Had a bit of a mad weekend - a good party in a crap club in Mayfair on Friday night, and a great house party on Saturday night. Plus some infuriating computer issues.
Anyway, I’m in a mad rush to get ready for Glastonbury, but before setting off I thought I’d add some details and pics from last year’s festival. I actually wrote this a few days after returning from Glastonbury last June - primarily to serve as a kind of aide-mémoire for me, so probably only of interest to a very small number of people - but for some reason never got round to posting it. If you’re interested, here’s Glastonbury 2007 - the gory details.
Okay, I’m officially excited about Glastonbury now. This time next week I’ll bouncing around to some great music in a muddy field in Somerset. It may not have as many good ‘big names’ as Bestival this year, but I think the 2008 Glastonbury lineup is actually really strong; if anything, I think I’m going to have more difficult choices to make than last year.
Details of Shangri La are out now too, and it’s looking much more fun than Lost Vagueness last year, and if Trash City is half as good as it was last year, it’ll be fantastic.
So, who to see? I’ve formulated a bit of a list, but haven’t checked times and days for clashes yet. Plus of course it never goes according to plan, so I’ll probably end up catching one or two of these acts, find someone brilliant that I’ve never heard of, and spend the rest of the time primal dancing around a fire in the Green Fields. Right, in no particular order… (more…)
Si and I had planned to set off first thing Wednesday morning, but as a friend was having a farewell party on Tuesday night before moving back to Norway, we were up parting until 3am. As a result we didn’t arrive at the festival until after lunch.
Simon had the idea of transporting our heavy gear from the car in a wheelie bin. I was a little sceptical, but it turned out to be a stroke of genius (coping admirably with the mud on Monday), not to mention making for a good talking point as we passed people on the way to Park Home Ground.
Unfortunately our old festival tent was nibbled by rats, so this year we splashed out on a swanky four-man job. It proved to be a little tricky to put up, due to both the high winds and the fact that it had an unusual way of securing the poles and illustration-free instructions. Just as were were about to try a spot of involuntary paragliding, our neighbours came and helped us out, basically putting the tent together as we held on to it. Kudos to Gary and Emma from Manchester.
Once unpacked, Simon and I settled down to enjoy somme G&Ts in the late afternoon sun, before heading off for a look around (and to get some essentials - how could be both forget to pack towels?). After exploring some of this year’s new areas, and some old haunts, we staggered back to Campo Relaxo at midnight, and stayed up drinking wine with Gary and Emma until about one.
Thursday
I awoke at 6am on Thursday morning with a feeling that something wasn’t quite right. Sure enough, after a spot of still-drunk flapping around, I realised that some thieving scumbag had come into the tent whilst we were asleep, unzipped my ‘bedroom’, leant over me and rummaged through my stuff. Normally I tend to keep my valuables in the bottom of the sleeping bag, but that night I’d left my stuff under a pile of clothes by my head. Schoolboy error. On the bright side, for some reason Scumbag didn’t take my camera, and thankfully didn’t take Si’s money. Let’s hope Scumbag spent my £280 wisely, although I suspect it just went towards some Burberry clothes.
So, not quite the perfect start to my first full day at Glastonbury - phoning a call centre in India at 6.30am to cancel my card, then the long trek across the site to report the theft to lost property and the (friendly) cops, and a soaking from the first downpour of the festival on the way back.
When I got back to Campo Relaxo I had a chat with some of our other neighbours who were emerging from their tents; amusingly, they asked if I’d heard ‘that guy snoring last night’. I felt obliged to let them know that I had, and that the culprit was my mate Simon. Later Si told me that I’d also been snoring like a bastard, so we concluded the reason our tent was targetted by Scumbag was that he must have heard us both snoring away and figured we were out for the count. Which is quite funny really.
Anyway, I’d been looking forward to Glasto for two years, and there was no way I was going to let Thieving Scumbag spoil it; I felt much better after brunch in the Green fields.
The rest of the afternoon was spent mooching around, meeting a few people, watching a band (no idea who) in the Leftfield stage as we sheltered from a downpour, and searching for insoles for Troy’s army boots (without any luck, but in the true Rat Mears spirit, he fashioned some insoles out of a cheap foam mat). I also had a bit of a chat with the guys at the Sea Cow stall - the fish’n'chip shop about a hundred metres from where I live - who were at Glasto for the first time.
Tracker managed to blag his way in to the festival, and rocked up to our tent that evening, along with the roughest cider known to man. The rest of the evening’s a bit of a blur… We went to Lost Vagueness… then ended up cutting some rug till the early hours in Slippery Dick’s Love Shack. Vaguely remember striking up a conversation with a couple after getting split up from everyone, and watching dawn rise at the stone circle in the pouring rain.
Friday
I didn’t make it down in time for Reverend & The Makers, but listened to them from Campo Relaxo and they sounded good.
Tracker, Troy and I only mananged to get down to the Other Stage on Friday lunchtime in time to watch Modest Mouse. Now I really like Modest Mouse, and they were good, but I’m not sure how engaging they’d be live without Johnny Marr.
After Modest Mouse we took shelter from the next downpour in the Saloon, then met up with Adam and Frances. Caught a little bit of Amy Winehouse on the Pyramid; pretty impressive, but can’t help but think that he performance might be better if she’d had an earlier slot, if you know what I mean.
Tracker, Troy and and I - fairly pissed by now - wandered up to The Park for Chas ‘n’ Dave. We got there early and watched Tigerstyle, a Sikh/Bhangra act on the BBC Introducing… stage. Very enjoyable, and got us ’screwing in a lighbulb’ on and off all weekend.
The sun came out just as Chas ‘n’ Dave appeared on the Park stage, for one of the highlights of the festival. There was a big crowd, and a great atmosphere, with everyone singing along, waving their arms like mentalists and doing the rabbit thing (at one point a guy in a rabbit costume ran across the stage). Si’s got a great video on Facebook of Tracker and me during Ain’t No Pleasing You. Utterly fantastic. Afterwards we all agreed that nothing was going to top Chas ‘n’ Dave, and I think we were right.
Next we went over to watch the Fratellis - not a band I’d any interest in seeing, but capturing ‘track four’ on video was of profound importance to Tracker. The consensus of opinion seems to be that the Fratellis were pretty crap, but we were down the front, completely out of it, and had a great time (yes, another one captured on video).
Clash No. 2: Arcade Fire vs The Cat Empire - Winner: Arcade Fire
Would have liked to have seen the Cat Empire (Tracker did, and said they were really good), but in the end I’m really glad I watched Arcade Fire, as they were fantastic. Wish I could say the same thing about the hog roast we had afterwards.
Clash No. 3: Bjork vs Arctic Monkeys - Winner: The Waterboys
I fancied watching Bjork, but as no one else was bothered, I thought go with the flow; however, rather than see the Arctic Monkeys (apparently they were a bit dull), we all agreed on the unexpected compromise of the Waterboys on the Avalon stage. Troy and I managed to catch a bit of Bjork, and from what we saw it looked like a brilliant performance.
Now I haven’t seen the Waterboys for years, and I knew they’d be good, but I really didn’t expect them to be quite so amazing. I can honestly say it was one of the best sets I’ve heard from any band; superbly talented musicians putting on an incredibly tight performance. Thoroughly enjoyable. We glooped back to Campo Relaxo rather gob-smacked by it.
Saturday
We didn’t exactly hit the ground running on Saturday, thanks to the dodgy hog roast, but took some time to struggle through the mud around the Tipi, Avalon and Cabaret fields. We met up with a few people for a spot of binge cider drinking, before heading off to the Other stage for CSS.
CSS were as good as I’d hoped, colourful, full of energy and great fun. Definitely want to see them in a smaller venue though. As luck would have it, we bumped into Carla and Ollie during the CSS set, which was cool.
I was quite looking forward to seeing Klaxons, as they’re meant to put on a good show, so we waited around for them after CSS. Perhaps we’d have been better off seeing them in the more intimate Dance tent rather than the Other Stage, but for me they put on the most disappointing performance of the festival. They sounded really unfocussed and pretty shambolic.
Then, after watching some cabaret in the Pussy Parlure, we managed to grab a seat on some freshly delivered bales of hay, where we sat drinking wine and people-watching for a bit (and got talking to some stereotypical Dutch people).
After a little R&R back at Campo Relaxo (completely forgetting about Africa Express) we wandered up to the Stone Circle, then back down to the Small World Stage, where we chilled out watching a band called Laxxula from Cyprus.
Clash No. 4: Editors vs Pie Minister - Winner: John Fogerty
I quite fancied seeing Editors, but we needed food, and Pie Minister sounded just the ticket. However, as we arrived at the Jazzworld stage, what should we hear but ‘Dude, dude, dude, looking out my backdoor’… we’d stumbled across John Fogerty. All thoughts of food vanished and we ended up knocking back Brother’s pear cider as we watched Fogerty play a blinding set of Creedence songs.
Clash No. 5: Iggy & The Stooges vs Getting into LV early for Madness- Winner: Madness
I’m pretty gutted about missing Iggy & The Stooges, as by all accounts they were awesome. Still, knowing how rammed Lost Vagueness was going to get for Madness’s ’secret’ gig after the main stages finished, we felt we had to get in early, even though it meant missing Mr Pop.
We’d been hoping to meet up with Matt Pritchard (of Dirty Sanchez fame) and bumped into him in Lost Vaguess where he was, er, having fun with a couple of mates, and he introduced us to some actor from Shameless (name-dropping only really works if you remember the person’s name).
Fortunately, Madness were absolutely fantastic, and we had a great dance-and-sing-along to them. At one point I started a chant, which the crowd joined in with; I was so chuffed - I’d never started a chant before. And to top it off, my chant was mentioned in Q magazine’s review of the festival the following week! It’s the little things, it really is….
We stayed in Lost Vagueness after Madness had finished, and got chatting to a friendly guy called Dave. The three of us watched The Beat on the Strummerville Stage at about 1.30am, before the guy’s fincee turned up. The four of us had some tea and several shorts, at which point my memory gets a little hazy. I think we spent the rest of the night dancing to 80s music in Lost Vagueness with Dave, Katie and their mates.
Thanks to the EXIF data on a photo I know Si and I headed back to camp at about 5 in the morning. I do remember we were given free pizza for breakfast at a cafe in the Green Fields en route, which was nice.
Sunday
We didn’t exactly hit the ground running on Sunday morning, funnily enough. After a bit of a saunter around the Circus Field, Tracker, Si and I then met up with Adam and a few of the others, before watching Billy Bragg in on the Avalon Stage.
We missed Dame Shirley, but struggled through the gloopy mud to see the Manic Street Preachers on the Pyramid Stage a little later. I find the Manics a little too AOR for my taste, but one has to be sociable, and at least they had Nina Whatshername from the Cardigans performing too.
We were really flagging by now, but thankfully we caught The Go! Team on the Other Stage, and their energetic performance was a real tonic. After the Go! Team and a quick pit stop at Campo Relaxo, Si and I returned to the Jazzworld Stage, determined to make it to Pie Minister before the end of the festival. In his excitement at finally getting one of their pies, Simon told the person serving at Pie Minister to keep the change. Unfortunately, what he thought was a fiver was in fact a £10 note, so they ended up receiving a £6 tip. And even more unfortunately it was my money. “I thought they looked a bit surprised!” he said. Still, they are the best pies in the world.
Expensive pies out of the way, we went to take in a bit of comedy before watching our mate’s old band Railroad Bill. They’re a skiffle band, and always great fun live; this was their 12th time playing over the weekend, and there was much spraying of throats during their performance. Most of the small but appreciative audience was dancing, and our noisy support earned us a name-check.
After Railroad Bill, we braved the torrential rain for our first night time visit to Trash City, and soon realised that leaving it till Sunday night had been a mistake. Trash City was fantastic, and in my humble opinion far superior to Lost Vagueness.
By pure chance we arrived just in time to see Ebony Bones perform an absolutely blinding set - a riot of colour, sound and energy.
We then struggled through the mud to what turned out to be the 1970s New York gay disco - moustaches supplied on the way in - which was a lot of fun.
Things went a bit pear shaped at some point in the early hours of Monday, as we got split up. I found myself back in Lost Vagueness and vaguely remember watching an Indian brass band, before throwing shapes in the Chapel. It’s pretty much just a blur to be honest.
And that was it - the three of us packed up at lunchtime on Monday and, thanks to finding a short cut across a field, managed get out of the car park and onto the road in less than an hour. The “I don’t think I can do that again” sentiments lasted about a day, but the thought of missing out on a sunny Glastonbury is just too horrible. There can’t be a mud bath again next year, can there?
I’ve got time to write a little something before getting into my New Years Eve glad rags. Firstly, I want to thank everyone who’s continued visiting despite the updates being few and far between, especially those who’ve taken the time to post comments. Normally I consider it only polite to respond to comments, but due to the amount of work I’ve had on these last six months, I’ve not always managed to do so (I see a new year’s resolution forming here…). So a belated apology for any unitentional rudeness.
In particular I want to thank Rachel from North London for taking the trouble to check her referrers and post a thank you for linking to her site back in November. If you’re not familiar with Rachel’s blog, I highly recommend checking it out; in it Rachel writes, among other things, about her experiences as a survivor of the July 7th bombings, and shares her thoughts on the government’s anti-terror legislation. Articulate, intelligent, funny and moving — definitely my blog of the year.
I also want to thank ‘Duff’ Gallagher, keyboard player with the Flaming Doo Dits for his comment on my Glastonbury post. Glastonbury was definitely the highlight of my year, and watching Lucifire and the Flaming Doo Dits’s zombie pirate swing in the Chapel of Love & Loathing was the high point of Glastonbury. (You can listen to some sample Flaming Doo Dits tracks here).
Right, time to get ready to party like it’s 1999. Chin chin!
OK, before I go any further, an apology: at the festival we had the opportunity to kill Vernon Kay and we failed to act. I am truly sorry. With that confession out of the way, on to my time at Glastonbury (this will probably be quite an unnecessarily lengthy account, more for my benefit – it was such an amazing time that I want to get everything down before I start forgetting stuff). (more…)
Whoo-hoo! Looks like I’ll be going to Glastonbury this year, staying in the VIP area no less. No mingling with the great unwashed hoi polloi for me, it’ll all be Pimms and canapés and manicures. Actually, it’s all rather out of the blue, so I’m not entirely sure what perks are on offer in the posh section.
Certainly there’s going to be a better class of mud in the VIP area — I hear it’s made of dirt flown in especially from Tibet, blended with some mud from the original Woodstock festival. No doubt I’ll be staying in a centrally-heated luxury Bedouin tent with my own private jacuzzi and bidet. “Kate, shut the fuck up and stop Pete puking outside my tent!”.
Nah, there’s probably a VVVVIP area for the celebs — the VIP area’s bound to be full of corporate hospitality wankers. Still, I fully intend to make the most of it. Cheers Si!
