HISTORY
Ruisrock is a rock festival held annually on the island of Ruissalo in Turku, Finland. Ruisrock, founded in 1970, is the second oldest rock festival in Europe and the oldest in Finland. Ruisrock has always featured some big stars except in the turn of 2000's, when in the backwash of slump there were some economy issues. Nowadays the festival is again booming, and it's about to become a four-day festival in the next few years. The festival area is also meant to enlarge (Ruisrock holds now 5 stages).
The festival area, lying in the island of Ruissalo of Turku within the Baltic Sea, is said to be one of the most beautiful in the Europe, and year by year it draws many foreign visitors. The area is divided into two sections, Niittyalue (meadow section) and Ranta-alue (beach section), and somehow tight gap combines the sections into one big area.
In 2005, when German Industrial metal band Rammstein performed at the festival, Ruisrock had a total crowd of 71,000, and in the recent years there has always been approx. 70,000 visitors in total. However the record was set in 1971, when there were about 100,000 visitors to watch e.g. Canned Heat.
In Finnish wikipedia, there's a list of all the bands that have been performing in Ruisrock festival.
The 2009 edition of the festival saw it "modern days" crowd record, when during 3 days there were totally 92,000 visitors. In 2009 the performers included eg. Slipknot, Disturbed, Faith No More, Mew, In Flames, Volbeat, Glasvegas, The Sounds and some legendary domestic artists, for example Children of Bodom, Eppu Normaali, Tehosekoitin and the very last gig of The Crash.
In 2010 the festival will be celebrating the 40-year anniversary!
Ruisrock Line Up - 2011
The Prodigy (UK), The National (USA), Paramore (USA), Hurts (UK), Primus (USA), Carpark North (DEN), Nekromantix (DEN/USA), Manu Chao La Ventura (FRA), Fleet Foxes (USA), Robyn (SWE), Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan (UK/USA), Graveyard (SWE), Bullet For My Valentine (UK), Elbow (UK), Anna Calvi (UK), Bring Me The Horizon (UK), bob hund (SWE), Sabaton (SWE), Circle, CMX, Kotiteollisuus, Pariisin Kevät, Apulanta, Happoradio, Jare & VilleGalle, Jukka Poika & Sound Explosion Band, Pertti Kurikan Nimipäivät, PMMP, Raappana & Sound Explosion Band, Rubik, Scandinavian Music Group, Stam1na, Sweatmaster, Uusi Fantasia, Von Hertzen Brothers, Amorphis, Jätkäjätkät, Jenni Vartiainen, Kaija Koo, Magenta Skycode, Michael Monroe, Paleface, The Capital Beat, The Freza