![]() ![]() “But now we consider headbangers big teddy bears.” “It was sometimes difficult for the people of Clisson – so many people dressed in black,” says Marc-Antoine Etourneau, director at Clisson’s E Leclerc supermarket, referring to the thousands of metalheads that descended on the town the first year. Despite initial apprehension, he says the town is mostly on board with the festival, and it has placed Clisson on the global map. Houses are rented out and local businesses capitalise on the metal euro: Benoît Payen of the local mayoral office says the festival brings in an estimated €20m to the local economy each year. Signs around the town proclaim it Rock City meanwhile the Hellfest site itself has been turned into a year-round public park and visitor attraction. As well as being taken home by the 80 different nationalities that attend the festival, bottles of Hellfest muscadet are also left in artist dressing rooms.įounded in 2006, Hellfest has grown into a worldwide metal phenomenon and taken Clisson, a town of roughly 8,000, with it. Paquereau says the freshness of muscadet, a dry white wine, lends itself to the June heat, with on-site temperatures topping 30 degrees, and is best enjoyed with oysters – a pairing served in premium hospitality areas. French people know about muscadet but people from England and Germany see the vines around but don’t know what they are for.” “At first we were really surprised lots of people drink beer but they enjoy tasting other things like the wine of the region. And in the wine bar, with between 15 and 30 people serving wine, we sell about 25,000 litres.” Hellfest’s wine accounts for around 5% of the winery’s overall production, and the promotion is priceless. “We sell about 6,000 bottles every year during the weekend. “We make a special festival cruet which is sold in bottles with a special label,” he says. As Rancid play to a raucous crowd at the Warzone stage, local winemaker Sylvain Paquereau of Domaine de l’Epinay pours wine at the festival’s dedicated muscadet bar. The festival campsite is surrounded by vineyards and muscadet is the local speciality. ![]()
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