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Since 2022, Mystic Festival has been housed in the confines of Gdansk Shipyard, the assortment of warehouses, train tracks and gigantic cranes lending the festival a post-Apocalyptic feel. But next year Poland’s biggest metal festival is set to get even bigger, relocating to Polsat Plus Arena in Gdansk to increase capacity, making 2026 the fifth and final time we’ll grace the coolest festival site we’ve ever seen.
There’s no time for comisserating, however. Spread across four days, this year’s Mystic lineup is a typically diverse affair with everything from death metal to thrash, sludge, prog and beyond.
Wednesday [June 3]
The first big discovery of the festival comes from DOLA, homegrown post-black metallers with a touch of Opeth intricacy. Nimble guitars give way to explosive, sludgy breakouts that bring to mind UK underground heroes Conjurer.
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Next up are hotly tipped death metallers NECKBREAKKER. The DM wunderkinds supported Slayer last summer and chuck out nasty, hardcore-flavoured grooves like brutal candy. The stagecraft is a bit cliche bingo (“I want to see you make a circle!”, though the intro “We’re Neckbreakker and we’re here to break your neck” is pretty great) but their relative youth makes it forgivable and the songs are killer besides.
It’s not all death metal, mind. A.A. WILLIAMS is just a couple of days shy of releasing her spectacular third album Solstice, and her offering of yet more gorgeous, gothic-coded melody is a welcome change of pace for the day. Brooding and melancholic, the likes of Evaporate and Love And Pain have long established their captivating magic, and new songs Just A Shadow, Poison and Little By Little – making its live debut – happily maintain that same mystique.
ICE NINE KILLS might be the big headliner of the first night (and you can read our review here), but they aren’t the only band with a bit of stagecraft at Mystic Festival 2026.
Closing out Wednesday are German anti-war troupe KANONENFIEBER. We got a glimpse at their insane live shows in January on the 70000 Tons Of Metal cruise, but closing the Desert Stage they show what they’re capable of, their furious blackened death metal enhanced with blasts of pyro, billowing jets of gas and evocative WW1-era German soldier costumes.
Thursday [June 4]
You can always trust Jason Aalon Butler to bring a ruckus. LETLIVE. have barely played their first note when the singer heads out into the crowd, starting a moshpit with the (admittedly sparse, to start with at least) crowd. What ensues is one of the most electrifying performances of the weekend, a reminder of that band’s brilliance that ends with Butler clambering into the scaffolding and screaming blue murder.
By the time BLOODYWOOD play the space has filled considerably. India’s biggest metal sensation always prove well worth the hype, and – a bit of awkwardness aside when they stand around during Babymetal’s feature on Bekhauf as it plays over the PA – their set brings an infectious sense of energy that sees huge dust clouds kicked up in the pit.
ANTHRAX have perfected festival sets. Coming on to Among The Living, they just kick out the hits with such velocity and enthusiasm that you find yourself headbanging and singing along like you’ve been swept up in some great thrash tsunami. There’s only one variation in the set – new song For The Kids is kicked out to a politely indulgent crowd – but you just can’t argue with Got The Time, I Am The Law, Caught In A Mosh et al.
By the same token, CAVALERA doing Chaos A.D. feels like an obvious slam dunk. They might be a few decades older, but Max and Iggor are still the architects behind some of the most aggressive and brilliant tunes of the 90s and the fact the crowd can’t help but roar “fuck shit up!” (from GOAT-contender live album Under A Pale Grey Sky) as Refuse/Resist kicks off. What ensues is a reminder of just why the Cavaleras are considered metal royalty, pits breaking out throughout the crowd at such volume that nowhere is safe.
After a double thrashtravaganza, you’d hope MEGADETH would bring things home. Only, there’s something… off about their performance. Just two weeks after being delighted at their return to furious form in the US, the journey across the Atlantic apparently sapping their powers as their performance feels toothless even with anthems like Symphony Of Destruction, Holy Wars… The Punishment Due and Sweating Bullets.
Thankfully, BLOOD INCANTATION save the night. One of the beauty’s of Mystic is in just how much there is to do, and between death metal sets Thursday there’s showings of All Gates Open: In Search Of Absolute Elsewhere, the documentary about the recording of the record which took Metal Hammer’s album of the year in 2024. Hearing Absolute Elsewhere in full at Mystic just underscores how boundary-pushing and brilliant Blood Incantation are, a singular force who are propelling extreme metal in exciting new directions.
Friday [June 5]
If Thursday belonged to thrash, Friday is all about sludge and stoner metal. We’d probably be much happier watching EYEHATEGOD under a blazing sun, but then ‘happy’ rather defeats the point. The NOLA sludge legends burn through 1993’s Take As Needed For Pain in full with a venomous vitriol that perfectly suits the downpours overhead, those low’n’slow rhythms so thick and harsh they’re practically tar in your ears.
“I thought they brought the whole neighbourhood today!” CORROSION OF CONFORMITY‘s Pepper Keenan isn’t wrong as he points out the sheer prevalance of NOLA bands on Friday’s line-up, set to take double-duty with a set from Down later. But first, COC are here to reminder everyone that they’ve got a new album, and it kicks ass. New tunes Asleep On The Killing Floor, Baad Man and Gimme Some Moore sound killer, and fit in perfectly alongside the southern-fried crossover of Vote With A Bullet and Clean My Wounds.
COC aren’t the only band feeling community spirit, however. Barely a month before they were due to play Mystic, BENEDICTION put out a statement that vocalist Dave Ingram had stepped away from the band. Rather than cancel, they drafted in former vocalist Dave Hunt, these days best known for his work in Anaal Nathrakh. Between DM blasts, Hunt enthuses about how touched he is that the crowd have turned up and been so excitable for the performance, undercutting the gruesomeness somewhat but giving us a lot of warm, fuzzy feelings.
It might be BLACK LABEL SOCIETY‘s long-overdue shot at headlining a festival, but Zakk Wylde happily shares the spotlight. Tributes to the Abbott Brothers and Ozzy Osbourne are plentiful throughout the group’s performance, from the use of a Led Zep/Sabbath mash-up as their intro tape to big-screen tributes to the Abbotts (In This River) and Ozzy (Ozzy’s Song) in the set that results in thousands of voices chanting “Ozzy! Ozzy! Ozzy!” The No More Tears cover is a nice touch too.
How do you end a wet and riffy day? With some techno-enhanced Vikings of course! EIHWAR sit somewhere between Perturbator and Heilung, taking the spiritualistic folk of the latter and the danceable rhythms of the former to make something totally unique and fascinating. Naturally, it’s a delight.
Saturday [June 6]
There’s some residual stoner in the air of Mystic come Saturday. ACID KING reopen a vortex to Sabbathdom in a trippy, fuzzy set that sees them play through 1999’s Busse Woods, the returning sunshine doing nothing to diminish the pervasive air of doom.
In a country with as strong ties to Catholicism as Poland, it probably shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise when we hear from a local that members of the church have been quietly protesting the gig all weekend. They’re probably best steering clear of HULDER. The black metal project might hail from the US but their name – taken from a Scandinavian forest creature – is a big hint that the group take their cues from Scandinavian black metal, inverted crosses flashing overhead as the group unleash wintry tones cut with folky melodies.
From one black metal maverick to another, GAAHLS WYRD has become a springboard for the multifaceted musical talents of its titular frontman. Corpsepainted and walking with an air of spacial dominion, Gaahl is utterly captivating to behold, making great use of the indoor space in the Sabbath Stage as his voice booms and he intones like he’s summoning some eldritch being from beyond the veil.
How do you follow that? Well, with one of goth metal’s most formative records played in full, of course. THE GATHERING are celebrating 31 years of Mandylion by playing a set heavily dominated by that record. The second Fear The Sea hits, the band’s influence on decades of goth metal is undeniable, traces of their DNA popping up everywhere from Lacuna Coil to Within Temptation. It’s a fittingly grand and melancholia-steeped end to another fantastic year at Mystic, bidding farewell to the Gdansk Shipyard as the festival continues to grow and evolve. Wherever it goes next, hopefully we’ll see you there!
Blind Bird tickets for Mystic Festival 2027 are on-sale now.
