The Big Chill 2009

[Tooter]

Wow! Amazing festival! Not too sure what the zombies thing was about though....it was a bit shit.....not a bad video but i think i just got really drunk and wondered off before the end! managed to freak out loads of kids

gorgeous weather, great lineup!

highlights for me were were Sneaky, Max Romeo, Pharoe Sanders, Parker, Ska Cubano, Orbital, Jazzsteppa, Tim Minchin, Gong and Chris Cunningham was truly unbelievable!

Hextatic 'ante up' Av made me nearly split my sides! I had to tear myself away half way through to go to Congo Natty and i believe i missed a blinder....when i got to Natty i found out Tenor Fly was on too! made up for it a bit! too much great stuff!

shiny people, glorious sunshine, great tunes, enough nitrous, not enough camping site stereos, enough fireworks and flares...

 

[Orang Utan]

channel 4 were filming a zombie/rave/festival film called I Spit On Your Rave

 

[joe_infinity]

THIS DOESNT MAKE ANY SENSE!!!!!!!


the original 'i spit on your grave' was NOT a zombie film

 

[Orang Utan]

so?

 

[joe_infinity]

so?

so WHY would you film a load of people dressed up as zombies, and name it after a film about rape and revenge among living people?



what were they thinking?

 

[Orang Utan]

it's a pun - i imagine it's supposed to be a horror-comedy shaun of the dead/return of the living dead type thing, not the faux-feminist revenge fantasy whose title it's riffing on.

 

[paolo]

Lazy Llama: little consolation I know, but lots of festivals have been getting hit since last year at least. The general concensus is that it's not 'merely' opportunistic, or indeed fence jumpers. People buying legit tickets solely to go on the rob. Glastonbury, Glade, Big Chill, anything with a profile that suggests the punters have decent cash.

People: Please use the lock ups. The more of us that do, the less rewards for these scrotes, and the less they'll come.

Good to hear it was a good 'un otherwise. Friendly Fires I'm loving at the moment... good time bouncy pop, and not bad live.

 

[CalmerChameleon]

I had an awesome time at this festival - my first Big Chill, but definitely not my last! My only slight criticisms were a slight lack of water taps and not being allowed to take alcohol into the main arena from the camp sites (though I did manage to smuggle in at least one can of cider each time I went in!).

I also missed almost the whole of David Byrne's set, apart from the last 3 songs which were fantastic, but that was due to my own stupidity - failing to tell the time properly

The really good things were:

- The gorgeous weather, which lasted from Friday morning until Monday morning
- ORBITAL - absolutely perfect
- Pharoah Sanders
- Max Romeo
- Tom Middleton's 'One more tune' themed set
- Chris Cunningham
- Russell Howard in the comedy tent
- Lamb
- Craig Charles's DJ set
- Drinking far too much cider from the Cider Bus
- Loads of lovely, friendly people everywhere
- My friend losing his bag containing all his money/weed/car keys and then having it returned with everything still inside
- Taking lots of drugs and drinking lots and having no sleep, but not really suffering any hangovers/comedowns at all!

 

[joe_infinity]

you could take alcohol in so long as you didnt have it on display inside a bag, i was getting through into the main site no problem with VERY bulgy pockets

 

[free spirit]

The only two things that pissed me off were people who push me out of their way to get to the front of the stages and all the people who leave litter behind. The area's in front of the stages were always full of food and drink containers and other waste. There were plenty of recycling and rubbish bins, I don't understand why people are just so fucking lazy and thoughtless

Worst thing was probably the litter problem - what's so difficult about hanging onto your rubbish until you walk past one of the plentiful bins I'll never know.

any chance you could expand on what the issues were with litter this year please?

am I right in thinking that you're both talking about litter being a problem actually inside the marquees / in front of the stages rather than around the site generally?

I didn't get out on site that much to see it for myself, but when I did it generally looked pretty tidy, but I rarely checked the main audience bits of the stages I guess.

I was managing the staffing for network recycling on site, so have a professional interest in the answer to the questions, which we'll use to help us identify problems to work on for next years plan.

FWIW we had a huge team down there working 24 hours a day to try to keep the site as clean as possible, service the bins etc. I'm thinking that we maybe struggled to get in to the audience bits of the stages to clean them while they were operating, not quite sure how we'd go about doing that properly next year, but I guess it's something we'll have to improve on if it really was a problem this year?

 

[ajk]

I was managing the staffing for network recycling on site, so have a professional interest in the answer to the questions, which we'll use to help us identify problems to work on for next years plan.

FWIW we had a huge team down there working 24 hours a day to try to keep the site as clean as possible, service the bins etc. I'm thinking that we maybe struggled to get in to the audience bits of the stages to clean them while they were operating, not quite sure how we'd go about doing that properly next year, but I guess it's something we'll have to improve on if it really was a problem this year?

TBH I wasn't bothered by the staff that were clearing up, they seemed to be doing a cracking job. It was just the selfish pricks that were dropping the stuff in the first place that annoyed me, piles of empty cups and fucking nitrous all over the show, even right next to the bins. I don't understand it.

 

[Lazy Llama]

Lazy Llama: little consolation I know, but lots of festivals have been getting hit since last year at least. The general concensus is that it's not 'merely' opportunistic, or indeed fence jumpers. People buying legit tickets solely to go on the rob. Glastonbury, Glade, Big Chill, anything with a profile that suggests the punters have decent cash.

it's been going on for years and is definitely organised.

There are frightening reports on the Big Chill forums where people had the inner mesh doors of their tents set alight and melted by thieves avoiding using the zips while parents and children slept inside. The thought of what could happen there...

 

[atitlan]

any chance you could expand on what the issues were with litter this year please?

am I right in thinking that you're both talking about litter being a problem actually inside the marquees / in front of the stages rather than around the site generally?

[...]

FWIW we had a huge team down there working 24 hours a day to try to keep the site as clean as possible, service the bins etc. I'm thinking that we maybe struggled to get in to the audience bits of the stages to clean them while they were operating, not quite sure how we'd go about doing that properly next year, but I guess it's something we'll have to improve on if it really was a problem this year?

To be honest I don't see what more the organisers could do. The problem is definitely not the site in general it is around the stages when the crowd starts getting denser. Loads of people seem to take that as a green light to just drop their cups / cans on the floor rather than hanging onto them until they next go to the bar or for a piss and walk past a bin.

As an example, most of the weekend the areas in front of the stages were pretty clean until after the main acts in the evening, but went to the open air stage after Norman Jay's set and the place was a complete tip.

Only saying this as you asked, the litter was just a minor irritant in what was an absolutely fantastic weekend. Only a poor lineup of artists would stop me going again next year.

 

[purplex]

TBH I wasn't bothered by the staff that were clearing up, they seemed to be doing a cracking job. It was just the selfish pricks that were dropping the stuff in the first place that annoyed me, piles of empty cups and fucking nitrous all over the show, even right next to the bins. I don't understand it.

That was the tidiest festival i've been to.
To be fair, tidiness is possibly not the first thought when one is off ones face.
I made a pretty fair effort at leaving no trace, and usually im pretty careless about that kind of thing if Im being completely honest.
Didnt hear of any thefts in the red camping.
That was a wicked festival, a superb weekend. Really surprised at the range of electronic music on display, it was musical heaven for me.
Production all round was amazing, but before I forget the mirror ball in the coop was made of win, Im a bit mirror ball mad me, and it was one of the best Ive seen.
Will be back next year.

 

[William of Walworth]

There are frightening reports on the Big Chill forums where people had the inner mesh doors of their tents set alight and melted by thieves avoiding using the zips while parents and children slept inside. The thought of what could happen there...

WTF????

What the hell were they thinking?? (I mean even from a being on the rob POV?)

Was it that they were avoiding unzipping a tent to minimise noise/risk of detection? Surely they'd have been heard once they started rummaging anyway?

Stupidly dangerous exercise but surely also nearly pointless?

 

[Lazy Llama]

WTF????

What the hell were they thinking?? (I mean even from a being on the rob POV?)

Was it that they were avoiding unzipping a tent to minimise noise/risk of detection? Surely they'd have been heard once they started rummaging anyway?

Stupidly dangerous exercise but surely also nearly pointless?

Extremely stupid and dangerous, I can only imagine it was so that they could silently lean in to the sleeping area to lift anything lying around.

This is the post on the BC forum about it. There is another post at the top of that page about someone waking at about the same time I was done

I awake with my 8yr son to find a guy with a scouse accent inside the tent looking through our bags...his claim to " be looking for Dave" was slightly flimsy when he was dressed in black hoody and wearing a scarf over his face.. I yelled, he left and I spent the rest of the night twitching at every noise..

 

[editor]

Almost all of the Big Chill's problems stem from when they got greedy and massively increased the size of the festival, IMO.

 

[Lazy Llama]

The tent thefts seems to happen at all the 'big' festivals now. I encountered it at my second Reading in 96 and have heard about thefts at every weekend festival I've attended since. While using the lockups prevents serious loss, until the thieves go away completely it won't stop the inconvenience of losing my jeans and contact lenses. I could have checked them in to a lockup but I'd never have found my way back to the tent

I heard that the "Customer Safety" team from BC is also doing V and Bestival this year, I just hope they're more proactive in the camping areas and less interested in stopping people taking unapproved drinks into the arena area.

 

[mwgdrwg]

I got my tent sliced wide open at Glastonbury once and lost a camera that I'd stupidly left in there. This was 15 years ago so I guess things never change.

Regarding cleanliness...this years Big Chill was very clean indeed. It was filthy last year, but it was a million times better this year.

 

[William of Walworth]

I got my tent sliced wide open at Glastonbury once and lost a camera that I'd stupidly left in there. This was 15 years ago so I guess things never change.

In fact Glastonbury has got a fair bit less bad for thefts since 2002 or so, compared to the mega theft years anyway ....

Still happens sadly, but nowhere near to the same extent as the worst years (which were 1999 and 2000 for thefts I believe).

 

[Shirl]

TBH I wasn't bothered by the staff that were clearing up, they seemed to be doing a cracking job. It was just the selfish pricks that were dropping the stuff in the first place that annoyed me, piles of empty cups and fucking nitrous all over the show, even right next to the bins. I don't understand it.

/\ /\ /\

Same here. I saw people litter picking regularly and they were doing a good job. It was just that there were so many lazy and thoughtless people leaving litter behind them in front of the stages. I didn't find the litter a problem, I was just shocked by it and a bit ashamed on behalf of those leaving it

 

[editor]

The amount of stuff left behind in the 'camper van' field the last time I went to the Big Chill was disgraceful.

 

[bendeus]

The amount of stuff left behind in the 'camper van' field the last time I went to the Big Chill was disgraceful.

Not this time around. Some people had left rubbish, yes, but the majority of pitches had been cleaned up pretty much completely by their inhabitants from what I could see.

 

[Shirl]

The amount of stuff left behind in the 'camper van' field the last time I went to the Big Chill was disgraceful.

When we left the camper van field there was hardly any rubbish. It was just around the stages that the rubbish was really bad.

 

[Riklet]

There were definitely a few organised gangs cracked by cops/security, definitely there was a lot of thieving, but it's a tough one tbh. Free lock ups are provided, and if there genuinely were Security patrolling the campsites constantly people would be fucking moany and grumpy about that (personally if I was a punter i'd rather have less security and take the risk of having stuff nicked). It definitely sucked hearing all the horror stories come rolling in (whole tents stolen, most stuff stolen etc), and just been reading a few more on the BC forums; made me glad I worked it, cos staff camping is always fairly well guarded ha. I really didn't understand why more people didn't use the FREE lockups though, they never looked that busy...

Didn't think much of some of the security. Grumpy as fuck and moany when you pointed stuff out which it might make sense for 'em to do, n just generally a bit irritating to work with. Didn't expect much different though, tbh. They were pretty shit at following up the reports stewards were calling in of dodgy peeps in the campsites. Did meet some lovely 'uns though... mostly they're just worn out from working 12 hour shifts and having to deal with endless wasted people. Kinda weird hearing complaints about "useless stewards" who were too fucked and stuff, everyone seemed professional-ish... or rather, not dropping acid and doing K on shift like i've seen before....

Never thought the rubbish was that bad, although it does ALWAYS get bad as soon as a big act kicks in and people start dropping stuff; in true British lemming fashion, everyone else follows suit. I love nitrous, but the nos crowd are pretty fucking SHOCKING with this... aint too hard to bag used chargers and put them in recycling. The recycling teams do seem to do a great job though; few of my mates did it, and by Monday afternoon lots of the site was fairly pristine looking. There was definitely lots of assorted junk and trash in the campsites, but mostly organised/bagged up at least.

It was my first time, so it's weird reading about the "family vibe" being ruined and shit on the forums by "antisocial behaviour" and "drug use in front of TEH KIDZ!11!" Shit, thank God they don't allow kids at Glade, B.C. seemed pretty fucking tame in comparison... people drinking, smoking weed, doing balloons and stuff. Why would you take your kids to a festival if you don't want to "risk" them seeing stuff like that? Maybe I am just a young and selfish knob, but they should be fucking glad someone wasn't frying up wonky 24/7 infront of their little darlings. Generally I thought it was a nice and friendly vibe, if a bit "stand off ish" compared to a few other festies. Tis nice though, cos you get loaaads of space to chill and dance, never felt crammed at all. I'll be tempted to go back next year I reckon, even though it's pretty damn big/busy.

 

[Dr. Furface]

Why would you take your kids to a festival if you don't want to "risk" them seeing stuff like that? Maybe I am just a young and selfish knob, but they should be fucking glad someone wasn't frying up wonky 24/7 infront of their little darlings.

Maybe I'm just an old and selfish knob, but I couldn't agree more! Take your sodding cherubs off to Latitude or Womad next year, puh-lease!

 

[fen_boy]

I thought the visible drug use was pretty tame myself. Certainly didn't bother me with my kids being there.

 

[bendeus]

I thought the visible drug use was pretty tame myself. Certainly didn't bother me with my kids being there.

Ditto.

 

[llion]

First time at the Big Chill for me and I absolutely loved it. The beautiful weather definitely made a big difference, but the line-up was so eclectic and varied I think I would have enjoyed anyway.

Highlights for me were David Byrne (amazing dancers and lovely versions of Heaven and Born Under Punches), Pharoah Sanders (amazing squeaky sax and spot on versions of Got to have Freedom and The Creator has a Master Plan) , Mulatu Astatke (amazing xylophone and white suit) , Music from the Penguin Cafe (amazing ukelele) and British Sea Power (amazing crashing waves of sounds and images), Chris Cunningham (amazing heaspinning stuff) and a lot of brilliant DJ sets - Mixmaster Morris wound up the festival with a really beautiful ambient set; Fourtet played a crazy mixture of stuff including lots of dubstep, a Battles track, some African music, some hip-hop; Gruff Rhys played an entertaining set which finished with a gabba version of the Final Countdown!, Metro Area played a connuseuir's set of disco/house classics; Tom Middleton's set was ace and having MC Ribbz with him definitely added to it and helped give it even more of an old-school rave feeling. My friend is a huge dubstep fan and was raving about how many great dubstep people he saw like Kode 9, Ramadanman and Jazzsteppa.

Josie Long was a bit shambolic but still very funny, especially when she went off on one about how many posh ravers she'd come across since arriving on site.To be fair, there did seem to be quite a lot of posh people around - I did bump into one bloke who sounded like Prince Charles - but it didn't detract too much. Definitely seemed to be quite a lot of money flying about like an untethered tent - my friend found two tenners on the floor! Everyone seemed really friendly on the whole, sorry to hear about the stuff getting nicked though. Would defo like to go back next year, seemed more exciting than Green Man, bit less crazy than Bestival and less dauntingly massive than Glasto.

 

[free spirit]

/\ /\ /\

Same here. I saw people litter picking regularly and they were doing a good job. It was just that there were so many lazy and thoughtless people leaving litter behind them in front of the stages. I didn't find the litter a problem, I was just shocked by it and a bit ashamed on behalf of those leaving it

ay, AFAIK though all the stages were well litterpicked overnight / early morning once they'd finished, and should have been pretty much pristine again by 10am or so each day.

I'd be interested to know if this wasn't anyone's experience of it?