Manowar Writes History in Bulgaria with 5-Hour Gig

Sofia News Agency

Legendary Manowar lived up to their reputation of the most uncompromising and loudest heavy metal band after treating 20,000 exalted fans with a record-long, five-hour-gig in Kavarna.

The band opened the annual Kaliakra Rock Festival 2008 on the Black Sea coast on Saturday.

The group kept their promise to break the record in Bulgaria for the longest running metal show.

The audience (about 20,000 people) enjoyed Manowar's greatest hits as some of them the band performed together with Sofia's Philharmonic Orchestra.

"Bulgaria is the place, where people know how to enjoy the real metal music. Death to false metal," the group's bass guitarist and main songwriter Joey DeMaio said during the show.

As a gesture of gratitude to their fans in Bulgaria the band played the country's anthem just as they did during their previous show, staged last year in the framework of the same fest.

Rock legend Alice Cooper is also expected to arrive in Kavarna for the first time. Kavarna is the starting point of Cooper's 2008 tour. He had stated that his show was so amazing that no one would dare to come on stage after he was done. Cooper's concert is going to be held Sunday.

Kavarna is hosting "Kaliakra Rock Fest" for the third time this year. Just in three years the fest became known as one of the biggest rock events on the Balkans. The fest is going to be held on July 5, 6, and 7. Some of the biggest names from the world of Rock will, once again, gather in Kavarna.

The spectacular concert of In Flames and Slayer will bring closure to the event.

The event's organizers had said that the percussions of Slayer are going to be transported from Germany. Technical requirements for the percussions are so complicated that no one on the Balkans could deal with them and this was the reason why they had to be specially transferred from Germany.

Slayer who have two Grammy "Best Metal Performance" awards are arriving in Bulgaria Sunday.

The Swedish band In Flames, performing as Slayer's support band are also visiting Bulgaria for the first time.