'I performed with Motorhead and Saxon on the Monsters of Rock mainstage in the 1980s'

"At the time we didn't have huge festivals like we do now, Monsters of Rock changed the game completely"

A drummer from hard rock and heavy metal's golden age who performed at the inaugural Monsters of Rock festival (now Download Festival) has offered an insight to what it was like rubbing shoulders with some of the biggest names the industry had to offer. From volatile arguments with Lemmy Killminster to career advice from Led Zepplin's Jimmy Page, Saxon and Motorhead's Pete Gill has seen it all.

Hailing from Sheffield originally, the 72-year-old drummer formed part of the original line-up of Saxon in 1975, a pioneering Heavy Metal band which burst onto the scene in the late 1970s. Pete spent a few years at Saxon before parting ways with the group in 1981.

After his departure from the band, all it took was an arm around the shoulder from rock 'n' roll legend Jimmy Page, who convinced him to join Motorhead, whom Pete stayed with from 1984 until 1987. During this time, Pete played the mainstage at Monsters of Rock twice, both in its inaugural year (1980) and again with Motorhead in 1986.

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Saxon often performed with household names of the time throughout this period, with the band often supporting the likes of Rush, Judas Priest and Black Sabbath - to name a few. Pete, recalling the events from more than 40 years ago, says the festival was the "first of its kind" to hit the UK and admitted that bands of the time had "never seen anything like it."

"Monsters of Rock was completely different to anything at the time," said Pete, "We'd supported Judas Priest in the build-up. Our album [Wheels of Steel] had just reached fourth in the charts and their album [British Steel] had also gone in pretty high.

"The promoters knew the festival was going to be huge, but we didn't expect 100,000 people to turn up. It wasn't the kind of numbers that heavy metal and hard rock were accustomed to, we'd never seen anything like it.

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"It wasn't like it is today. We'd turn up the day before - of course, this was back when it was just one day rather than a whole weekend - and we'd get about 15 minutes to sound check, which was silly considering we had a 40-minute set to play the next day. We'd spend the night before in a hotel, either off the M1 or near the airport itself.

"On the day of the festival, it was quite phenomenal really, we'd get blue-lighted by police to Donington only an hour before the show - so if you were playing at 5pm the police would pick you up at 4pm. The show itself was wild, looking out at a sea of people and hearing the noise from the crowd was something else."

After playing at the 1980 festival, Pete returned to the main stage once again in 1986 with Motorhead. Despite being surrounded by rockers, best known at the time for their... well... rock and roll lifestyle, Pete says he was more into his fishing as opposed to the non-stop party life demonstrated by fellow bandmates, none more so than Mr Rock and Roll himself, Lemmy Killminster.

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Pete told how Lemmy's partying habits affected the band during Pete's three years behind the kit, and spoke of one night in particular where tempers boiled over following a show in Boston, US. Pete said: "Lemmy hadn't been to sleep for three days after we arrived in Boston, he wasn't the kind of guy to get a good night's sleep when he was jetlagged - he preferred to sample the atmosphere.

"We played a show and Lemmy was stumbling across the stage - he was in a right state. Somehow we managed to finish the show, but then it was time for an encore and Lemmy had other plans.

"We came off the stage and I went into the dressing room. Lemmy was sprawled out on the floor gasping and the encore had to be pulled. I was furious.

"I lost my rag completely. I remember grabbing a large jug of orange juice and pouring it over his head. I went absolutely ballistic and we had a proper bust-up right there in the changing room. Lemmy had this persona of being a hard-man rock and roller, he always had a cigarette in his mouth and was always watching old Hitler movies. We had many bust-ups over the years but I guess you could say this was a highlight moment of our relationship."

Pete went on to applaud the success of Download Festival in recent years, adding that it adapted well over time by introducing new acts and genres. This year's Download Festival will see Queens of the Stone Age, Fall Out Boy and Avenged Sevenfold take to the stage at Donnington Park, and will take place between Friday, June 14 and Sunday, June 16.

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