Festival Choices: Download 2010 vs Sonisphere 2010

So we've had a couple of rounds of announcements of bands from the UK's two main alternative/metal festivals. Both seem to be trying to pull out all the stops in the battle for our money. The headliners of both will attract a lot of different kinds of fans. AC/DC are arguably the world's biggest hard rock band ever, and the Download organisers have been trying to get them since 2003. Iron Maiden on the other hand, rival Metallica for the title of the world's biggest metal band, and Maiden headlining a festival on home turf is always a special experience.

Download securing Rage Against The Machine is a real coup, particularly as they tried to get them 2 years ago, only for Rage to opt for Reading and Leeds instead. Awareness of Rage in the mainstream is at an all time high after their highly unexpected UK Christmas Number 1, and there are alot of people, myself included, looking forward to seeing Rage for the first time.

If Rage are the real coup for Download, then Rammstein certainly fit that tag for Sonisphere. Their UK tour from earlier this month has been heralded in the press as one of the greatest live shows of the last 10 years, and that's in mainstream newspapers such as The Times and The Guardian, never mind Kerrang, Metal Hammer et al. They've promised to bring their full stage show to Sonisphere for their first UK festival appearance, so that is going to be something special.

The final Download headliner, Aerosmith, are something of a wildcard at present. Steven Tyler's future with the band is unclear at best, being in and out of rehab and seemingly having a lot of disagreements with his fellow band members. If it's Aerosmith with Tyler, then it will be a fantastic spectacle to close the festival on what could be another classic rock Sunday. With another singer, for me it just won't work.

Alice Cooper is also something of a Wildcard for the Friday night at Sonisphere, as I am not sure how much of his material apart from Schools Out and Poison is familar to people who are not Alice Cooper diehards. Nevertheless, he will bring an entertaining show to the Rocky Horror Themed Friday at Sonisphere which is a great idea to get people involved dressing up and generally having fun.

The supporting cast on both sides is impressive to say the least. Sonisphere have the likes of Slayer, Anthrax, Fear Factory, Iggy & The Stooges, Placebo and The Cult, where Download has Deftones, Stone Temple Pilots, Them Crooked Vultures, Megadeth, Bullet For My Valentine, Lamb of God, Five Finger Death Punch and Motorhead, to name a few.

At the moment, it seems pretty even. The one factor for me that currently just shades things in Download's favour is the chance to see David Ellefson back in Megadeth, something I was sure I would never see. No big fan of Megadeth would pass that chance up if they could afford it.

So at the moment I'll shade things just to Download, but only just. Keep the announcements coming.