Bloodstock outlook to 2027 with Electric Callboy, Motionless In White and Mercyful Fate Leading First Wave

Bloodstock Open Air wasted little time looking beyond its 2026 edition. While this year’s festival was still underway at Catton Park, organisers revealed the first 27 bands for 2027, with Mercyful Fate, Electric Callboy and Motionless In White taking the three main-stage headline positions.

The announcement came directly from the Ronnie James Dio Stage following Municipal Waste’s set, continuing Bloodstock’s tradition of giving those already on site the first look at the following year.

What emerged is more than a handful of early names. A substantial part of the 2027 festival is already taking shape, running from established heavy metal and hardcore through melodic death metal, modern metalcore, doom and some significantly heavier territory.

Bloodstock returns to Catton Park in Derbyshire from 5 to 8 August 2027.

Three very different headliners

Mercyful Fate will headline Friday’s Ronnie James Dio Stage, returning after previously topping the Bloodstock bill in 2022.

Their appearance comes with another significant promise. King Diamond says the band expect to have their long-awaited new album out by the time they return to Catton Park.

Saturday represents a considerable change of direction.

Electric Callboy will make their first Bloodstock appearance and go straight into a headline position. The booking reflects how rapidly the German band’s place within European heavy music has changed, moving from metalcore and electronic crossover into arenas, major festival positions and their own Escalation Fest.

Bloodstock now puts them at the top of a festival traditionally associated with a considerably more conventional metal audience.

That makes their debut one of the more interesting bookings in the first announcement.

Motionless In White then close the festival on Sunday.

For the American band, it will be their first European festival headline performance and, according to Chris Motionless, their only UK show of 2027. Like Electric Callboy, their position demonstrates how far a generation of bands that emerged from the 2000s and early-2010s metalcore scene has moved up European festival bills.

Much more than the top line

Below the three headliners, Bloodstock has already booked several names particularly relevant to the current European heavy scene.

Swedish metalcore band Imminence are confirmed alongside Humanity’s Last Breath, while The Halo Effect bring a direct line back to Gothenburg melodic death metal.

The UK’s Sylosis return to Bloodstock 17 years after first appearing on the Sophie Lancaster Stage in 2010. This time they step onto the Ronnie James Dio Stage following a period of renewed growth and increasingly substantial European headline touring.

Then there is Acid Bath.

The reunited Louisiana band have become one of the more significant return stories in heavy music, making their Bloodstock booking considerably more than another legacy name added to the bill.

Elsewhere, the first wave includes DevilDriver, Green Lung, Wind Rose, HammerFall, Corrosion of Conformity, Hypocrisy, Decapitated, Witch Club Satan, Conan, Tortured Demon and Gutalax.

Bloodstock is also bringing the current Children of Bodom tribute incarnation to Catton Park to honour the legacy of Alexi Laiho.

Hardcore remains part of Bloodstock’s wider picture

The Sophie Lancaster Stage provides another side of the announcement.

Madball headline the stage on Thursday, putting New York hardcore into a prominent position before the main festival programme gets fully underway.

Gaerea take Friday’s headline slot, followed by Kanonenfieber on Saturday and Dethklok on Sunday.

Pig Destroyer, Fulci and Dutch band Dool have also been confirmed.

That spread is part of what has increasingly made Bloodstock relevant beyond traditional heavy metal. The festival can place Mercyful Fate and HammerFall alongside Madball, Imminence, Electric Callboy, Humanity’s Last Breath and Gaerea without pretending they belong to exactly the same scene.

They don’t.

They do, however, increasingly share audiences and festival spaces.

BLOODSTOCK 2027: FIRST WAVE

Ronnie James Dio Stage

Mercyful Fate · Electric Callboy · Motionless In White · Acid Bath · Green Lung · Children of Bodom · Imminence · DevilDriver · Wind Rose · HammerFall · Corrosion of Conformity · Sylosis · Hypocrisy · The Halo Effect · Decapitated · Witch Club Satan · Humanity’s Last Breath · Gutalax · Conan · Tortured Demon

Sophie Lancaster Stage

Madball · Gaerea · Kanonenfieber · Dethklok · Pig Destroyer · Fulci · Dool

Bloodstock could easily have waited until the dust settled on 2026 before beginning the next cycle.

Instead, it announced 27 bands in front of the people already standing at Catton Park.

The three headliners also tell an interesting story about where heavy music currently sits. Mercyful Fate represent one of metal’s foundational generations. Motionless In White have grown from the modern metalcore circuit into festival-headline territory. Electric Callboy have taken an even less conventional route to roughly the same destination.

Three different generations and approaches, all ending up at the top of the same stage.

Bloodstock 2027 already has a shape.