Offspring the Elder (16) and I are off to the Reading Festival tomorrow to catch Pip Blom (me), Billie Eilish (both) and 21 Pilots (her).
I haven’t been to Reading for 21 years. Is there anything else on the lineup I should catch?
If anyone fancies a pint/cuppa, get in touch.
21 years wat the last time I went.
Only the Foo Fighters hold any real attraction to stand in a field this year
(Neither Hawkwind or The Enid are on the bill this year – surely some mistake?)
Neither are Daphne & Celeste.
Nor is Kevin Rowland in his undercrackers, thankfully.
Please be kind about The Enid and Hawkwind. For some of us, they provide a little stability in a rapidly changing world.
I attended 1977 and 1979. The first was a wretched Somme though Thin Lizzy, Graham Parker and the Rumour, and the last ever UK Sensational Alex Harvey Band show were tremendous. 40 years ago tonight, Motorhead preceded The Police on the Reading Friday, and it proved an inspired double headliner. The rest of the festival was disappointing, Thin Lizzy being replaced by the desperately dull Scorpions, no Undertones, and worst of all The Ramones replaced by Nils Lofgren. Not that Nils is necessarily so bad, but The Ramones were favourites at the time (alongside The Enid and Hawkwind).
I was there in 1979 and I have to say Inner Circle, led by the charismatic Jacob ‘Killer’ Miller were brilliant, especially in the light of the shower of beer cans they had to endure from the more moronic element in the audience.
The Members were pretty good – “We’ve spread mud on the stage from the field at Woodstock to mark the occasion”, as was Peter Gabriel, introducing material from his yet to be released 3rd album, opening the set with Biko.
I’ll tell you what, Reading has improved a lot in the last 21 years.
Stacked barriers to prevent crowd crushes, friendly and helpful security, free water refills (by crikey, we needed it in blazing sunshine), cleanish toilets, accessible facilities, and a well-behaved crowd.
I only saw a couple of punters off their heads (I saw plenty more with sunstroke/dehydration), only a couple of other people over 30, nobody threw any bottles/piss, most cleared up/recycled their rubbish, strangers helped those in need.
It made me think (i) the youth of today are going to be ok (ii) I’d go again (iii) maybe the ticket price put off the real scuzzers (iv) where were the dealers? (v) I might give the Blossoms album a go.
I hope Leeds is the same! My 17 year old friend has gone with his mates for his first festival experience…got to go and try and find him and pick him up tomorrow.
However hard that turns out, imagine having to do it in the pre mobile phone days. Modern life is not all rubbish!
I overheard this exchange at the crush barrier yesterday:
Young lady (aged about 20): “I’ve lost my mum, dad and sister. Can you help?”
Security bloke: “Have you tried calling them?”
YL: “I’ve lost my phone, too.”
SB: “What’s his number?”
YL: “I don’t know. It’s stored in my contacts as “Dad”.
SB: “Where’s your tent?”
YL: “We don’t have one, we’re here for the day.”
SB: “Where did you arrange to meet up if you got lost?”
YL: “Umm… we didn’t.”
SB: “Have you tried the welfare tent?”
YL: “I’m not ill, so they sent me back over here.”
SB: “Err…”
That’s true @gary
He has somehow managed to keep his phone charged most of the time so far. But will probably forget to call or text…
Nope, he’s called. And wants to be picked up after Post Malones gig at 00.45. Bloody kids.
Crikey. Is “But that’s past my bedtime!” a valid answer?
We skipped Post Malone and were home by midnight. After 9 hours standing in blazing sunshine we were both knackered, stinky, shrivelled up and covered in fine grey dust.
21 Pilots were entertaining enough to prevent me looking at my watch (much) or thinking “we could be half way home by now”, but I’d struggle to whistle a tune – and I’ve seen them twice now.
Absolutely no chance of a lift home from my dad at 00:45 when I was a lad. After 10pm I was strictly on my own.
Generally, if still out by that time of night, I’d have been in a state I didn’t want my dad to witness anyway.
The youth of today. Tsk. etc.
Well yes. Apparently being picked up last night meant missing the queues this morning. It was carnage getting on and off the site of course though quite easy finding him when I actually got on. Got home at 03.30!
He has surfaced today and has reeled off a list of the the bands he saw, particularly impressed by the Wombats and Dave. But I think the overall experience was a bit much (“there were people playing loud music till 4 in the morning!”) and he had his tent nicked late on so he’s not going next year. Shame.
Maybe get him to try Reading next year? It seemed very civilised. Leeds sounds like Reading did 25 years ago.
The first time I went to the Reading Festival, I went with my gig buddy and his big brother. Neither of them had been to Reading (the place) before. We were staying at my student digs off Cemetery Junction, an hour’s walk from the Rivermead site.
We stuck together until the first chords of The House Of Love’s ‘Christine’ at which point a crowd surge took them away.
I didn’t see them again, spent the rest of the day checking at the meetup points, left messages at the welfare and police tents, gave up after midnight and plodded back to the digs.
Shortly after 1am, I arrived and found them both asleep in the front garden. I still have no idea how they found it.
75 for me, and it was actually the mighty ‘Wind on the friday night. Supertramp and Yes topped the other nights and I can’t remember a note of any of those 3 performances. Daytime was good tho’, my highlights being Caravan, the Ozark Mountain Daredevils and Gary Holton’s Heavy Metal Kids. That Jesus was dancing near us, too, which was nice. I think Wally must have been there too: certainly a lot of people wee shouting for him. I can’t remember the toilets, most blokes seemed to just pee against the outer perimeter walls.