Glastonbury 2008 - Sunday and Monday

Day 5: Sunday – the Last Day

After about two hours sleep, it was time to rise again. Weather was looking iffy again. Energy was provided from the “Danish and Delicious” stall, who were kindly still serving breakfast bacon and egg baguettes long after their claimed finish time.



But really, who stops serving breakfast at 10am at Glasto, especially several days in?! Opening the day was Gilbert O Sullivan, who I didn’t think I’d heard of, but I did recognise some of his old 60-70s pop songs.



Torturous lyrics (eg Jenny was a mare, who I could just about bear, I met her on the stair, she had nice hair, etc!!), but I’d been clever today and brought my fold-away chair so I was slouched with breakfast in front of him with no energy to move!



After bacon baguette.. special Yeo Valley Glasto yoghurt.


Great Success (said in Borat accent)!

Next up was Brian Jonestown Massacre. I didn’t have to move.



As I sat, three Japanese girls came and sat in front of me. They carefully laid out their mat, then sat very properly. One had a carrier bag, out of which she took three paper cups and one can, one single can of Carlsberg. She opened it daintily and carefully shared it between the three cups. They toasted, sipped away, then when they’d finished, folded the mat up and headed off. Very amusing. I wonder if they were drunk?!



Then I went for a wonder.. to get some much needed coffee. A folk group were in the bandstand singing about Glastonbury and how nice Emily Eavis is!



Back to Pyramid, John Mayer was on.



Watched him for a bit then went round to other to meet up with the gang, who were watching Jack Penate.




It’s getting to that stage..


Not sure I approve..

The flag was clearly visible..



Someone had a reel of stripy tape and was busy sectioning off large parts of the crowd for no apparent reason!


Crowd games


Pete


Lisa


Tom demonstrates tai chi


Sarah’s got the right idea

Scouting for Girls,



another Introducing tipped band a year or two ago, are up next, and really get the happy crowd going, in particular somehow making the following work:



“Woooahoohoh, yeah yeah yeah, I’ll see you at Glastonbury next year!”






Scouting for Girls


Brief threat from cloud


Flag still going strong


Crikey

Next… I’d really like to trawl round to Pyramid for Neil Diamond, but it’s too far and I’d have to rush back for Mark Ronson who is on next. Again someone I don’t know much about, but my little bro Lewis keeps going on about him, and his remixes being better than the originals.


Mark Ronson


Sam hates Mugabe too


Sarah’s friends


Close up of Jo’s badges


Mark Ronson’s band

Mark brought up a series of guests to do his songs with him. Some were quite well disguised.



Others not so – Lily Allen appeared, but didn’t know her lines, and so sang from a piece of paper, and still managed to screw it up!


Lily Allen


Cheeeese






Lisa issues Pete with marching orders

The group now splits, with the others staying here, but myself heading off with Sarah’s friends to see Leonard Cohen at Pyramid. We caught the end of Goldfrapp. What hair! What a dress!!



Into the magic central D for the show..


No crowd squash

Leonard Cohen



is back from a 15 year absence from performing, and what a chap. He just charms the socks off us. Grinning with delight at every applause, bowing and taking his hat off after each song, going down on one knee as he croons – I’d surely have his babies!!


Down on the knee



The crowd loves it!





And the sun begins to set on my first Glastonbury. It’s been incredible.



But it’s not over yet. Back round to Other for Groove Armada. Huge flows the other way for Verve who are playing Pyramid. I think in general more people went the other way, as Groove Armada had room to dance.



We made the right choice – the gang who went to Verve were freezing, whereas we were toasty warm dancing around like nutters to I See You Baby (Shakin’that Ass) and At the River (If you’re found of sand-dunes and salty air, etc). The lights were awesome, especially wearing the Tilted Disco glasses, though how Pete wore them for almost the whole set I do not know!


Fireworks going off over Green Fields


The end of the night…

And that was it. The set finished early, which was slightly disappointing, but the show itself? Incredible, and a great way to end the day. We all headed back to the Camper van to rendez-vous and have a cuppa. Interestingly, heading out, it would appear the gate security was all gone, which I was a little confused about – surely this means anyone could come in and steal stuff etc? I would have thought it would make more sense to hold security until Monday lunchtime or so, as I think the majority were leaving then. I got the brews in at the van..



Then I realised what might happen… eyes were drooping all around me.. surely not.. the night is still young?! But the oldies were ready for bed.. and so I had to go it alone – take a stance for the team and party all night. Glastonbury was not over yet, not whilst the Pyramid’s beams were still lighting up the sky!



I headed down to my beloved Trash City,


Trash

and into Drag Strip..


Drag Strip

Sure enough, a energetic punk band had the audience going.. it was Urban Voodoo Machines.



When their set finished, I headed through to Shangri La. This was my last chance to explore the whole place properly. First up, Shackney, the reggae joint:


Shackney

Then the SlumberRave,



where one takes shoes off (yuck, plus my back wasn’t really up for bending down to them anyway!) and dances on beds



Music was no good though, so I didn’t stay long.

The venue of the night for me was Dada, which had two bands still to play full sets whilst I was there –the first of which was Shantel and the Bucovina Club from Germany,


Shantel and the Bucovina Club

Who really had the crowd going, although with the amount of dodgy cigarettes being puffed on I was having difficulties staying inside the tent!!

Before the next set, I went round Dirty Doctor Fiddley’s Bat Cave, a bizarre tiny place playing scratchy 20s LPs,





Tarts n Tease, where a live set was setting up, but for now was just a disco with an almost empty bar..





A quick look at Basslines (music wasn’t all that), then back to Dada for Destroyers Vs Phol Bros, a mad act with seemingly more people on stage than in the audience – there must have been about 15 musicians playing!



When they finished, it was time to grab a bite and head up for sunrise at the Stone Circle.







Portion of chips, very nice. I strolled up, enjoying the last couple of hours before home time. There were still lots of people streaming about.



The thing to do seems to be congregate with chums, have a fire, and smoke things. Frankly I think more of the haze was from smoking than the fires! Sacred indeed!



Time to head home.


Quiet gates on the way back to my tent


Very very sleep-deprived but.. I made it!!!

Glastonbury 2008 I have loved every minute of you!!

Day 6 – Leaving the Dream
I packed tent up, left a note for the others and headed across the site for the last time, right to the other side, for the 8:30am coach.


Rubbish being collected at Pyramid

Despite the Leave no trace, the place is a tip. There are so many rubbish bins, I don’t know why people still treat the place so badly. They’re very strict about glass, but the amount of cans trampled into the earth, surely not good for cows?

On the way out I pick up a copy of the Q end of festival magazine, which has reviews and summaries, and a large fold-out aerial colour photo of the whole site, which is interesting. You’re supposed to locate your tent, but I reckon I was about an inch off the edge!


Queuing for the bus home

Misses
Such is Glasto that I missed all of the following, all of which I would have liked to see. But that’s what Glasto is like.. I don’t have any regrets.. alright, I do regret not seeing Massive Attack in particular, but, you have to make choices and what I did see was amazing. What I can say with certainty is that I made the most of it! So here’s the list of misses, in no particular order: KT Tunstall, Editors, Fratellis, Kings of Leon, Franz Ferdinand, Massive Attack, Sinead O Connor, Freestylers, DJ Yoda, We Are Scientists, MGMT, Estelle, Fat Boy Slim, The Cribs, The Ting Tings, Howard Marks, Dizzee Rascal, Pete Docherty, Ethiopiques, Crowded House, James Blunt, A Skills, Massukos, British Sea Power, Wombats, Elbow, Matha Wainwright, The Futureheads, Buddy Guy, The Proclaimers, (most of) Kosheen, Liz Green, Cerys Matthews, Neil Diamond, (most of) Goldfrapp, The Verve, Eddy Grant, Katie Melua, Annie Mac, UNKLE, Dirty Pretty Things, Derrick May, Bluetones, Thecocknbull kid, Noah and the Whale, Mitch Benn, Tony Benn.


You know it’s over when

Although for the next couple of days I saw people about in London with them still on! Denial!



It does seem like leaving a dream world. I had the same feeling coming back to London from Glasto for 5 days as being away for a year and a half! Don’t go travelling, just go to Glasto! You won’t regret it, especially if you go with such a nice bunch as Mike, Tom, Lisa, Pete and Sarah - thanks guys, you really made Glasto the amazing experience it was for me. And so it just remains for me to say…

Woooahahooo, yeahyeahyeah, I’ll see you at Glastonbury next year….!

Glasto 2008 Blog Index: Wednesday - Thursday - Friday - Saturday - Sunday Monday

Glastonbury 2008 - Saturday

Day 4: Saturday! Non Stop Music Action



Knitted house

Once again I head off on my own in the morning to catch Shakin’ Stevens kicking the day off.


Shakin’ Stevens

Good set, although when he said he was going to do some songs off his new album there was a groan and someone yelled “No!”, a bit mean! Also someone in the crowd had made a large Green Door and was holding it up the whole set, but he never sang it! I was more disturbed by the chap in front of me who apparently had a transparent skull!


I can see your brain, mate

Shakin’ done, I pegged it down to John Peel for Emmy the Great who is very very lovely.





“What are you doing here?”, she asked, “You should be at Martha Wainwright on Pyramid!”. She worked her way through several songs including the divine Gabriel, also explaining that this is the first time that she’s played without her ex-boyfriend’s band. Ah ha, single, eh?

After Emmy, it was back to Other Stage for Los Campesinos, another Introducing band who have taken off. In fact, lots of the headline acts here started out with Radio 1 Introducing – I know it’s only a smallish proportion which go big, but generally the bands that Hue Stephens raves about seem to do very well. Perhaps because he raves about them… oh well.



Los Campesinos means “The countryside folk” in Spanish, a cute name for a band that are all from about 20 miles of Glasto in various directions. Good local Somerset boys.



Unfortunately I’d made the assumption that the boys would get down here in time for this 12:40pm act, so had purchased a four strip of beer. Of course they hadn’t. Ah well!


Ale, enough for this set at least


Happy people in sunshine

Interestingly, the drummer had a remarkable resemblance to Mike Sowa, who appeared shortly after they went off stage. I think we should be told!


Sowa?

Up to Park, where I caught Laurel Collective on Introducing Stage



Afterwards, there was a mystery guest, though slightly disappointingly for me it was Get Cape again! Well, he’s good, but I’ve already seen him (although not two metres away I suppose).


Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly

Before Team Waterpolo and then Alphabeat on the Park Stage (they seemed to be running quite late, hence catching Waterpolo).



Alphabeat are a cute Scandinavian band, unashamedly loving pop, and the main reason I was up here! Clashing with Crowded House though, sob.

After Alphabeat and some tasty nachos, I watched Picture Books in Winter on Introducing. Incidentally, the reason I don’t talk more about what all this music was like is that I’m awful at describing music.. it was progressive funky retro house upbeat vibe-laden rock with a punky edge?! I just don’t have the vocabulary. Suffice it to say that if I mention it, it was good and I recommend it to you. There was no such thing as bad music at Glasto as far as I could tell, and if there was, I wouldn’t have hung around to listen to it, there’s too much good stuff going to waste as it is!

Down the hill to some Tom-tipped bands. Incidentally it was great having Tom and Lisa along, firstly they were very lovely people, but also really knew their music. I’m a bit out of touch, having been travelling for the last two years almost. I’ve got some great Ethiopian and Easter Island tunes, but as for British indie.. I’m a bit rusty. Anyway, The Courteeners were on at John Peel.



I could see the flag near the front but there was no way I could reach it. I’m not good at doing the “barging through crowds” thing.



Round to Pyramid for a bit of the Raconteurs


Not the best view


Flags ahoy

Then I followed the “ladies” round to Duffy at Other.



By now my back was killing me – there’s an awful lot of standing around at Glasto, so given the now glorious sunshine, it was time for a brief lie down whilst being serenaded with my “local” song, Warwick Avenue (my local tube station!).


Duffy


A Knee View

No rest for the wicked though, I had to get in position for the evening set. So, I’d decided to do Pyramid for the whole evening. This meant Manu Chao, Amy Winehouse then Jay Z. This also meant.. sigh.. missing Massive Attack. Life is cruel. Anyway, the benefit to my plan was that we’d worked out that there was a small area in front of the Pyramid stage protected by a crowd-surge buffer, with small entrances at the sides. If you were inside this area, it was surprisingly spacious, no matter how many people were in the main field behind you. And no shoving up. I manoeuvred myself in plenty before Manu Chao came on. Amy would surely be packed, so this was the time to get in.


Looking back at the crowd!

Manu Chao I came to know in Peru. For some reason they’re bonkers about him in South America. He plays poppy reggae, all upbeat with generally quite silly lyrics, in a variety of languages, often Spanish (though I think he’s actually French?).





Next up.. Amy Winehouse. I have to confess when I came back from my travels, I’d heard the name so many times, but didn’t know the music. She was in the news so often, how could one escape her? Anyway, I was not disappointed with the music, though one has to wonder how much longer she’ll carry on for, burning the candle at both ends as she does.





On stage she was funny, but a bit wobbly. One wasn’t sure what she’d do next, from using rather unpleasant language about Kanye West, to telling us that her husband was coming out of jail in two weeks and when some people boo’ed, threatening to call their mothers and complain about manners. It was rock and roll, and most enjoyable. Her singing was fabulous, and the backing singer dancer chaps, my goodness they had some moves. How do you dance like that in a suit? I need to practice at home in front of a mirror!





Towards the end of her set she proceeded to climb down to the audience and walk along singing and touching.



One could see the security people fretting about this, and sure enough, someone apparently tried to grope her, at which point she started punching and elbowing until pulled away. End of set!! Rock and roll, man!!!



Next up, the most controversial act at Glastonbury in years… Jay Z



The focus of the fuss had been remarks from Oasis’ Noel Gallagher, something along the lines of “Jay-Z? At Glastonbury? No f*cking way, I won’t have it.” So how did Jay-Z handle this? After the large video screens played the video clip of Noel making these comments, mashed up with all sorts of other video shorts implying that Jay-Z wasn’t welcome, he swaggers on stage with a guitar, grinning, and plays Wonderwall, with 150,000 people singing along. Fantastic!!!



He then launched into a set apparently programmed to be relatively easy to get into, for those non-R&B types like me, with most songs starting with a sample of someone else, like Punjabi MC, or Rihanna’s Umbrella song, then he’d start rapping. He got a bit political for me, with lots of Bush bashing (yawn), but otherwise it was good. I think he himself was impressed when he cut the music to one of his songs and the crowd kept singing it for two clear verses! I of course had no idea what the words were.

I suppose part of it was him trying to prove himself, and hence no rumoured guests came up to perform with him, but it also did seem like he was genuinely surprised at the massive positive reaction he received from the crowd. I was proud, and enjoyed the whole show. I won’t be rushing out to buy his CDs though, haha!



The headline over, I was swept with the crowd towards John Peel, looped round up to Dance Village and by lucky chance caught the end of the Kosheen set, including the beautiful All in My Head.


Kosheen

Meeting the peeps at the Pussy Parlour, we headed over to Trash City where we caught a bizarre performance involving naked ladies and snakes in Drag Strip. Whereas Tom and Lisa were in charge during the day, Sarah and Pete were the stewards of the night! Sarah somehow got us past most of the huge queue for the gay bar – you get a stick-on moustache as you go in. All good and fun, especially with her setting me up with someone who we subsequently lost! The thing that bothered me is that I’d have to dance with about three random men every time I’d head to the bar. It’s simply not cricket! Later we headed over to Shangri La for Basslines and Tilted Disco till dawn, baby..


Shangri La


Basslines for breakfast


There’s something mad about queuing in broad daylight..


What’s going on just in front of Pete

This is the way it’s supposed to be, party on!!

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