Come and read about the first night of the Hard Rock Hell Roadtrip Ibiza and see the pictures of the debauchery!

Ibiza may seem like a strange place for over a thousand rockers and metal heads to travel to and watch bands for a week. But once you’re here it makes perfect sense. Sort of. Yes Ibiza is famous for it’s 4/4 dance music beats and superstar DJs, but sitting around the hotel lobby bar with Grand Magus and Wolf, drinking, listening to old punk and trying to catch lizards at midnight seems perfectly natural. And we haven’t even seen a band yet.
After a couple of beery looseners Hammer and the two Swedish bands head over to Hogans where the ‘welcome drinks’ has become a full blown gig in the small bar.

Welsh rockers Lethargy are already on stage hammering out their Zep-inspired post-grunge. On CD the young band are great and live their showmanship really shines. The five guys – ranging from quiet to shy – go wild on stage and the metre-long hair of each flails and whirls like some heavy metal dervish. The bar is more than a little warm but the gathered masses headbang, sing-along and throw the horns. We spot SCottish metallers Attica Rage in the audience, one of whom admits that he’s not actually ok. Last night he has absolutely no recollection of events between 9pm and when he woke up this morning. The burly Scot shakily holds up a bottle of water. Despite the quite epic finale to a great set, the band humbly unplug their guitars and head outside for a ciggie.

Outside in the street, world’s collide. While the (slightly) well-behaved metal heads sit and drink and talk, the streets are littered with the casualties of the local bars: drunk guys and girls stumbling through the streets on their way to where they probably don’t know.

The buzz is almost tangible and the excited hubbub of the crowd is furthered by the sight of dolled up girls, men in drag and the beckoning of girls at the strip bar next door. Tempting as a pole/lap/table dance might be we instead chat to Lethargy and some other random rock fans about how things are going for the band. But that soon descends into irreverant merriment (read: doing the thumb/willy trick where you draw a little line on the end of the former so it looks like the latter)

Last of the night are Pig Iron who bring the perfect blues-infused drinking anthems, to accompany each pint. Their frontman honks and parps on the mouth organ and each trucker riff drips with bluesy soul. While bluesy, the band pack a punch not a million miles from Zakk Wylde’s ‘Pride & Glory’ and incorporate great use of bass fills which adds a groovy twist to the mix.

Once again the bar fills and despite nearing three o clock in the morning show no sign of wearying. The hard rocking stomp finishes and once again everyone spills out into the street to gets some smoke a fag and once again mingle with ‘the locals’ and resist the tempting invitations of the sirens in a nearby balcony who seem keen for us to ‘enter her establishment’. I wonder if she prefers ‘Powerslave’ to ‘Seventh Son…’

We finally wander back to the hotel with a head full of beer, chat and rock’n'roll. Tomorrow it all kicks off proper and we have no idea what that will entail… tune in tomorrow to find out!