Achtung, Jackson fans—Iron Maiden just took “Best Live Act” at the second annual Metal Hammer Awards at this year’s Wacken Open Air festival, Aug. 5-7 in Wacken, Germany.
The German edition of the famed metal mag chose its award winners by online vote, staff consensus and a panel of musicians. Other winners were Rammstein (Best Album, Liebe ist für alle da), Steel Panther (Best Debut, Feel the Steel), Blind Guardian (Best German Band), Motörhead (Best International Band), Slayer’s Kerry King (God of Riffs), Ronnie James Dio (Legend), Anvil and Doro (Maximum Metal), Behemoth (Metal Anthem, “Ov Fire and the Void”) and Eluveitie (Up and Coming).
Wacken Open Air is one of Germany’s biggest summer music festivals, held annually in the town of Wacken in Germany’s northernmost state, Schleswig-Holstein. It’s truly massive—more than 82,000 horn-throwing metal fans attended the 2010 festival.