The 2006 Download Festival was held at Donington Park, England on the 9th, 10th, and 11th of June. Download 2006 boasted the largest selling acts out of all the UK music festivals that year (in terms of the combined total of every act).[citation needed] The three days comprising the headlining acts (Tool, Metallica and Guns N' Roses) have sales of approximately 200-250 million albums between them, more than the entire line up of 2006's V Festival.
2006 was the first time the festival was mirrored in the Republic of Ireland, as Download Festival Ireland.
One memorable moment of the festival was the announcement that Korn vocalist Jonathan Davis had been rushed to hospital. Similar to 2004's Metallica set, Munky, Fieldy and David Silveria arrived and explained to the fans why Jonathan couldn't make it and played with guest vocalists Corey Taylor from Slipknot, Dez Fafara from DevilDriver, Jesse Hasek from 10 Years, Benji Webbe from Skindred, M. Shadows from Avenged Sevenfold, and Matt Heafy from Trivium. Lyrics from from the song "Blind" were displayed on the screen because Matt Heafy could not remember all the words. Another talking point of the festival was Metallica playing the album Master of Puppets in its entirety in honour of its twentieth anniversary. Guns N' Roses also performed material from the long forthcoming Chinese Democracy album which was received quite well by the crowd.
