About the Festival



The D.O.D. Festival is Ireland’s biggest and longest running heavy metal festival. The festival takes place over two days in early July each year in the County Laois village of Ballylinan and hosts a wide variety of bands from throughout Ireland and the rest of the world.

Originally held as the Day of Darkness Metalfest on June 22nd 2002 and headlined by Primordial, the festival now attracts visitors and acts from all over the world. Among the acclaimed acts to have played the festival are Entombed, Candlemass, Destruction, Sabbat, Unleashed, Rotting Christ, Dismember, Watain and Nifelheim.

The Festival has two goals - to attract top class international metal acts to an Irish metal festival and to give Ireland’s many great indigenous metal acts the opportunity to showcase their material alongside their international peers.

Way of Darkness Festival - Germany
D.O.D.’s partner festival Way of Darkness (W.O.D.) is held annually during early October in Bamberg, Germany. Each year two bands from D.O.D. are chosen to play at Way of Darkness, giving them a unique opportunity to play to over 2000 German metal fans. Likewise two bands from W.O.D. come to play at D.O.D. each year.

Past D.O.D. Line-Ups

2008

Saturday Line-Up
Unleashed
Doomsword
Mourning Beloveth
Celtic Legacy
Thy Sinister Bloom
Chambercraft
Graveyard Dirt
Overoth
Darkest Era
Nephridium

Friday Line-Up
Watain
Nifelheim
Old Season
Stand Up Guy
Sirocco
Neocosmic
Victim X
Visceral Attack

2007

Saturday Line-Up
Entombed
Sabbat
Abaddon Incarnate
Cruachan
Conquest of Steel
The Prophecy
Spearhead
Hatred
Era Vulgaris

Friday Line-Up
Candlemass
Skyforger
Mael Mordha
Gorilla Monsoon
Putrefy
The Swarm
Warpath
Hallowed

2006

Saturday Line-Up
Destruction
Primordial
Morphosis
Hexxed
Mass Extinction
Aftermath
Primed
For Ruin
A Distant Sun
Nothing is Sacred

Friday Line-Up
Moonsorrow
Geasa
Sorrowfall
Ground of Ruin
Minds Astray

2005

Rotting Christ
Desaster
Mourning Beloveth
Scavenger
Waylander
Carnún Rising
Primal Dawn
devilmakesthree
Wreck of the Hesperus
Ground of Ruin

Eve of Darkness Warm-up Show
Steel Tormentor
Primed
Slave Zero
Skoll

2004

Dismember
Ancient Rites
Abaddon Incarnate
Mael Mórdha
Putrefy
The Swarm
Old Season
Sinister Demise
Sol Axis
Mabus
Demize
+ Special tribute to Bathory featuring members from Primordial, Sol Axis, Geasa, and Kingdom

2003

Mourning Beloveth
Mael Mórdha
Honey for Christ
Waylander
Die Laughing
Scavenger
Carnún Rising
Old Season
Inhumane
The Swarm

2002

Primordial
Mourning Beloveth
Primal Dawn
Geasa
Condemned
Bloodbox
Coldwar
Corrupted (IRL)
Slave Zero
The 8th Day
Die Laughing