Mayhem Festival

The Mayhem Festival was a touring heavy metal festival that took place during the summer. The inaugural season took place in 2008; the festival has since become an annual event across the United States. Most years also include a single date in either Montreal or Toronto, Canada. The tour has been sponsored by the Rockstar Energy Company since the time of its inception. It was assembled by Vans Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman, and by John Reese (who was Lyman's partner on the Taste of Chaos tour). On August 2, 2015, Reese confirmed that the 2015 festival would be the last one.

Bands and musical style

All of the touring groups that participate can be classified as hard rock, and most are considered metal. The bands represent a broad range of heavy metal and hardcore punk subgenres, including grindcore, metalcore, thrash metal, death metal, groove metal, power metal, progressive metal, alternative metal, nu metal, industrial metal, and more.

Special guests

On a nearly annual basis, big-name guests are occasionally brought onto the tour as temporary replacements for the main acts who are forced to cancel a few dates. The first such occurrence was in 2009, when Mushroomhead performed instead of Bullet for My Valentine for three tour dates while they appeared at the European festival Wacken Open Air. In 2010, Avenged Sevenfold was added as an extra performer for two dates only, one of which was on the release date of their fifth album Nightmare. In 2011, Dethklok filled in for Megadeth on the festival's first day, while Testament replaced In Flames on the first two tour dates.

Mayhem Festival 2010

Mayhem Festival 2010 was the third annual Mayhem Festival created by Kevin Lyman. The 2010 edition of the festival was co-headlined by Korn and Rob Zombie. As in previous years, the main sponsor of the festival is Rockstar Energy drink, and each date had a different Battle of the Bands winner performing on the Jägermeister stage. In addition to three stages with various heavy metal bands, Mayhem Festival 2010 also hosted other entertainment acts. As in previous years, the Freestyle Motocross stunt team Metal Mulisha returned, in addition to comedian Jay Oakerson and a costume party/variety act "Beacher's Madhouse" featuring DJ's and the scantily-clad "Beacher's Babies".

In April 2010, an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico owned by Transocean and operated under contract for BP, exploded, which led to a massive oil spill in a disaster known as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. At this time, several people around the world, including Mayhem Festival 2010 headliner Korn, decided to boycott BP by not purchasing their fuel. Jonathan Davis, the lead singer of Korn commented, "We need to do our part to let BP know there are consequences for causing something like this. We want to send a message to corporations like BP so that they will take more preventative measures in the future." Korn will not be using BP, or oil from partnering companies, to fuel their tour buses during upcoming concert dates and also encouraged the other 2010 Mayhem Festival bands to participate in the boycott. Several artists not on the Mayhem Festival later joined in on Korn's boycott, including Disturbed, Rise Against, and Megadeth. Korn's encouragement for Mayhem bands to join the boycott eventually made its way to tour founder Kevin Lyman, who decided the entire festival would not be using BP oil. In a press release, Lyman stated that he is, "encouraging everyone we deal with to find alternative ways to get down the road this summer."

Mayhem Festival 2011

Mayhem Festival 2011 was the fourth annual Mayhem Festival created by Kevin Lyman. The official lineup was announced on January 31, 2011. It was the first year that the festival utilized a rotating main stage slot, and the first year that the tour had more than one act returning from previous lineups.

Rotating Main Stage openers

The 2011 iteration of Mayhem Festival was notable as the first year in which the tour utilized multiple acts to fill the opening slot on the Main Stage on different ranges of days. Machine Head opened the Main Stage from the tour's onset until July 20th, Trivium performed from July 22nd to August 2nd, and In Flames played from August 3rd until they dropped off the tour. While one band opened the main stage, the other two instead performed as headliners on the Jägermeister Mobile Stage and Revolver Stage.

In Flames drops off festival

On July 31st, Swedish band In Flames announced that they would not be able to continue touring with the festival by posting this on their official website: "It is with huge regret that today with immediate effect In Flames must cancel their current US shows as part of the Mayhem tour and their own US Headline shows. But due to a serious terminal illness of one the band’s immediate family members they feel they have no option. We have had the most amazing and fun times as part of the Mayhem tour and we are truly grateful for all the support the whole festival has shown. We will be back at the start of 2012. Once again our apologies"