V Festival 2011

So remind me, how did people ever exist without the internet?

Well, I suppose good TV and magazines help, but still.

Apologies given for not posting regularly, I’m afraid even accessing my blog is a struggle. I don’t know how I’ll be able to update because of this, so I suppose for the moment I’ll just start with the important stuff—that is, V Festival. This will take a while, but bear with me.

My day on Saturday began early in the morning. It was looking fairly okay outside and I got ready. Things always take a while on Saturday V mornings, mostly thanks to packing the bags, but we got out of the house by 10. Traffic in the way to the festival was typical—that is, fairly bad. We got in and parked , luckily, next to a lamppost. (far easier to find when leaving). We then got our things together and headed into the campsite, where we were greeted by the usual already-drunk shirtless young men and hoards of girls in short shorts and floral tops and those fake eyelashes in a bottle I keep hearing about over here. In an effort to avoid the crowds at Gate 1, which we were stuck in last year, we walked all the way around the campsites, usually against the flow of everyone else. When we got to gate three, we joined all the other people sitting on the ground, most of them waiting for friends(as one does spend the majority of their festival-going time). At this point my mom texted the friends we were waiting for. Now, here’s something about this family which is key to the events of much of the weekend: they attract chaos like a gravitational pull. Through some bizarre chain of events, they were babysitting for someone’s toddler and they were going to bring him along, and then they weren’t, and they were gonna be super late. Anyway, upon finding this, the gate opened and we easily moved into the inside of the festival. Due to my dad’s choice of circuitous route around the festival, it took a while to make our way to the grass in front of the main stage, where we sat down and waitied for the area to fill up around us. With time to spare, my mom and I headed over to the merch stand(usually packed in the middle of the fest), where I spotted my dream t-shirt: the cover of Primal Scream’s ‘Screamadelica’ album, on a t-shirt. I’d always figured people who have fashion blogs should wear them oversized and torn-up with leggings and Doc Martins. I’m probably a bit pretentious for buying this(although I do, honestly, like the album too) but it is just such fantastic cover art, I couldn’t resist. And, it’s cool because it’s super iconic, but only for people who are ‘into music’. It’s like one of the most iconic covers of the 90s, but it’s not like having the cover of Nevermind or Morning Glory across your chest because you have to be A.) a bit of a hipster and B.) a bit knowledge to get it.So, yeah. Hipster fashion fun.

It was getting closer to midday by this point, and me and my dad decided to head down to the front for the first act: Fun Lovin’ Criminals. I know almost nothing about this band, apart from Scooby Snacks, but with the smell of beer and smoke and cigarettes looming around me, I completely gelled with the Latino-American groove funk sound. Their set started out slow and simple, but welled up to a fantastic ending with their title song, with their whole small crowd singing and jumping up and down aroundthem.

Me and my dad got back to Base Camp, and then he departed to wander the festival. A few minutes later, with my mom and sister, our friends arrived, with their entire festival gear(bright blue chairs and all) with them. At this point, Ziggy Marley had started on the main stage, and my friend’s mom was getting really into it, but I found his set a bit stale and not something that was catcing my eye. We all checked our setlists with us, and I then recommend that we(myself, and my two friends who are siblings and will for simplicity’s sake now be referred to as C and G) go and check out Alex Winston on the 4th stage. So, we started for a trek across the festival and the small theme park area, and got to this small stage. The crowd was tiny, but we just got there in the middle of Sister Wife, a ‘quirky’ pop song and the only one of hers I know. Pretty good for its type. She has a good voice. Her crowd this early in the morning was tiny, but she got into it, rolling across amps and waving a hippie maxi skirt, belting along to a set of catchy, if similar-sounding, pop songs.

Her set was short and ended quickly, so we got back and Ziggy Marley was still playing, while passing through Ale Blacc’s set. We then decded, for G’s sake, to go and see Labyrinth play on the third stage, which is a long walk away. The crowd for Labyrinth, which was under a tent, was huge and we had trouble working our way far enough im, Even then, we couldn’t see anything. I know almost nothing about Labrinth, other than he works in pop and has done a colab with Tinie Tempah. He started; he was okay. Nothing more, nothing less. A bit forgettable, but I tried to get into it. While we did go for G, she couldn’t see anything, and we tried desperatly to push our way out. So, we headed all the way back to Base Camp, through the Kids in Glass Houses crowd at the second stage.

When we got back, KT Tunstall’s set was in full folky swing. By this point, however, the heavens had opened. Most of the crowd had rushed out to the shops to buy some rainproof ponchos, and these empty poncho packets littered the ground all around where we were sitting. We stayed, freezing, listening to Ms. Tunstall while we waited for my dad to come back from the car with our rainjackets. However, C and G’s mom wanted us to take shelter. G decided to stay by the Base Camp, but me and C headed off, on my recommendation, to the sheltered 4th stage for Frankmusik. It turns out, everyone else had decided to act similarly to get out of the rain, and we struggled to get into the small, crowded tent. However, going to this set was completely worth it, as it all kicked off when the show started. I knew a few of Frankmusik’s songs but even with those I’d never heard before, it was very easy to just dance along and get into the spirit of it. Frankmusik plays electrop. This is important to note, when I tell you that a full-on moshpit started in the middle of the crowd. At a pop show! Madness! The guys in the mishput were hilarious and I even found myself on the outskirts a couple of times, being unwillingly pushed into the crowd(though I desperately backed out). Inevitably security were dragged in at some point, as this tiny stage was not built for this kind of chaos, but still we had good 'vibes' through the rest of the set.

When we got back, miraculously, it had stopped raining. it was still wet under foot, though, so my friends' overly anxious mother fored me into a rainjacket and wellington books. Looking like a terrible festival cliche and with time to kill, I stuck around for the remaining 20 minutes of Bruno Mars' nauseatingly pleasaent set with no songs I recognized. Afterwards, the said insane mother of my friends decided it was totally rational to go home and get changed for the evening. One friend went along with her but the other narrowly avoided this. Now, with no one watching the camp, we sat down for a fairly good Lostprophets set. I say good, but the singer nwas pissed off, as the crowd were not getting into it at all. But he did remind me a little bit of Simon Neil from Biffy Clyro, so that alone entertained me for quite some time. I wouldn't have stayed for the whole thing but as I said, we were pretty much delogated the job of watching the camp, a task which would become the bane of everyone's existence for the course of the entire weekend.

So, Lostprophets were down screaming and playing mediocre guitar solos and such, so me and my friend C decided to wander down into the crowd for the big one of the night--Kaiser Chiefs. For 5th grade me. Also because everyone knows they were amazing live. We got a fairly good place, maybe five rows in towards one side. The weather was nice, the bear-throwing was minimal, and I wasn't being unwillingly thrown into any moshpits. For now, all was well. But they started, and as per expected, all hell broke loose. They opened with Everyday I Love You Less and Less, and continued with Ruby, the Angry Mob, I Predit A Riot(wonderful), and some stuff off the new album. Ricky ran across the stage, dragging the poor cameramen across in his wake, and ended with a stage dive. Incredible.

next up, Plan B and a whole lot of stress. Inexiplicably, someone had decided it would be a good idea for my mom and G to come and find me and C in the crowd. We were very far in, with very good places, and we knew this was nearly impossible. However, they perservered. I had to mediate between everyone, trying to find them, and had to continue via text contacting peopple even as Plan B started, inbetween songs. Ignoring this nightmare, yeah, he was good, doing almost exlusively Strickland Banks stuff. And Charmaine. I know a lot of people were worried he couldn't fit an evening slot, and it seems he really tried hard to prove otherwise. props to him. I don't think a lot of his music is amazing, but the atmosphere was awesome, and at one point he was only about five feet away from me.

And to end Saturday with, the big one. One of the musical loves of my life--Arctic Monkeys. The crowd was insane, it was dark, I still hadn't found my mom and G, then my phone died, people were cutting past, my hair was soaked in beer, people were fainting around me, and I could barely move. Believe me, the intervening time between headlining and supporting aritst at V really is quite unpleasant, and made all the more complicated me trying to find these fucking people in a crowd of thousands of people. Eventually, I have up my really freaking good place in the crowd to go back a bit, though not enough to find them, when it started. And my god, it was everything i could have hoped it would be. They open with Library Pictures, which is both unusual and brilliant and loud and perfect. While everyone is going crazy in the crowd, the tall guy in front of me moves to the side for a splitsecond so I can see Alex. And what has he done to his hair? it's all...short. Good, but short. And yeah, his hair is important, believe me, everyone has been following its changes over the past seven years or so. They continue with Brianstorm(increedible), this House is a Circus, Still Take you Home, Don't Sit Down Cause I've Moved Your Chair, Pretty Visitors(great), She's Thunderstorms, Teddy Picker, Crying Lightning, Brick by Brick, the Hellcat Spangled Shalala(love it), the View from the Afternoon, I Bet you Look Good On the Dancefloor(or sweet perfection), Suck it and See, if you were there beware, do me a favor, when the sun goes down. For the encore, they did Mardy Bum(AT LAST), Fluorescent Adolescent(lovelovelove), and 505, the last of which was performe dwith Miles freaking Kane. the crowd was wonderful, the band were amazing, and the show was perfect. three times I've seen this band now, and their shows never stop blowing my mind.

After all the chaos earlier in the day with finding my mom, it just so happens that five seconds after me and C start heading back to the base camp with the rest of the crowd, they show up. However, we tried our best to put it all behind us, as we trecked back to everyone else. my dad had gone to see Chase and Status, who he thought were okay. Everyone else staued for the Arctic Monkeys, though, and thought they were great too. it had been a long day, so we didn't stay long to chat, before heading back to the car and leaving after a very intense first day.

Day Two began with another very long walk from the car park to the campsite, though this time a lot more peaceful, as by then an awful lot of the drunken idiots from last nght had wound up either extremely hung over or dead. After getting into the arena, I got an ice cream, and then headed down the front of the stage for Imelda May. Her music is aceessible, easy jazz pop that's fun to dance to in a crowd. I own her album, which is quite good. She even does a great Tainted Love cover, which I recommend you go and listen to at once. It's quite something.

Afterwards, I hung out and base camp for some while, still waiting for my friends to show up, and Squeeze started. I've never listened to any of their stuff, but they seemed pretty okay. Eventually, the friends did show up, and the mother hurridly moved into the crowd. My mom stayed for a while, and then headed off to see the Noisettes on the second stage. With being responsible for the bags, we stayed there for quite some time. Afterwards, someone came back to watch the stuff, and we were free at last, so we headed down into the crowd for Ellie Goulding. We found my friend's mom, and hung around there for a while, before going as far into the crowd as possible. Ellie was good--the crowd was lame. She opened with Under the Sheets, which is my favorite, and then played This Love, Every Time You Go, Guns and Horses, a cover of Your Song, the Writer, Lights, and Salt Skin.

Once again, I find myself watving the posessions of other people back at base camp. After getting lunch and what have you, this continued for some time, before my mom took me away to see Good Charlotte. She felt bad that I'd been left watching the stuff numerous times at this point. We stayed there for a good twenty minutes at the second stage, then headed back to the first, where the Manic Street Preachers had started playing. I painted the face of a friend, and my mom and dad headed off to see Hard Fi, who I hear were excellent.

In the evening, I headed over to see what would turn out to be the highlight of the weekend. It is bliss in the form of amazing electropop from the wonderful Hurts. I got into this band last year, I bought their album, I loved it, but the brilliance of this band really presented itself to me for the first time here. This was at the third stage, but there was almost no one there, so we got really close to the front. Their stage set it was amazing. It was all dark and pseudo-gothy and they had dancers all in black and a full band. The sound was incredible, too. They had such stage prescence and made the whole thing so great. Plus, Theo. Oh my god, Theo. he is incredible. Everything he does and say and his voice, wow. So, they played Wonderful Life, and Stay, and Silver Lining, and Illuminated, and Sunday, and Evelyn, and Better than Love, and a Kylie cover, and oh god it was perfect I must see them again soon.

After we got back to the main stage, we noticed two things. One, that the Script had got off a few minutes early and we had missed them. two, loads of people had come to see Rihanna. it was completely packed right the way through the field. After some confusion, I got my mom, C, and G to head into the crowd. This was surprisingly difficult as it seems the entire fstival was now around the main stage. So, I was cramped but really couldn't see the stage at all. NBo matter1 tHE SUN was setting, Rihanna was basically okay, and the vibes were good. I rec ognized some of her stuff, mainly singles I suppose. to me, Rihanna never seems comfortable doing anything in the public eye ever outside of, say, music videos, so I suppose with expectations like that, she did well.

Luckily after her, the crowd for headlining Eminem did die down a bit, but still, it was insane. Like, genuinely terrify at times. I got to sit down briefly. Even though it was crowded and I found myself once again being shoved around and soaked in beer, everyone was ridiculously excited, and I couldn't help but join in. And when he got on stage, wow. It was something else. Really. I didn't expect too much out of an Eminem live show but my god, there were explosions and amazing lights and the best soundsystem I've ever heard at a festival ever, ugh, it was to die for. Even though I don't know a lot of his work, it was so easy just to go along with the crowd this time because he was so, so good. He opened with Won't Back Down, and played 3 AM, all the hits, and some stuff off the new album. Stan is one of my favorite songs ever, honestly, so that was great. He ended with Lose Yourself. However, the best bit, the bit I've been looking forward to for months, was Love the Way You Lie, with Rihanna. pretty freaking cool, no? that was amazing.

We left the arena after that amazing show briskly, briefly stopping to say goodbye on the way out. The drive out of the parking lot, however, took more than two hours. I'm not going to dwell on this.

so, an amazing weekend that I can't wait to experience next year. However, this was one hell of a long blog post, so I'll catch up with you again soon. Typos in this are rife, I apologize, but this took so long to write and I am so exhausted. I will go to sleep now.