What does a festival need? I would argue that there are 3 essential elements…food, drink, and toilets, to these you would normally add one or more of music, stalls, comedy, DJ’s etc. This being a music festival, we were always going to have music, and in fact, the bands selected are among some of the best out there. However what the festival organisers failed to recognise was that without those 3 essential elements, you may as well have no music, because nobody is going to have their basic needs catered for. In fact, its perfectly possible to have a fine festival with relatively no good music since you are with your friends, hopefully in the sun, and relaxing.
My first concerns were raised when on the myspace site the organisers boasted of the 2, thats right - 2, bars that would be onsite. Capacity 5000…2 bars. Hmm, they had better be big ones. On arrival I was shocked to see that, not only were they small bars, each was being manned by roughly 8 stoned idiots, wandering around in a daze. Within 30mins of opening, one bar claimed to have run out of beer. Things went from bad to worse, with queues of up to an hour and a half being reported by some people. Heres a pic of one of the bars:
Those people you see milling around - they are not simply socialising. There was fortunately, a wine bar, the queues for this were only half an hour, and stretched in polite single file around the site:
…and the rest
This was OK, until they ran out of wine. Twice. Apparently the delivery broke down on the way. What fool doesn’t get the drinks in the day before a festival? And food was no different.
Then there was the toilets, ladies queued for up to an hour, so even those that managed to get a drink had a long wait ahead of them once it had passed through. The gents boasted 8 urinals in each of the 2 toilet areas. These instantly flooded, leaving people to piss on the grass, turning it into a quagmire.
All of this might have been OK, if the organisers had let us take our own drinks in or let us go in and out. No way - everything, from beer to water was confiscated on the entrance. Why on earth do this, clearly to make money from sales, and then barely offer any drinks anyway. Some festivals throw free water at the audience when its hot, the respect these guys showed us I wouldn’t be surprised if they got on stage and threw piss at us…in fact they took the piss so much perhaps that would have been for the best.
Well, despite all this, at least there was the music. There were 4 stages, two of which were in tiny tents, impossible to enter without getting in a crush, and impossible to hear properly outside. Another, the homefires stage was half facing a fence, and had sound limiters in place making it very difficult to see or hear there either. Indeed one band, The Archie Bronson Outfit were stopped halfway through a song and told to turn it down. They complained about this, saying that when putting on a rock festival outside you shouldn’t need to limit the volume, but obliged. About to play their final song they were pulled off stage and told the council would shut the festival down if they played another note. All the while, the dance tent pumping out noise not 15 meters away. ‘Hopefully see some of you at a proper festival’ they said as they left the stage.
Of the bands I wanted to see, I missed many due to the policy of timing bands at half hour intervals, but all playing at the same time. For half an hour 3 bands play, then nobody for half an hour. What with all the queuing on top of this, there was very little time to catch bands. I managed to see The Earlies turn in an excellent set, saw the reformed Fridge featuring Adem and Kieran Hebden (Four Tet) who also both played solo. I just about heard Gruff Rhys, although he was hiding at the back of the stage so nobody could really see him. Saying that, it was the Homefires ‘aim it at the fence’ stage, so you couldn’t see anyone anyway. Luckily I was stood behind King Creosote and The Aliens at this point so at least I could see some musicians, even if they weren’t playing at the time.
The advert for the festival promised Morris Men, brass bands, tombola, welly throwing - non essential, but it all sounded fun. It all turned out to be a lie. Not even the giant marrow competition was anywhere to be seen. 2 fairground sideshows, and a lot of space was all there was. Should have filled it with bars, food and toilets perhaps.
The headline act was Justice, the French duo, but by this point I was too tired to really enjoy their Daft Punk like DJ’ing. In fact, I didn’t feel like I really saw any bands at all, and the sets were all so short there wasn’t enough time to get into anything. Field Day claimed to be a one day music festival with the feel of a village fete. Let me tell you this - accidentally stumbling on a crowd of women crouching behind the coconut shys urinating on the floor was not something I have ever seen at any ‘village fete’ I’ve been to in the home counties. Nor have I had drinks removed at the entrance to a fete, and then been forced to wait for an hour and a half in the hot sun to be allowed to purchase another one. In fact…I’m not even sure I’ve even been to a village fete, so I can’t be sure about this, but I have been to a number of music festivals, none as badly managed as this one.
A video compilation from the festival
Albums
The Archie Bronson Outfit
The Earlies
Justice
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