“Bloodstock has always been a special place for Motörhead and for Lemmy.” Lemmy Kilmister’s ashes to be displayed annually at Bloodstock festival

Lemmy Kilmister onstage in 1982
(Image credit: Steve Rapport/Getty Images)

Derbyshire metal festival Bloodstock Open Air has announced that it will display a monument dedicated to late Motörhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister every year, which will include some of the musician’s ashes.

The “Lemmy Forever” memorial will debut at the festival’s 2024 incarnation this August, which will be headlined by Opeth, Architects and Amon Amarth.

The installation will be viewable in the Catton Park weekender’s “RAM Gallery”, and will include a bust of Lemmy as well as an urn containing some of his remains.

When not on site at Bloodstock, the memorial and the ashes will live at the Rock City venue in nearby Nottingham.

Motörhead’s manager, Todd Singerman, comments on the news: “Bloodstock has always been a special place for Motörhead and for Lemmy. The people and the energy matched Lemmy’s values perfectly.

“Alan [Hungerford, festival organiser] and Vicky [Hungerford, owner, director and band booker] were also great friends, and basically family of Lemmy, as he was the reason that they originally got together.

“This is definitely a fitting honour in the continuing series of enshrinements of Lemmy’s ashes in his most loved places.”

Lemmy’s ashes have also been scattered at the German metal festival Wacken Open Air. Singerman commented last year: “Wacken was one of Lemmy’s dearest homes and we’re delighted he has a place here forever.

“He was a man of the people, and as such, he ‘lived’ in many places worldwide. It’s our aim to allow him to rest permanently in all his ‘homes’ globally and allow his fans worldwide to have a place close to them where they can both pay respects and celebrate his enormous continuing legacy and influence.”

Motörhead tour manager Eddie Rocha and production assistant Emma Cederblad both have tattoos that contain some of the bassist/vocalist’s ashes, and more of his ashes were sent to friends in bullets with Lemmy’s name on them.

Lemmy died on December 28, 2015, four days after his 70th birthday and two after he was diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Matt Mills
Contributing Editor, Metal Hammer

Louder’s resident Gojira obsessive was still at uni when he joined the team in 2017. Since then, Matt’s become a regular in Prog and Metal Hammer, at his happiest when interviewing the most forward-thinking artists heavy music can muster. He’s got bylines in The Guardian, The Telegraph, NME, Guitar and many others, too. When he’s not writing, you’ll probably find him skydiving, scuba diving or coasteering.