Week 34 & 35 – Friday 26th August – Sunday 28th
August – Reading Festival – Richfield Avenue, Reading - £200
Week 34
Reading Festival –
Friday
“Harrison Ford was in Indiana
Jones with David Attenborough. . .”
What finer way to end the summer than a music festival?
Sure, it hasn’t been much of a summer, but Sandro, Salazar and I were hopeful
our second festival of the season would feature a little less rain than Glastonbury.
So hopeful in fact that we decided to leave our wellies at home, putting great
confidence in the British summertime. A wise move indeed.
It was dry when we arrived in Reading early on Thursday
afternoon and queuing was pretty quick and hassle-free. With Sandro lugging a
trolley and Salazar and I carrying our handbags, we found a decent plot of land
and set up our tent quickly, without Sandro even having to shout at us. We also
had the energy to quickly return to the car and pick up our last two crates of
beer, which we let Sal haul back to camp.
San and Sal had both been to Reading nearly a decade ago,
whereas I’d only ever been spoiled at Glastonbury. There were chilling warnings about the difference in atmosphere,
the lack of things to do, tent fires and most horrifically, the fact that we wouldn’t
even be allowed to take our beers into the main arena. At this point however, compared
to Glastonbury the only negative was that the guide and line-up lanyard’s
weren’t included with your ticket and cost an extra ten quid. Even that didn’t
bother me though, considering it was Sal’s tenner.
-------
With no music to
entertain us, we enjoyed a civilized barbecue and went for a walk. On our
travels we passed an embarrassingly long line of people queuing to receive an
‘Over-18s’ wristband, so we stopped, pointed and laughed at their young faces. There
wasn’t much else to see. No Brothers Bar, no Reading equivalent of the Hollywood
sign, no Stone Circle and no Candy.
With Little P also
absent, it was up to Salazar to take on the mantle of ‘Easy Target’ during the drinking
game we ended the night with. “Harrison Ford was in Indiana Jones with David
Attenborough,” she said in our film connections game.
“You mean Richard Attenborough?”
I asked.
“Yeah, that’s the
one!” She replied.
“Ok, but uh, he wasn’t
in it either,” I said. “Sean Connery was, but I don’t think he ever did any
nature documentaries.”
Ominously, it had begun
to rain, so by ten o’clock we were back at the tent. Sandro’s powernap turned
into a deep sleep before Sal suffered the ultimate insult when I dozed off
mid-conversation, just when she was about to elaborate on David’s film career.
-------
When I woke in the morning the other two had already risen,
and were deep in discussion. Unfortunately, but unsurprisingly, we’d tempted
fate a tad too much and it had rained heavily throughout the night. I was duly informed
that our first task of the day would be to buy some wellies.
There was still no let-up in the rain and the ground was
slushy with thick mud. Sandro was wearing his signature fedora and was armed
with his bullwhip, while I wore the two hats that had earned me my latest
nickname (“Two’at”), but the flip-flops we were wearing didn’t stay on for
long. Sal meanwhile, was doomed in her daps and tights and she knew it.
“I can't go on, you two go ahead,” she said, “and carry me
with you!”
Sandro had no desire to carry her, and nobody had faith in
my underrated strength, so we left her in a not-so-safe place and set off
barefooted. Liberated from footwear, we breezed past the struggling hordes, who
gave horrified gasps and squeals.
“Oh my God! That’s disgusting!” the average girl might say
as she watched the brown stuff squelch between the toes of our sexy feet, while
the average man’s response was slightly different. “Hmm, I bet that actually feels
really nice.”
It did. It felt lovely, relaxing, smooth and it was surprisingly
stable. In fact I’d have happily stayed barefoot all weekend if people’s
reactions hadn’t started to become so tedious. Trench foot was a secondary
concern.
The first place we reached selling wellies had only a pair
of size 9s to spare. After shelling out a whopping £18 (begrudgingly) I slipped
them on. Sandro remained on dry land while I boldly continued on. At the next store
I came to I was able to buy San and Sal a pair of Wellies each for the bargain
price of £30, and I returned to share the spoils.
-------
Wellied up and with
lighter wallets we had a quick barbecue breakfast, before heading to the arena
to begin with the business of Gigaweek. I couldn’t quite believe we’d have to
queue each day at the gates to the main arena, where security staff were on the
prowl and full of daunting warnings for alcohol smugglers.
“Anyone found to be
trying to smuggle beer in, will face an exploratory rectal examination!” was one
such message.
Inside the arena were
six stages, all within close proximity. The first stage we made for was called the
Festival Republic Stage, named for the company who run the show, for a slice of
home in the form of Cardiff-band Islet, who were okay as it goes. They showed a bit
of talent and seemed to have a few fans present who sang along, despite only having
a couple of EPs to their name. Sal was even complimentary of the female drummer.
The most negative
consequence of the arena can ban was having to fork out £4 for a Tuborg or £4.20
for a Gaymers. There was a novel idea and incentive for people not to litter (which
I’m sure is more widespread than I’m aware) as people were encouraged to
recycle paper cups and other such materials with the offer of 10p per paper cup
returned, while a precious plastic bottle would fetch as much as 20p.
-------
The young entrepreneurs among the crowd sniffed a money
making opportunity and effectively became poorly paid litter collectors for the
weekend. Well, I say poorly paid, but the shameless and energetic among them
looked like they were more than covering their beer costs, especially as they
never seemed to drink themselves.
In the Islet audience
was a youngster, who admittedly had a beard that put me to shame, who was holding
a stack of thirty odd cups. Testing his instinct, I kicked an empty cup at his
heels. Showing his natural talent for cup gathering, he noticed it before it
had even made contact with his welly and instantly reached down and put it atop
his pile.
When Islet finished
and the crowd dispersed his work really began, scurrying through the remains
left behind. Salazar and I decided against donating our own cups to his cause
(we’re no mugs) and had a quick chat to him about his motives. Apparently he’d
run out of cash at a recent festival and would only be able to afford more
drinks if he stooped to these depths. Sandro thanked him for his efforts,
grabbed the tower of cups, and pushed the boy into a pool of mud.
-------
Although we were
grateful that Flapjack hadn’t joined us at Reading, we risked being reminded of
him when we made the trip to see Miles
Kane in the huge tent known as the NME/Radio 1 Stage next. Having seen Miles
at Camden Crawl and Glastonbury, we knew what to expect and we got it.
Unlike at
Glastonbury, gas canisters are prohibited from the Reading site, so aside from
our barbecue diet, our food supplies were limited to cereal bars, which left us
with little choice but to buy from the food stalls, which were generally
overpriced and unimpressive. We did so between watching Miles and another band
we’d seen in Camden, Dry the River, who
played the Festival Republic Stage at 3 o’clock. There were a couple of good
songs and a couple of very bad vests on show.
We then caught a
glimpse of The Naked and Famous, who
were neither naked nor famous, at the NME tent, before returning to the
Festival Republic Stage to see Foster The
People, who were genuinely brilliant. “They make you wish MGMT’s second album hadn’t been toilet,”
Sandro summarised.
-------
Deftones were the
first, and only, band we saw on the Main Stage on Friday, with the bill heavy
on hardcore, post-hardcore, alternative rock and Emo music. 30 Seconds To Mars were warming up for headliners
My Chemical Romance and I hadn’t
brought enough eye-liner to watch either.
Sadly the sound was worryingly bad. It was pretty blustery and even a cover
of Katy Perry’s ‘Firework’ couldn’t disguise
a slight disappointment.
We returned to the NME tent to see The Vaccines although Sandro departed to see White Denim part way through their set, before we all found
ourselves at the Dance Stage where Simian
Mobile Disco were monkeying around. By this time, the cider was starting to
take its toll on Salazar, who couldn’t live with my breakneck drinking pace.
As White Lies played
inside the NME tent, outside we tested out my shoulder hoisting skills on
Sandro and Salazar. While I failed to raise the human wardrobe, I lifted Sal with
ease. As I’d made lifting and holding her on my vast shoulders look so simple,
Sandro suggested I offload her in his own patented fashion.
The ‘Sandro Dismount’ involves holding the hands of your
jockey and allowing them to slide off your back. Sadly, my technique was modelled
on a bucking bronco and Sal toppled backwards into the mud pit behind us. Foolishly,
I kept holding her hands and was dragged down myself, though luckily Sal broke
my fall so I didn’t get too muddy.
-------
Sal however, was now muddy
and drunk enough to sleep, so she and Sandro returned to our tent while I went back
to the Festival Republic Stage. The alternative to My Chemical Romance were more Goth than Emo. No, not Beady Eye, whose famous front-man would
undoubtedly have loved to have seen MCR,
but The Horrors.
Their music is genuinely
imaginative and while I didn’t expect them to thrive live (especially after
Barlow had described them as horrible at Glastonbury), some of the sounds they
squeezed out of the stage’s speakers were extraordinary. They played a mix of
songs from recent albums Primary Colours and
Skying, which I lapped up while
standing alone, as others around me wondered why I wasn’t collecting paper
cups.
As I left, I glimpsed
the climax to My Chemical Romance’s set,
which consisted of ‘We Will Rock You’ followed
by ‘Welcome to the Black Parade’. I
later found out that fuzzy haired legend Brian May had joined them for their encore, which explained the
cover. If I’d known that at the time, I probably would have looked out for his
spectacular barnet on the big screen, instead of speeding away swiftly, skating
through the mud in my wellies and collapsing on the sleeping Sandro and
Salazar.
-------
To be continued. . .
30-5 - Wibidi - ✓
6-12 – Alice Russell - ✓
13-19 – Brother Steve - ✓
20-26 - Reading - ✓
August
30-5 - Wibidi - ✓
6-12 – Alice Russell - ✓
13-19 – Brother Steve - ✓
20-26 - Reading - ✓
27-2 - Reading
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