Heavy music fans in Australia must have been naughty all year, because this Christmas Santa dropped a big fat lump of coal in their stocking as Soundwave went under. One of Australia’s biggest festivals had gone belly up after over a decade of bringing bands to our shores, from Iron Maiden to Green Day.

Not long after the news there were rumblings of a replacement festival. One of the bands from Soundwave 2016 was going to organise its own event from the wreckage. Devil You Know drummer John Sankey stepped forward, and Legion Music Fest was born.

EXCLUSIVE: Read our interview with Legion Fest founder John Sankey

Legion Music Fest is pencilled in for March/April and is scheduled to hit all the major cities (yes, Perth too). The organisers have been announcing their lineup as they go, and have confirmed international acts such as DevilDriver, Front Line Assembly, and Sankey’s own band Devil You Know. They’ve also added an Australian stage at the request of fans, which currently features acts such as Dream On Dreamer, 28 Days and Caligula’s Horse. There are still approximately 15 acts to be announced.

Things seemed to be going great for the new festival, but the first bump in the road came at the launch of its Pozible page. Legion Fest aims to be the first festival to be crowdfunded by the fans, and if it succeeds, will smash crowdfunding records in Australia.

When the Pozible campaign was launched, it was revealed that Legion needed to crowdfund $3.275 million dollars in under a month to run the festival.

Legion Fest’s organisers are giving it their all with the odds up against them. Planning an entire music festival weeks out from the scheduled dates is a mission that not even the most accomplished festival promoters would attempt. Soundwave had the entire year to craft its lineup, and as Sankey put it himself, “time is so limited, we don’t have the luxury of picking and choosing”.

This is what will sadly also be Legion’sdownfall. Legion’s short timeframe has left organisers with slim pickings for the lineup, plans that needed to be made and changed on the go, and a short time to crowdfund a large amount of money. Time was against them at the start, but they tried.

In the coming weeks we will see disgruntled fans express their anger online, feeling the same betrayal that Soundwave left them with only a few weeks ago. But Legion is a concept that needs your support, not your anger.

The Pozible guidelines means that no punter will be left out of pocket, and Legion never promised to be Soundwave 2.0 – it just tried to make sure that heavy music fans in Australia didn’t have to go without.

There is no eccentric billionaire with a deep desire to reform Rage Against The Machine lurking in the shadows, so if Soundwave was your yearly pilgrimage, then you need to give Legion a second chance. Look at what Legion has done in a matter of weeks and ask yourself what it is capable of with a calendar year.

Legion wants to be a festival that listens to the fans, and the fans need to trust Legion in return.

Legion Fest Lineup:

Devildriver

Devil You Know

Darkest Hour

Front Line Assembly

Battlecross

Dream On, Dreamer

Aversions Crown

28 Days

Caligula’s Horse

Darkc3ll

Rick Dangerous & The Silkie Bantams

MofoIsDead (Brisbane Only)

My Secret Circus (Melbourne Only)

Horrorwood Mannequins (Sydney Only)

Legion Fest Dates:

Melbourne– Saturday March 26

Sydney – Sunday March 27

Brisbane – Monday March 28

Adelaide – Friday April 1

Perth – Saturday April 2

To pledge to Legion Music Fest, visit its Pozible page.

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