I am Sick of Green-Field, Refugee Camp Festivals
I am sick of them, and I am not going anymore. You know the ones, hundreds of tents as far as the eye can see, grass which gets ground to dust or churned into mud within a day, fields strewn with polystyrene boxes, paper plates and plastic pint pots, toilets as fearsome as the fucking Sarlaac pit. I could (yes, yes, and do) go on, but you know what I mean when I refer to a green-field refugee camp festival.
I am not just being prissy about hygiene and personal comfort or anything like that – well, the toilets are pretty horrific – I just don’t like large groups of people. In fact, off the top of my head, the only time I actively enjoy crowds is at a football match.
As well as attending quite a few for the sheer enjoyment, I ended up going to an awful lot of festivals last year as Meursault’s driver, and most of them really, really were fucking awful. The funny thing is, though, from the band’s perspective the best shows didn’t always come at what were, from a punter’s point of view, the best festivals. They had a riot playing T in the Park, for example, whereas from a fan’s perspective that’s a festival I wouldn’t touch with a bargepole.
Still, driving them around did give me a pretty thorough overview of the UK festival circuit, and whilst it was fun to try lots of the big ones, including my first trip to Glastonbury, I think I have come up with some general guidelines for myself when it comes to festivals.
For example, five thousand people is already way too big. The lineup at End of the Road saves it, but in every other sense it is just the same as all the other festivals – the same food stalls, the same venues, albeit in a different field – all these are just businesses which tour the festival circuit all year, meaning one festival looks pretty much exactly like the next.
I did think Truck stood out though. For all the lineup wasn’t as strong as the likes of Green Man or EotR, all the stalls at the festival itself were provided by local businesses. This meant not one single one of those depressing places which tour each and every UK festival was there, and this gave the place a real character of its own. We were lucky with weather too, which helped, but this was one of my favourites.
Of the smaller festivals, well you all know how much I love Pickathon and Homegame, and the Fence Away Game last year was just mind-blowing. At these smaller festivals the landscape tends to more in evidence, as it isn’t overwhelmed by the miniature city which lands on top of it for a week. And I may be a city boy at heart, but a weekend in a tentopolis in a field doesn’t seem like a holiday, but a weekend in the Scottish mountains really does.
Equally, when the people are fewer it just feels more like an expedition and less like a stampede. It feels like we’re visiting the countryside rather than barging across it, and I do think that breeds a slightly different mentality in the fans as well, and that they are more likely to be respectful of their surroundings under these circumstances.
I have also learned that I don’t actually care as much about lineups as I would have thought. I could go to the End of the Road Festival twice and still not see everything I wanted to see, but on a couple of occasions that has led to me worrying about what I might be missing, rather than simply relaxing and having fun .
What I find is that, for all I obviously want at least some bands I really like to be there, when the lineup is a little patchier there is more time to just relax and enjoy being away from it all. It’s nice to have little pockets of time where you aren’t thinking about what is happening on whatever stage. I like there to be a few things I am really keen to see, a few things I am interested in taking a chance on and quite a lot of time I am not fussed about anything. At those times I tend to just sit back and relax or go and see a band I have never heard of, which is really nice way to spend a weekend.
Without the experience, the infrastructure or the financial backing, these festivals can be a little hit and miss I guess. Close to Edinburgh there are a couple – Kelburn Garden Party and Doune the Rabbit Hole – which look really interesting and which have been described to me as both brilliant and awful depending on who I’ve spoken to. I’d still rather go there than Rockness though.
There are also a couple of interesting ones a little further afield. One, The Insider, I know nothing about but is located up near Inshriach House in the Highlands near Aviemore and should be spectacular. The Imploding Inevitable Festival seems to be quite similar in spirit, is taking place in Fellfoot Woods in Cumbria. Both the lineups have that excellent combination of complete obscurity and a handful of bands I really want to hear, and both locations look really interesting.
The thing with these really small festivals, though, is that their PR reach can be a little limited, so there are no doubt dozens of others going on around the UK I’ve never heard of, but whatever they are they look a damn site more like fun than any of the big boys which, honestly, just bore me to tears these days.
Ella and I went to Reading 5 years ago. The last time I will ever go to something that size as a punter. We were surrounded by 70% bellends on every side, awful toilets and arseholes screaming at each other at 4am across the campsite. I think the only way I made it through was by being drunk the whole time, which probably made me a bellend too.
2 years ago we went to End Of The Road and absolutely loved it. Everyone respected each other, there were no wankers being sick on themselves, and I was quite sober (or at least I wasn’t at ‘staggering around drunk’ level.) I took risks on bands I knew nothing about and came away with a few finds and plenty of fond memories.
After going to my first Home Game this weekend I can’t imagine ever returning to the likes of Reading again.
There’s something about the pile-em-high-sell-em-cheap nature of big festivals that always makes the whole event feel like a massive rip-off. They also seem to reduce people to some hilariously degrading behaviour (witness the piss-anywhere-attitude of many girls attending T in the Park).
Connect was my last proper ‘big’ festival experience, and despite some good intentions on the part of the organisers, the site was a rain sink which, despite a great first night, went downhill rapidly and culminated in a very long wait to be towed out of the car park by a tractor. Not an experience I’d care to repeat.
At the risk of being in a minority (although we’re voting to encourage that today, right?), I must confess I’m in two minds about massive festivals. Yes they are corporate and stuffed with bellends (although perhaps everyone was fundamentally OK and just trying to get through like you Scott and the whole thing just spiralled into an enormous bellendfest) but I do see them a fairly economical way to see a bunch of big bands for a reasonable cost. Finding a suitable lineup is a trick and the last time I was at Leeds I was camped a full half hour hike from the stage which was a huge ballache but I’m not ready to dismiss them just yet.
I just don’t actually enjoy going. I’m not criticising them in a ‘how dare you like this!’ sort of way, which does happen with music sometimes, more in a ‘right, fine, I see what you’re doing there, just leave me out of it’ sort of way.
To see lots of bands cheap I’d tend think about city-based festivals like Stag & Dagger or In the City or something like that, where you can stay in a hotel and get away from it all if you get a little bored.
Really.
EoTR – ‘same food stalls’ ???
How can you say such a thing when they sell Pieminister pies (who are from bristol so are local as well) !!
I agree with the sentiment though, I don’t think I could go back to a big festival (maybe apart from glastonbury) such as leeds or T.
Looking forward to Stag and Dagger in a few weeks.
EotR is by far my favourite green field festival, Wilf, but there were definitely a few ‘same old’ stalls there the last time, if I remember. It’s what made Truck such a surprise – finding absolutely nothing but the local record shop, the local Rotary Club selling bacon sarnies and the local Asian Association selling absolutely fantastic curries.
Bart, some fun is Bad Fun and needs to be hated. Yes, I’m looking at you, V Festival.
I seem to remember going to V festival donkeys years ago basically because girlfriend of the time didn’t like the idea of the hygiene aspect of Glasto and because you could get a day ticket. It was OK, but the atmosphere was a bit ‘this is a festival for people who don’t like festivals’ kind of thing. There probably were smaller festivals of the likes of Homegame and EoTR ten years ago, but I wasn’t aware of them.
T in the Park I haven’t been to in a long time; had fun but there’s too much of a bellend presence – I’m inclined to put this down to the fact that T stands for Tennents. I’m not slagging people off for drinking, but for the way that whatever substance people are on, some feel it gives them the right to act like a dickhead. It doesn’t.
As for Glasto…haven’t been for a very long time. the first year i went was 1995 and then I went in 1997, and 2000. I saw great sets…but the problem is that i feel it has become a victim of its’ own success. It’s slightly ridiculous that it now has to have the amount of security it does, the ticketing system…it’s a shame. Still seeing those Radiohead and Pulp sets is not something I would exchange for anything.
As for homegame….well, i’d love to go, but if you’re a couple it’s £150+ for the weekend, plus accomoodation…and that too sells out too quickly. Some of us need time to plan the logistics.
Have fun, though, very jealous…
But no love for Wickeman? Damn you Matthew. Mind you, when Meursault played (which people still talk about) in 2009, Neil lost his phone and you brought the Scooby Doo van. We stood, blinking in the sunshine, looking on, envious at the possible luxury to he had.
Stopped going to T when it moved to Balado. Reading just got too expensive. Camping’s only good if you’re getting shitfaced but the older you get, the more you want to actually see some specific bands and the hangovers tend to last longer (true). A hotel while at a festival in the city? Why thank you. That’ll do nicely. Next year though, Homegame. Has to be done.
(come back to Wickerman, or at least Solus)
‘Wickerman’ F*ck. Can’t even spell it properly.
Hi Chay – actually I had an absolutely brilliant time at Wickerman, but that was largely because, Solus Tent aside, I thought the entire lineup was awful. So basically we just lounged around in the sun, popped into the Solus every time anything good came on and spent the weekend getting pished.
I would never have gone to Wickerman either, just because the overall lineup wasn’t my cup of tea at all, but we ended up really enjoying ourselves.
I liked bestival because there was fancy dress, a boat ride and the Pet Shop Boys.
Could have done without the “herbal highs” though. Horrid stuff.
You very nearly went off to sleep in the woods when you took that stuff. Naughty, naughty midget. No biscuit.
I’m a festaholic and like to try a new one each year, this years addition is Bearded Theory next week. Festival season already! It’s going to be about 4000 people so I’m hoping a bit like EOTR.
As a pal said V Festival is for people who don’t like music, but when you have teenage kids you have to do your duty. Whoever stuck the mojito tent dead centre last year was inspired.
And really Glastonbury is about where your heads at and how much fun your pals are. Even with that many people there’s always somewhere to chill.
Next year is the year for the smaller ones though.
Homegame tools, otherwise Summer Sundae in Leicester is great. Not too big, uses the De Montfort Hall and several smaller tented stages. The big outdoor stage has a grassy bank for the audience, great view. The music is adult-friendly with a mix of new, established and classic. Solas near Biggar looks interesting this year, and I would love to try Truck. Small and interesting does it every time for me