With Download Festival almost upon us, the Mail Remembers has taken a look back at Castle Donington's festival of the 1980s – Monsters of Rock.

Were you part of the 40,000 strong crowd in August 1982 when rock stalwarts Status Quo headlined the show?

Quo were already in their 20th year when they headlined at Castle Donington venue with a performance worth waiting for.

The rockers were 30 minutes late when they arrived on stage and carried with them ghosts of a disastrous festival concert at Reading in 1979.

But fans need not have worried as the group blasted through a set list of more than two and a half hours.

Fans had been complaining that the £11 on the gate ticket price was excessive and many had voted with their feet and abandoned the festival leaving plenty of prime viewing spots for the tens of thousands which did attend.

Monsters of Rock Festival back in 1982. Were you there?

Before Quo, the Monsters of Rock festival was opened by Canadian Group Anvil who according to the Burton Mail's on-site reviewer Mark Salter, performed a solid heavy metal set.

Second on the billing was Uriah Heep followed by the space-age sounds of Hawkwind. Unfortunately, Hawkwind managed to mess up their track Silver Machine which was the one which most fans recognised.

Saving the evening from an early death was Barnsley band Saxon followed by Gillan. But it was Status Quo, 'as laid-back and easy as ever' which gripped the crowd and ensured many remembered Monsters of Rock 1982 as one of the greatest.

The Monsters of Rock Festival grew over the years but as rock music fell out of favour, organisers found it increasingly difficult to attract headline acts. The last Monsters of Rock gig at Donington was in 1996. The event has since been replaced by the Download Festival.