Jeremy Clarkson on Glastonbury

[Numptycorner]

Disclaimer: I went in 1995 so it may have changed.

1) It's the only festival I've ever had my bag searched at - mainly seemed to be to preserve the profits of the beer sellers by stopping people taking beer in. And what is with this separate arena and campsite stuff?

2) There was no club when I went - everything shut at 11:30

3) No, they're not. Most separate the party areas from the sleeping areas. They usually have patrols telling people to keep the noise down in the camping areas - they did when I last went to Glastonbury and they did when I went to V99.

4) Toilets and running water were a disgrace. I've been to illegal festivals that were better supplied. Seemed to me they were only installing the minimum allowed by law rather than attempt to give a decent camping experience.

I went to Glasto in 02, everyone going in was being frisked.
In my experience, Glastonbury is as noisy as Reading in the camping areas, the toilets are as filthy and there is/was as many. The only benefit being urinals. I never saw anyone telling people to be quiet or stopping people from having loud parties at their tents.
At Reading there was a club night at the Rivermead centre in the 1990s which shut around 3 or 4. I know because I went.

You sound like one of the trendies who doesn't want to get down and dirty, perhaps next time take some rubber gloves to protect your fingernails?

[Cowboy Bob]

I went to Glasto in 02, everyone going in was being frisked.
In my experience, Glastonbury is as noisy as Reading in the camping areas, the toilets are as filthy and there is/was as many. The only benefit being urinals. I never saw anyone telling people to be quiet or stopping people from having loud parties at their tents.
At Reading there was a club night at the Rivermead centre in the 1990s which shut around 3 or 4. I know because I went.

You sound like one of the trendies who doesn't want to get down and dirty, perhaps next time take some rubber gloves to protect your fingernails?

Well I last went to Glastonbury in the 90s and it's definitely gone downhill, which is why I don't go anymore. They definitely had people going round keeping the campsites quiet there, and there was no checking of bags at the entrance. And as for the Rivermead thing, that's hardly "at the festival" is it?

As for being a trendy, you're kidding me right? I'm complaining about the trendies BEING there, not the other way around. Some of the best festivals I've been to are the illegal ones from the late 80s/early 90s (Castlemorton anyone?) with no trendies in sight. And you dug your own hole to cr@p in. So no, I have no problem getting down and dirty.

[Numptycorner]

Well I last went to Glastonbury in the 90s and it's definitely gone downhill, which is why I don't go anymore. They definitely had people going round keeping the campsites quiet there, and there was no checking of bags at the entrance. And as for the Rivermead thing, that's hardly "at the festival" is it?

As for being a trendy, you're kidding me right? I'm complaining about the trendies BEING there, not the other way around. Some of the best festivals I've been to are the illegal ones from the late 80s/early 90s (Castlemorton anyone?) with no trendies in sight. And you dug your own hole to cr@p in. So no, I have no problem getting down and dirty.

Only joking!
I'm not sure the Rivermead is officially part of the festival, but it's stumbling distance, when I went James out of the Manics was at the bar with the one who went missing. The indie DJ was the bloke out of EMF who died. Rock n Roll eh?

[gingerjedi]

Festivals will always be muddy, smelly, and noisy, it’s funny how so many people complain about how they are not what they used to be? I went to Watchfield in 75’ when I was 4 and all I can remember is watching a bunch of saggy titted naked hippies on stage banging tambourines and the toilets being just a big 5hit pit with metal seats around the edge so I cannot begin to imagine what the IOW festival in 1970 was like when .5 million people turned up!! Rose tinted glasses spring to mind.

These days the IOW festival is still quite charming compared to most though I didn't go this year as the wife is pregnant and festivals are not the best place when you need to keep clean and can't drink.

[pisces]

Only Iggy and The Who looked worthwhile from the TV. CSS looked quite good too. Even The Manics sounded tired. **** The Killers and The Kaiser Chiefs and every other indy pop act designed for kids. Meaningless drivel or as they put it themselves, everything is average nowadays.

[gingerjedi]

You had to be there, man...

One of my favourite festival memories was at the IOW fest in 2006, just when I thought it was all over I started to stumble (pi55ed and stoned) back to my tent when the sky lit up with fireworks and 'All Along the Watchtower' was blasted out from the main stage speaker system, they love Hendrix there.

[gingerjedi]

I wasn't of course...

Don't tell me... you were at Woodstock??? oh... no that was 69' maan

[DS23]

[QUOTE=chubba]
See some of the most bizarre and amusing sights at that time of the morning too. Although some of it may have been hallucinations
QUOTE]

indeed.

my one and only glastonbury festival experiance was 85. that was a wet one and no mistake.

i woke on the saturday morning wet and er.. wet. there was no base to the tent and we were lying in our sleeping bags on a floor of mud where the night before had been soft grass. i lifted my head and the first thing i saw was a gathering of slugs that had been nestling right next to my mouth. nice.

i was first awake, it was early - must have been 6 or 7, i just poked my head out of the tent to greet the day and get some air. one solitary female figure was very slowly squelching along. she stopped just before our tent, i thought one of her shoes must have become stuck but then realised that she wasn't wearing any shoes. odd. she stood in the ooze, spread he legs, hitched up her skirt and urinated, copiously, into the mud.

i used to recall the whole weekend lineup and who i'd seen, what they were like, blah, blah but nowadays i can't hardly remember anything about it but that one incident. god we got stoned though and had nowhere near enough beer money.

[Cowboy Bob]

One year we were at Glastonbury (late 80s) and we pitched up alongside a couple of guys. The first night we got the campfire going, invited them over and smoked them out. Next day one of them comes over, says they were there to sell a whole load of whizz that weekend but they'd spilt a load on their tent floor. It had bits of grit in so they couldn't sell it (grits not good for the nose) so would we like it. Of course we said yes and mixed it into a gallon of homemade parsnip wine we'd grabbed from some stall somewhere. Two days later I remember coming round in front of Asterix In Britain in the cinema marquee with no idea where anyone I knew was. Don't have any idea what bands I saw that weekend, but I'm pretty sure I had a good time...

[xoggoth]

What he is actually saying is that all of you stupid sods who were too young to be going to rock concerts in the 60s and early 70s know nothing about rock or indeed about anything at all. Only those of us who were at the Isle of White and took all our clothes off man and saw Dillon and er er various people know anything about absolutely anything at all wow. Not that I was there of course, much too young.