Download Festival headliners Metallica make donation to Leicester homeless charity

Download Festival double headliners Metallica have donated £40,000 to a homeless charity based in nearby Leicester.

Immediately after Metallica’s phenomenal Apex Stage set on Thursday night (8th June), the band’s non-profit organisation the All Within My Hands Foundation announced that they had made a generous grant to Help the Homeless Leicester.

They tweeted: “After an awesome first night of @Metallica's #M72 World Tour at @DownloadFest, we were proud to grant £40,000 to @homelessleics.”

Help the Homeless founder, Arif Voraji said: "We've seen a massive drop in donations from the public and donations from corporations, but at the same time, we've seen an increase in demand.

"We've seen a 100 per cent increase in demand for the food bank and our other food services and it's not just individuals coming to us, it's families too."

Explaining that Help the Homeless has had to "strip back" some of its services in recent months, Voraji added: “This money will help us to keep doing what we're doing and help not only homeless people but others who are struggling, people in recovery, people who have just moved into new accommodation.

"But it will also help us with the day-to-day costs of running the charity and just keep the lights on.”

You can see photos of Metallica’s set plus all the action from Day One at Download Festival 2023 below featuring Alter Bridge, Halestorm, Skindred and many more.

Metallica headline Download Festival again tonight (Saturday 10th June) where they will perform a completely different setlist.

Metallica previously donated £40,000 to a Manchester based homeless charity before their Etihad Stadium show in 2019, and £24,000 to two London charities – City Harvest London and Magic Breakfast – ahead of their Twickenham Stadium gig.

The ever-charitable Metallica always donate to local aid agencies on pit stops on their tour dates and back in June 2018 they gave their entire £85,000 Polar Music Prize money to three separate Swedish charities.

When wildfires were ravaging California in November 2018, Metallica pledged $100,000 to wildfire relief efforts through their All Within My Hands Foundation.

In February 2023, Metallica donated over £200,000 to Turkey-Syria earthquake relief effort.

Each December, Metallica hold their annual Helping Hands Concert in California with proceeds going to All Within My Hands.

Metallica and more rock Thursday at Download Festival 2023:

PHOTO GALLERY: Friday at Download Festival 2023

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• Metallica
• Download Festival