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Rock Meets Country 2025 (Day 1, 26th September 2025)

Florian Buechtingby Florian Buechting

Two weeks after I featured the Tennis Davis Cup tie in Biel, it was time to travel to Switzerland again. From 26th to 28th September 2025, the small town of Sempach hosted the first edition of the Rock Meets Country festival. As the name already suggests, the festival was set up in a way that it combines different genres of music. Each day was branded under a different slogan and corresponding music acts. The festival weekend started on Friday with the Legends of Rock

This posting comes with 835 major size pictures as part of the concert gallery.

 

Seepark Halle Sempach – The Venue

Sempach is a 4,000 people small Swiss town in the canton of Lucerne. It is located right at Lake Sempach. The Seepark Halle, is a typical one-level venue. There is also a upper gallery, which was used as VIP area. I found different capacities, but I would assume that it held about 1,000 people. Day 1 of the Rock Meets Country 2025 was sold out. There was limited public parking close to the venue (5 CHF / 24hrs). The organizers had established a visitors parking in the outskirts of Sempach, coming with a bus shuttle (roughly 10 CHF / 3 days with shuttle). However, also due to the camera equipment and the convenience of being able to relax in the rental car (the organizers did not offer a press room), I arrived early and went for one of the public spaces.

 

Rock Meets Country 2025, Day 1 – Schedule & Main Artists

With doors opening at 17:00, the festival was scheduled to open just 15 minutes later. The band to open the weekend was the Swiss band Risen, which had been explicitly mentioned in my interview about the festival. In contrast to the rather young act, the main acts of the day were true rock music legends. Ronnie Romero, the singer of the band Rainbow, was scheduled to be the last act of the day (23:40). Before him, they were two really classic and long-running acts as well, The Animals and Canned Heat. I was also looking forward to Swiss Marc Amacher, who was also scheduled to be on stage on Sunday.

 

Main Stage Lineup
17:15 Risen Swiss rock / hard rock band
18:00 Unexpected Fall Post-grunge and alternative rock band from Switzerland
18:50 Jack Slamer Swiss rock band from Winterthur
19:40 Jody Swiss Industrial metal act
20:50 The Animals British blues / rock band around Eric Burdon.
22:10 Canned Heat Legendary US blues rock band who is active since the 1960’s
23:40 Ronnie Romero Singer of the British hard rock band Rainbow

 

 

Rock Meets Country 2025, Day 1 – The Shows

When doors opened at 17:00, there were several obvious issues in the venue, like a europalet in front of the bar. However, the attendance started to grow slowly and the first band. Risen just managed to open the festival in time and they did a pleasing performance. However, they closed at 17:45 and the organizers allowed them to play an encore. This finally lead to a 15 minute delay for Unexpected Fall, who felt to attract more people with their powerful – and louder – performance. The delay could not be recovered during the other sets and even increased slightly. Jack Slamer was the first highlight of the first festival day. As the delay had accumulated already significantly, the organizers were strict about an encore this time.

 

Then, it was time for Jody. Her rocking set illustrated while the Lucerne lady does have quite some success abroad. Nonetheless, The Animals were the first who truly deserved the Legends of Rock label. It was especially touching to see their original drummer John Steel on stage in Sempach. Somehow the same applied for the act thereafter, Canned Heat. They had brought quite a fan base to the venue, so that the Seepark Halle was packed now. Again, it was the drummer, Adolfo Fito de la Parra, who is the only remaining (somehow) original member of the band. But their classics still live on. I decided to skip Ronnie Romero and go back to the hotel. The delays suggested that his set would not start before midnight and I felt strong fatigue and the burden of masses of pictures.

 

Side Stage

The Lakeview Stage was free and could also be attended without a ticket. The opening act there was Johnny Trouble, who did a good warm-up for the people. Much more than a warm-up was the energetic set by domestic Marc Amacher, who did an amazing blues-rock set with his band – and was scheduled to come back to main stage on final day.

 

Rock Meets Country 2025, Day 1 – The Gallery

Here are 835 major size pictures of the show. They are located in the concert gallery:

 

 

Flyctory.com Country Music Top Pick! Reviews in 2025

Here are all 2025-published Media reviews about Country Music with a Top Pick! rating:

 

Floorball and Switzerland

Here are all my postings related to floorball and Switzerland:

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