Welcome to Rockville: My First Music Festival Experience

Three days ago was when the final day of Welcome to Rockville 2025 happened. Me, my parents, and two other family friends each got a single day general admissions pass for Sunday, which was when Korn would perform. It was my first music festival, and especially a good choice that my metalhead parents chose to invite me for. I never regretted answering yes when they asked if I'd like to come. If it wasn't for that, I would've never had the best day in fucking 2025 ever. (So far.. We're only approximately halfway through the year.)

On the way, we first stopped at BJ's Brewhouse and with my honorary Korn t-shirt on I had me some tasty spaghetti and a screwdriver cocktail. This also wasn't the first time my parents went to Rockville and Mom made sure we don't first eat the shitty greasy ass fried food at the festival that she'd tasted before. After finishing our grub, we head to the Daytona International Speedway, where the festival was being hosted. We got our admission bracelets and went straight to seeing our first set, which was Sevendust. I've listened to their songs with my parents a few times beforehand, and they're pretty good. (I should perhaps listen to them a little more.) By the time they were ending their set however, the lead singer offered to smoke marijuana joints with anyone who brung them. Wait a moment.. That's fucking cool! But I thought drugs weren't allowed to be brung within one of the biggest rock and metal festivals in the US.. How?? And in Florida of all places???

After Sevendust's performance finished, we got off of the grass we sat on and headed to a whisky venue, where there were picnic tables. My stepdad was having really bad foot sores that day as well as other days before, and this spot was convenient for my parents to stay for the rest of the festival in, as it was equally distanced between the Apex stage and the Octane stage, which they could see the screens of. Here's the map for reference btw so you know what I'm talking about.

Me though? I was a youngin' who needed to move my lazy ass or I'd miss out on plenty of shit. So whilst Daughtry played, I explored for a little bit, bought me a cloth fan at the merch store, sat back down at the Octane stage to snag a good close spot for the next set, and toked a joint with a juggalo couple. Oh yeah, I forgot to clarify that Insane Clown Posse, a hip hop duo, would perform at a darn rock/metal festival, and I saw many juggalos in their good ol' clown makeup who were hyped to see them. I'm guessing they were here because events like these attract an alternative crowd and ICP sorta fits the bill for that.

It wasn't ICP that played this early in the day though, but that of Motionless In White. If you want my opinion on them, I'd consider that they're not necessarily my thing. I don't really like the vocals that much. Nonetheless, they had a good performance, and around the last song, the lead singer was throwing roses into the crowd, and behind me were two scene girls who fangirled the fuck out when he did that. However, there was a moment where a crowdsurfer got injured and the singer offered to halt the performance for a brief moment in order for them to get safely carried away from the crowd. I thought that was generous.

Whilst my parents watched Chevelle play, I went to the Garage stage to see Deafheaven. This was the stage where lesser known extreme-sounding bands played. Because of this, not too many people came to see them, and I was thankful of taking a very good spot up close to the band because of that. Before the band started their performance, I smoked a joint with this Aphex Twin fan who wore black shorts with the logo and the Come To Daddy single cover. (Not to be confused with the EP cover lol.) Then Deafhaven comes on, and shit starts to get crazy. I was filming some clips to send to an online friend of mine who was a big fan of the band, who told me that the lead singer knew how to perform and engaged with the audience through such, and boy did that proved to be fucking true. Dude was posing like a fucking honorary viking warrior, on and off the mic. The bass was blasting, the drums were rushing, and a moshpit formed, the first one I've ever seen irl. (There were probably other moshpits that happened in previous performances, but I wasn't that close to see them beforehand.) I constantly panted, sweated, sipped my water, and fanned myself to endure the chaos I surrounded myself within, but my high ass still had so much fun nonetheless. In fact, I'd consider this to be the best performance I went to in the entire festival.

This is the only image I have of this stage as well as the entire festival where people's faces are hidden. Lmk in the guestbook if any of you wanna see more images from the event and I'll upload them with the faces censored.

When I got back to the table my parents sat at, they were watching Marilyn Manson perform. Ngl, the dude knew how to perform too. My parents really wanted to see his set as non-fans because of his flashiness and at first I thought they wouldn't like it because he has a tendency to pull off transgressive and offensive shit, but to my surprise, they actually enjoyed his performance.

By the time Bad Omens came, I lined up to go on the ferris wheel and I almost stepped and tripped over a nitrous oxide canister that was straight up lying on the ground in the middle of the line. Damn.. I thought weed would be the only thing this festival would tolerate. I don't know how one person managed to smuggle whippets into this festival, considering not much of metal objects could be brung within the premises. As I got up the top of the ferris wheel, I saw from above not just Bad Omens at the Octane stage, but motherfucking ICP in the Vortex stage, where backup dancers in clown attire splashed Faygo all over the crowd. The juggalo madness came right back at me like a fucking boomerang, I swear.

Finally, once performance is left. The headliner that everyone had anticipated. Korn performed at the Apex stage, and I was at the spot where crowdsurfing had occured. I smoked some weed once more with another dude who looked like a millenial vegan coffee shop barista and enjoyed the moment as a big ass beach ball was being tossed around towards the front row, a drone flew over the entire crowd, and Jonathan Davis's gang pulled off a spectacular show.

Man, this was an experience I will never fucking forget. I got to meet likeminded people and got to run wild and free. As a metalhead who was raised by metalhead parents, this event felt like home to me. No. It felt like heaven.