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"Festivals": the end of season debrief

hello entropized. gmaster8, hipster, dashboardlizard, perky and I will all be at thimbleberry too, but if you're who i think you are, you'll already know that :)

Should be brilliant, I'm really looking forward to it...such a great little festy!
 
O2 Wireless, Leeds - Really enjoyed Pharrell, DJ Shadow and my favouritests Massive Attack

Global Gathering - Awesome friday set by Daft Punk, made the weekend, which is lucky cause packed off on saturday

Creamfields - Didn't get a licence for it's regular place and the new one was not designed for this type of thing. Dodgy atmosphere but Prodigy were wicked.
 
Knockengorroch Spring Fest – Absolutely wonderful. Remote, friendly, small, good selection of Music & Ales. Got asked to lead the kids parade in my cardinal’s robes. The cold & rain was to be expected & didn’t impact the enjoyment.

Strawberry Fair – Enjoyed it more than last year’s chav-infested event but thinking seriously about blowing it out for Wychwood next year. Camping was a nightmare.

Sunrise Celebration – Greenfield type hippified 5-dayer. Tons of space. Very relaxing. Lots of smily faces. Would have been pretty much perfect if twice the numbers of punters & all of the bands had turned up.

Rise – Overcrowded Finsbury Park freebie. Only the “African Village” was really worth a visit.

WOMAD – Lots of changes for the better to site layout, toilets, car parking etc. Music was top quality albeit leaning a little heavily on the African headliners. Only spoilt by the unacceptable amount of thieving in the campsites.

Beautiful Days – Bigger & better than my previous visit 2 years ago. Sound quality excellent on all stages & the masked ball worked really well. Only downer was the campsite toilets.

Solfest – Another great little northern event. You can park your car right next to your tent. Food & other stuff a great improvement over last year and nowhere near as windy either.

Off The Tracks – Beer / Music Festival lover’s paradise. Mainly indoors so the howling gales & rain didn’t matter.

Still to come – Knockengorroch (again) and Whitby Musicport
 
Hollis said:
Only if they buy the smoothie corporate dream.. me and you - we score great victory over the rich! character: he admits.. we were the ones with the foresight. :cool: :cool:

Grr!

And I must admit to not seeing as much rubbish in one place ever as at Fruitstock on Saturday evening.
 
6 toilets shared between the entire campervan area, and the kids field. it was horrific...mid 90's glasto level horrific.

BD is a really nice festy, but there are a few things that they do just do so consistently badly...like bogs
 
Eatern Haze was good - proper bands, proper beer, food not bad, bogs a bit cruddy, weird security on day one, water hard to find but present.

They just sent me a nice email saying:
Eastern Haze said:
We are planning a vast number of improvements to make sure that you have
an even more fantastic time at next years Eastern Haze. These
improvements will include the following:

* The camping field will be laid to lovely soft lush green grass
so you can lay your heads down after your day (or night) of partying, on
a comfortable patch with no trace of stubble in site (well apart from
those people who have not shaved recently!!)
* We are looking at laying in a subsoil water system which will
allow us to bring you lots of water points (which you will be able to
find with our new improved water signs).
* We will be having a lot more toilets on the site, including a
number in the camping field - we will also have more cleanup crews to
make sure that they are cleaned and serviced for your use. We will be
providing hand washing facilities as well.
* We are looking at having some shower facilities (probably solar
powered) for when you feel you have reached the heights of festival
mingingness and need to sluice away the festival layer, ready to emerge
and party on!!.
* We will have a nice colourful programme packed full of
interesting festival facts and figures, a site map and running times for
all the areas of the festival, so that you can find all those things you
want and when they are happening.
* We will be expanding the content of next year's event - we are
planning to have several dance areas dedicated to different genres such
as a dedicated Psy Trance area, there will be a lot more Cabaret, Comedy
and Theatre. There will also be a lot more interactive, walkabout
theatre and festival weirdness.
* There will be a bigger and better Holistic area with an even
larger range of therapies, readings and workshops.
* There will be lots more green and alternative technologies
around the site.
* We will be spending a lot more time decorating the site making
it an even more beautiful and colourful site.

which was nice...
 
My Lot

Strawberry Fair – It was my first time at this fest and it was a really good day out. We saw some good acts in the green area. Did anyone see the Don Bradmans? They had me in stitches. We got a bit merry throughout the day and the Shivers and Broken Family Band finished a great day off in style.

Big Sexy Fest – Another great time: arrived after the footy finished and chilled by the reggae tent, spent some time outside that mental punk tent , but the highlight for me was having a couple of hours stomping in my bare feet to Chris Liberator at the top of the hill :cool: .

Wireless Wednesday - I Got free tickets to see this at short notice, so I popped along after work. I was gutted I missed Gogol Bordello, but I doubt there would have been much of an atmosphere for them at that gig anyway. I enjoyed the Raconteurs and thought the Strokes were a bit poor. The sound quality was terrible as well. I did get to meet Michael Eavis though :) he was in the crowd watching Carl Barratt’s band with Emily.

Wireless Friday - I’m not a huge Massive Attack fan, I do like them, but put them on the stereo if I fancy an early night. We only really got tickets for this to see the Flaming Lips, who were superb and chucked in a Bohemian Rhapsody cover for good measure. We spent most of the day getting blasted on pear cider. At both Wireless days I felt like we were surrounded by Kate Moss wannabe’s, with big sun glasses and short skirts etc. It’s not got a proper festival feel about it and I won’t buy tickets again; definitely seeing as the promoters were giving them away free a week before.

Rise – Too many people and too much booze and nose are my memories of that day….I have snippets of not being able to hear Coxon and singing along to the Wailers, but that’s about it.

Fruitstock - Again far too many people, but this time all spread out on picnic rugs with bottles of bubbly. Saw Nouvelle Vague, who were ace and then left.

Sziget Hungary – If you ever want to go a foreign festival make sure it is this one! It is absolutely amazing. It’s over a week on a large Island in Budapest on the Danube and had big name headliners like Prodigy and Radiohead etc. But the most fun was to be found in the smaller tents and bars, and there are a hell of a lot of these. Most of the acts I enjoyed were ones I had never come across before like Pannonia Allstars Ska Orchestra and Anima Sound System and loads more I can’t remember the names of. They had a covers band tent as well which was a good laugh.

The music gets going each day about 6pm and goes on all night at the smaller stages and dance area. The prices are cheap: less than £1 for a beer and £2-£3 for a good meal and they don’t ram the island full of people so you never feel too crowded. It’s near the centre of Budapest so you can explore the city in the day as well. The only bad thing was we could not find any drugs, but we didn’t need them to have a good time there. Highlight of the fest: Gogol Bordello on the last night. Best gig ever :D . I could go on about how good this fest is for ages

Reading Festival: Probably not a popular fest here due to it’s corporateness, but in the absence of Glasto my friends wanted to go and see some bands and I thought I’d give it a go for the first time. I don’t like the whole separate arena-campsite set up and having to smuggle booze into the arena was a pain, and it could do with more late night entertainment, but we had an absolute ball regardless….probably because we had good drugs though :D . Musical highlights for me were Gogol Bordello (again), Peaches, Primal Scream, Body Count (I wanted to see them so much 10 years ago), Dizzie Rascal, Soulwax Niteversions, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah’s and Pearl Jam who were absolute legends for me.
 
Tort said:
WOMAD – Lots of changes for the better to site layout, toilets, car parking etc. Music was top quality albeit leaning a little heavily on the African headliners. Only spoilt by the unacceptable amount of thieving in the campsites.

It's sad to read about the crimewave at Womad... or any festival for that matter.

I'm hoping to pay Womad another visit next year :cool:
 
Strawberry Fair – Finally made it to my first! Lovely weather and great company. Generally nice atmosphere but in terms of entertainment, I got the impression it was better for kids and families than anyone else. Would definitely go again, though.

Big Sexy Festy – Bit quiet initially due to the footy, but a lovely day out. Was amazed someone was still allowing such an underground event (right and proper skanky punk!) to be held in this day and age in a London park (increasingly it’s ‘Chris de Burgh seated event in, crusties out!’) Nearest thing I’ve experienced to the sadly missed Hackney Volcano. Hope it happens again.

Secret Garden – A lot of fun in a field. Some of the organisation (toilet provision, programme info) left something to be desired, but a small, lovely-looking fest for grown-ups who enjoy a bit of childhood regression and fancy dress. The main attraction was really other festy-goers – pirates playing badminton, God dancing with Satan, duelling Darths, people hurtling down hills in a bath on a trolley, mariachis going wild with glittery fairies… nice. Big names was not what it was about, but Dreadzone, the Puppini Sisters, Robots in Disguise and Eyelash (who helped their cause by giving out nitrous during their set) were highlights. Also had food stalls you didn’t see at any other festies… not the cheapest, but some really nice places (sadly, I never got to try anything at ‘Pizza Slut’).

Alas, gsv heard someone say it wasn’t likely to happen next year as the organisers had lost too much money, which I can well believe. I expect we’ll go again if it does come off, but if not, I think we’ll try Bestival, which I gather from reports is similar in feel, but on a larger scale.
 
Glade - excellent, though too hot (but better than rain). Overkill tent, esp. bangface made the weekend.. without that I wouldn't have thought it so great. Nice site, needs more water points though. Dissapointed by how breaks has become house though. superb production on the stages. to quiet later on but it's not their fault they (like everyone else) is limited, just that the music has more need to be loud than some of the other festis
best act? ermm.. Altern8, Bong Ra and Lawgiverz will vie for that accolade

Soundstation - alright.. needed to be busier, and I didn't really enjoy any of the music acts in the dance tent.. best act? Bugz in the Attic, but I suspect only cos they were live and the rest were DJs.. all a bit bland tbh.

Supersonic - Superb :) eclectic, hard, fucked up music all the way.. best act? Rother & Mobieus, Modified Toy Orchestra or PCM..

Urban Art Forms (Vienna) - nice.. strangely small site (7500 tickets apparently, but the site was not much bigger than the ID Spiral area at Glade).. could walk from one end to the other in 2 minutes.. msuically would have been better if i liked DnB (one of the two rooms, which ran from 4pm on thursday till midnight sunday non-stop.. by the looks of some of the people so did they :eek: ) but the house/electronica/techno room was good.
they had a drugs testing stand which was cool..

Bloom this was very near endorse it and on the same weekend.. I Thought the weather was pretty decent to be honest.. couple of spots of rain but nothing more.. overcast and a bit of sun.. could have been alot worse.. needed some more people to keep all three rooms full but musically was pretty good..
best act? Joey Driscoll or Vjamm Allstars

Drop Beats Not Bombs Urban Festi without a doubt the hardest to do.. 4 days.. thank fuck for the friday break though..
best act was the whole of Wrong Music on the wednesday or House of God on saturday
 
@ Cloo re: Secret Garden - a couple I know, who were over from Oz went, but can you shed light on what they said about the council amending the licence conditions at the last minute which meant that everything had to finish at 1am whereas the organisers had stuff planned in one tent until 5am?

They said it was good but he missed the trashed people wandering about in the early hours and you're not going to get that when you're tucked up in bed just after midnight!
 
Wychwood
Great company, good variety of music, good food and 25 mins down the road from me. Weather was decent except for the 10 minute monsoon

Sunrise Summer Solstice
Confused, rather empty and a strange tent/bar type thing in the campsite that only seemed to serve elderflower cordial and played some of the wrongest (? is that a word?) cheesy rock music at top volume throught the night and most of the day. Has the makings of a fantastic festival if they can get their act together but am not holding my breath.
Despite all this had a great time and would consider going again if the dates were right and IF they do actually ever keep their promise to refund my £10.00 parking which they wouldn't refund at the festival itself as they had announced and still haven't refunded as of today. Before anyone accuses me of being a cheapskate, I volutarily donated £25 to their begging bowl before I found out that my parking money would not be refunded. I object to them keeping that too without asking first.

Nowhere
Spain, went on my own to this and didn't know anyone there before-hand

45 degrees, winds approaching hurricane force for 3 days, dust storms, situated on the edge of a cliff, halfway up a Pyraneean mountain track. No advertising at all, nothing at all to buy. Bring it all with you or starve (including water).

8 days of heavenly craziness including 3 days with only 3 hours sleep. No bands, no stages but DJs & music to chill, dance or sing along to at various camps 24 hours a day. Lots of workshops from nipple pasty (should that be pastie?) making and twirling through learning to pee standing up for girls to making blinkies and facepainting, loads of things going on, yoga, human pony races, cage fighting with huge over sized boxing gloves and a neon bouncy castle and lots of other stuff including our own radio station and a TV showmade there and screened there.

The best compost loos I've ever seen (they were moved each day and the trenches dug over), 3 meals a day from a communal kitchen which we all (in our camp) took turns in manning. Acres of camping space all with views to die for and open air solar showers with water sent up in a huge water bowser by the mayor of the local town as a present to us.

No children but people from around the world GB, all over Europe, USA, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Ireland etc, every single one of them that I met was a delight to know. The best 8 days I've spent for a long, long time. Probably more of a big party than a festival really though.

Ashton Court
Was saved by being in good company but it's lot it's magic

Edge
Tiny local festival put on by some mates, good company, free jacket spuds in the fire pit, decent (local) bands and the ability to nip home if you've forgotten something, a great way to spend the weekend

Big Green Gathering
Bigger and busier than before, now with added drink licence and 3 beer tents inluding the bibmle inn. Some really good music, some Ok, subgiant, batucado sound machine, Templehedz & urban dib stood out for me but there were 3 daft monkeys (who seem to play everywhere I go, I think they're stalking me), Kamel Nitrate, Galaktikos & Arthur Brown too & lots and lots of others. I like BGG because of the variety of the stuff on offer, being able to walk around and come across random things like the man and boy who had their heads covered on wet clay and were shaping them into weird masks or the horse drawn cart trailing arounf the camp site in the morning selling bread, sausages and groceries. Decent if not hot weather this year too.

Beautiful Days
The music wasn't up to much for my taste, there were only 3 or 4 acts I really wanted to see, but if I went to BD for the music, I'd never go. The company, the camp and the randomness of some of the things on-site make it for me. My 4th BD and I've enjoyed them all but I'm thinking of giving it a rest next year and doing something different.
 
N1 Buoy said:
My Lot
Pearl Jam who were absolute legends for me.

Weren't they great, Eddie Vedder was moved to tears through most of the performance. I'm seeing them again on Monday in Paris and I cannot wait!:D
 
pinkychukkles said:
@ Cloo re: Secret Garden - a couple I know, who were over from Oz went, but can you shed light on what they said about the council amending the licence conditions at the last minute which meant that everything had to finish at 1am whereas the organisers had stuff planned in one tent until 5am?
Oh, I did hear something about last-minute reorganisations, but I didn't know why, and I guess that would be it.

No one mentioned it being planned to finish any later than it was though, and mashed people were still wondering round and entertaining themselves into the wee hours as far as I could tell!
 
William of Walworth said:
Please interpret ... :p :confused:

Just that I didn't enjoy it as much as I used to.

Can't point at any one thing really but too many people and too many of them off their heads enough to require medical attention, too many people squashed through a small hole to get out at the end, too many people throwing undisclosed liquids into crowds, too much rubbish on the ground at the end of the night. The way the girl a the Bristol Ticket shop was holding a personal conversation with someone else at the same time as she was speaking to me when I rang for tickets (after completely messing up and not sending our tickets last year), the fact that I wasn't well right up until Saturday mid morning. The queues for the bars, the queues for the loos. The fact that I wasn't particularly desparate to see particular band and even then when I watched Dredzone some random guy right behind me was yelling abuse at them down my ear.

None of the above would normally put me off much, I guess I just wasn't in the mood; post-Nowhere blues I think.
 
Cloo said:
Big Sexy Festy – ...Hope it happens again.

I hope so as well. I talked some people into going to a benefit for next year's one in a North London squat last weekend and I hope our fivers weren't wasted.

It was completely toss music you'd find down your local ritzy for most of the night upstairs and a Solution Sounds rig playing reggae to an audience of about 3 downstairs. We left when they put on Cool and the Gang, that was one step too far.
 
Paulaviki said:
Weren't they great, Eddie Vedder was moved to tears through most of the performance. I'm seeing them again on Monday in Paris and I cannot wait!:D

You lucky man, I hope you have a good one in paris. I wouldn't mind seeing them again either after waiting so, so long to see them in the first place.

I bet Eddie won't play Paranoid on a ukulele agin though :D
 
badly drawn cat said:
Just that I didn't enjoy it as much as I used to.

Can't point at any one thing really but too many people and too many of them off their heads enough to require medical attention, too many people squashed through a small hole to get out at the end, too many people throwing undisclosed liquids into crowds, too much rubbish on the ground at the end of the night. The way the girl a the Bristol Ticket shop was holding a personal conversation with someone else at the same time as she was speaking to me when I rang for tickets (after completely messing up and not sending our tickets last year), the fact that I wasn't well right up until Saturday mid morning. The queues for the bars, the queues for the loos. The fact that I wasn't particularly desparate to see particular band and even then when I watched Dredzone some random guy right behind me was yelling abuse at them down my ear.

None of the above would normally put me off much, I guess I just wasn't in the mood; post-Nowhere blues I think.

Fair enough, I had many similar objections too (although I was with a chillled group of Urbanites so that was :cool: ).

I may not go next year ... not sure yet ...
 
N1 Buoy said:
You lucky man, I hope you have a good one in paris. I wouldn't mind seeing them again either after waiting so, so long to see them in the first place.

I bet Eddie won't play Paranoid on a ukulele agin though :D

pv is a girlie, another refugee from efestivals I think.
<waves at paula>
 
badly drawn cat said:
pv is a girlie, another refugee from efestivals I think.
<waves at paula>

Apols pv :o I just saw the Paul bit at the begining and got my gender assumptions wrong.....damn internet!
 
Can't wait to post my full list/review for the season just gone, at the weekend! :cool: :)

I hope the new ex-efests influx sticks around to swell the numbers at Glasto Camp Urban next year! :D :p

There's a currently well-buried Glastonbury 2007 thread somewhere on the Music Forum ...
 
*books place on Glasto Camp Urban for '07* :cool:

I will defintely be trying to go to Glastonbury, although this time I won't be able to get there until very late Thursday evening/early Friday morning and I'll have to be back in London for Sunday night. Perhaps someone would be kind enough to save a space for me? Or perhaps I'll just bring nothing but a sleeping bag and gatecrash other people's tents :)
 
N1 Buoy said:
You lucky man, I hope you have a good one in paris. I wouldn't mind seeing them again either after waiting so, so long to see them in the first place.

I bet Eddie won't play Paranoid on a ukulele agin though :D

*cough* lucky girl *cough* :p

There are rumours they will tour next year and do a few wembley dates, so I will keep an ear out!!:)
 
I hope the new ex-efests influx sticks around to swell the numbers at Glasto Camp Urban next year!

i think its likely :)

we'll try and behave, but to be honest, we're not right good at behaving
 
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