger the stage times for the big stages and those queues could have been halved. Getting to the site was ok but only just made it in on time for MMATSU opening the Dickies Stage. Travelled with Big Green Coach Company and for some reason they set off 30mins later than they did in 2022 and 2021. We got there in time but only *just.* Given that the festival gates open at 9am its really bizarre that the coaches were not arriving until 11.30 or later. Personally I would prefer to arrive on site around 9am-10am and have a nice chill start to the day, especially when meeting with friends travelling from elsewhere. Instead I had to dash in to see the first band I wanted to catch and then try and find my friends with zero phone signal on site making it impossible to get in touch with them. For me the phone signal thing is a massive issue that Slam Dunk needs to address. Far bigger events than Slam Dunk happen every year and are able to provide strong wifi and 4G/5G signals for everyone in attendance. Yet every year at Slam Dunk I end up losing my friends and not being able to contact them because of the terrible phone signal. ​ Overall tho I saw 11 bands and my cumulative total queuing time was no more than about an hour which included getting in, 1 pizza, a trip to the bar between each band and maybe half as many trips to the urinals (2 beers = 1 piss)


bzzklltn

I’m glad I was guest because the queue for the toilets looked ridiculous. We weren’t too bad until the end of the day, we stuck our heads into DJ Fresh by ultimately decided to start the walk back to the BGC. Left ourselves 40 minutes to get from the grounds to the coaches. Doubled checked with a steward we were going the right way. Reached a man with a microphone shouting that coaches, trains and taxis needed to wait until they’d cleared the queue. Cut us all off and made us wait, starting to panic we’d miss our coach. Then we all got bunched up again further down, group of lads in front of us started talking to a steward about the fact that coaches were leaving in 15 minutes and we were being held up, steward told us we were completely in the wrong places. Chaos ensued, everyone’s pissed off, steward checks with another steward, second steward tells him everyone’s going the same route, and we all carry on. We all get carted out by the train station ages away from the coaches, none of their radios work so they can’t communicate with anyone in the coach park and it’s now gone 11.15. Ended up having to run down the road back to the coaches, whole thing took an hour from leaving the site to being on the coach. Luckily they held them all up till about 11.40, because if they’d actually left on time we’d have been stuck in Hatfield.


safety_mouse

I've been rubbernecking other people's experiences for three days now so only fair I share mine... First time at SD North, we went to Live at Leeds on Saturday, which was a very different experience with a *lot* less people, and I think it prepared us better for SD. As a green choice more than anything, we took the shuttle: £24 return for us both. I've not seen any comments about this eye watering bit of greenwashing from the event organisers and the "big green" coach company, so let me say I think it's atrocious that parking was so cheap when they could have subsidied the shuttle and avoided a lot of emission from private transport alongside a lot of the delays. The shuttle was obviously using the same single lane access road to the site, so that was slowing things down quite a bit. So as we were leaving Live at Leeds on Saturday, past an empty car park we made the call to drive up the next day but then we saw the post about parking at SD South on Sunday morning and instead chose to park in a residential area about 15 minutes walk from the site - I tell you what, ticket boycotts won't do anything but if more people clog up those residential sites next year it will be the NIMBYs that live on those streets that will be the ones to complain to the council and make the organisers shape up (DM for postcodes). Getting in, therefore, was relatively easy. We didn't feel super great about the lacklustre security but had a chat with the security guy and he was feeling uneasy about how busy they were expecting the day to be... We wanted a full experience, so when there weren't bands we wanted to see we were checking out the key club stages or tactically using the time for comfort breaks. We saw a bit of Billy Talent from the toilet queue and then dashed over for Yellowcard on the Kerrang Stage which we knew was going to be a fight with Hawthorne Heights ending combined with the poor layout of that tent - but this was another thing we learnt from Live at Leeds was that half of that tent on the far side from the entrance side was being left empty - a poor layout for crowd control. Going off others' stories that it has historically been a staggered line up, the stage timings and resultant clashes were a bit of a dissapointment. With the Kerrang tent set up as it was, fighting a way out during a band wasn't worth it so we endured Yellowcard's average set when Billy Talent and BFS would maybe have been a better time - but hey, it's a festival and not every act can live up to expectations - but I want to say that there were a lot of bands that seemed to be having tech troubles. Yellowcard had their issues, and on Saturday Maximo Park performed two or three songs without anything coming through earpieces. Other acts just sounded bad and out of balance. We used one tactical break for food, and being Leeds locals and with pre-armed knowledge from Live at Leeds knew Mor Mor be great scran. We were waiting for around 30-45 minutes I would say? So we were definately lucky in this regard, I feel for anyone that had to wait longer than that because this would have been avoidable (and more profitable??) by laying on more vendors. One more thing - toilers are one thing, but 8 tap water taps for 30,000+ people is surely not enough water provision, and I would like to see SD (or anyone) cite an industry standard that says it is. If weather on the Sunday had been as hot as Saturday, we'd be talking about a whole other queue for water. Overall, the acts more than made up for a lack of organisation by a company that has more than enough experience to know better. Our forward planning allowed us to avoid the worst of the experience, but I think we were very lucky in that regard - overflowing urinals by 5pm is ridiculous (F for the lad that slipped in the pissy mud just before Billy Talent, I'm sure he wasn't the only one) and I can't even imagine what the portaloos were like. We won't be rushing back to SD. This elder emo just wanted a decent mosh but I didn't even get that...and I can't blame that on the organisers.