Who would you recommend I see at Glastonbury? (other than the Wombles, obv)

Twitter was the battery killer for me last year. If I only used my phone for calls and texts I wouldn't have had to recharge it at all.

Yeah I think if I was going I'd take my non-smartphone Nokia, it has WAP or GPRS or whatever on it if I *really need* to get online and the battery lasts like 4 days

surely there's a java twitter app for nokia/ericsson/dumbphones now?

Oh, there is - I used to use something called Twim on my old Sony Ericsson. It was pretty rubbish, mind - better off on the website.

Do you remember us using Twitter at 2007 Glastonbury, Matt, and thinking it was well cool for ... arranging things?

Wombles should do Screamadelica

http://yfrog.com/khhpyp

They will 'slip inside this house' if those wombles don't tidy some of those cables away.

I made several very ill advised tweets at Glastonbury 2007 thinking it was just going out to six friends and not being published on the internet under my full name. Lol naivety.

I know it's misanthropy, but the way the papers seize on FESTIVAL SEASON every summer, and have so many aspirational articles about where you should go to be more "in the know" than whoever else, despite the fact these articles are blatantly targeted at people who still somehow seek cultural guidance from the last remaining dinosaurs, just sickens me. A friend of mine from work asked me last year if I was going to any festivals and I said "no, I am a big music fan."

Which was being a dick, I just feel like they've become like an extended travel section or something, not that it's really a reflection on the events themselves, just sort of ostentatious consumerism.

Having said all that I should say I'd LOVE to be going to Glastonbury, it is totally irrelevant who's playing. But the prospect of rain there is pretty awful. It's not really that much fun if it rains, at all.

I kind of see what you mean Local Garda - festivals have slowly but surely gone from being events attended by the hardcore contingent of music, culture and party-goers to an alternative holiday destination for part-timers and dilletantes. Fair enough if that's the way things are going it would be bad form to dismiss it. But festival season's seeing an increased transition between "We hitched down to Glastonbury in a camper-van and jumped over the fence" to "Couldn't afford the Seychelles this year, so we booked a day off work, loaded the Land Rover with camping gear, pens and swimming trunks and headed down to Glasto. The kids love the new Coldplay BTW".

If you're genuinely worried about that you're going through some Reynoldsesque mid-life crisis. I mean, complaining about gentrificiation is one thing but does anyone above a certain age really want to go to Reading or Leeds or one of those other festivals full of 18-year olds getting trashed and throwing gas canisters on bonfires?

umm... wat? no

It's not really the age profile that worries me, and actually I'm not really sure what DL says is what I mean. I think it's more the accompanying idea that loving music necessitates going to festivals, when actually I know some people who go to like 3/4 festivals a summer whom I wouldn't really consider major music fans. But actually I feel a sort of shammed up concept of "loving music" is kind of used as part of the bombardment to sell people festival tickets. I'm trying to say this without actually creating straw men...

I know what you mean - it's because festivals are embedded in the marketing process for bands these days, far more than they used to be.

xpost That is, i'm not necessarily opposed or worried about it - it's just something that happens when good things get popular. Admittedly, i do find it annoying having to camp next to a family of screaming children who'd rather not be there while their parents seem to do nothing but scream back at them from under the world's biggest fucking gazebo. Take them camping FFS, or leave them with the grandparents or whatever. I know I shouldn't complain as everyone's entitled to attend a festival, but it is a factor that put me off last time I went to Glasto and one of the reasons I sought alternatives.

If you're not going to complain, dog latin, then I will. For years, festival-goers have been told "It's not really about the music", the idea being that you should be too busy getting up to all kinds of great stuff with hash brownies in the stone circle to worry about seeing boring old bands, but now the average festival (Glastonbury is too big and varied to qualify) teems with people who think it's not about the music and they're not crazy psychedelic adventurers, they're fucking awful, because they're only interested in setting up gazebos and taking picnic hampers and being a part of the festival "experience" and not getting excited about any music except Kings of Leon and Groove Armada. Which is fine if that's the festival's whole deal - Camp Bestival, say - but it's infected almost all of them.

<iframe width="560" height="349" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/eBZ8nng-1-g"; frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

oh dear

that was supposed to be the video to Adam Buxton's Festival Song and be terrible witty but instead it just ended up a massive embarrassment

someone posted this on another thread, last word in festival line-ups imo:

http://recordpreserveshare.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/the_standard_festival_line-up_template.jpg

No comedian?

I agree

Ronan, stop harshing my buzz re: the weather.

sorry Nick, just trying to improve my own buzz as regards not going. god knows it's hard to keep our own personal buzzes unharshened in the current climate.

Oh God, now I'm firmly on the treadmill of checking metcheck and accuweather's forecasts every few hours.

Should I visit <a href="http://www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk/areas/the-unfairground/bezs-acid-house-tent";>Bez's Acid House</a>, is the question.

Should the Submit Post and Convert to BBcode buttons be further apart, is also the question.

think there was an episode of scooby doo in bez's acid house.

old mr ryder covered himself in powder to scare away potential ravers.

Awesome times:

http://uk.weather.com/weather/10day-Glastonbury-UKXX1641

I've realised that this is to be my 10th Glastonbury (that I've camped at, at any rate) and, in spite of this, I still have no idea what I need to take. Sleeping bag, wellies, waterproof trousers, wet wipes and a box of wine should cover me for the weekend, no?

A tent should cover you...

Here's the canonical Glasto packing list with some lady-centric things removed:

festival ticket
train tickets (+railcard if you have one)
tent
sleeping bag
sleeping mat
pillow if you can be arsed to carry it
blanket if you're a big wuss
big chunky (waterproof?) shoes/boots/wellies
summer shoes/trainers (flip flops/sandals are nice but not when yr in
the middle of a heaving crowd)
anything waterproof you have - jacket/trousers/binbags
t-shirts/tops (as many as you plan to wear plus one spare)
socks (ditto)
pants (ditto)
jeans/some kind of trousers, x2 if you can carry them in case of rain
shorts/skirt
jumper (with hood if you have one)
something else warm (if it's cold you want lots of layers rather than
one big thing)
woolly hat
sun hat
shades
water bottles
as many bin bags as you can find in your house - these are for wearing
as well as putting stuff in
umbrella
toilet roll
mobile phone
cash & cards
alarm clock?
deodorant
wet wipes
soap
toothpaste
toothbrush
towel
sun cream
earplugs?
aspirin/paracetamol
something to read
pens & paper
immodium if you really can't face the loos
hairbrush if you need one
torch + spare batteries (batteries are a total rip-off on site)
plasters
swiss army knife
fruit/nuts/crisps etc
alcomahol - you're allowed to bring your own booze to glastonbury,
glass isn't allowed but if you're bringing anything in bottles shove
them down inside your wellies in your bag and pack around them with
clothes/plastic bags
stove? if yes then gas, tea, coffee, filk, cupasoup, a cup,
lighter/matches, pan/s
if you smoke, cigarettes/tobacco/papers and a million lighters

Gets less essential the further down. Would add spare mobile phone batteries to that list, or something you can charge yr phone with.

I think tampons are fairly lady-centric. unless you're doing that "light the end and throw" thing beloved of student parties...

I am in awe.

An alarm clock seems pretty unnecessary.

Of that list. Massive help, thanks Matt.

Yeah no one needs an alarm clock at Glastonbury unless you're getting up super-early to go home on Monday and will have no phone battery by then. Otherwise, you're lucky if you get any sleep.

Apparently it absolutely shat it down on site yesterday. There was a hoax picture doing the rounds on Twitter (from 2007, purporting to be the Other Stage yesterday) but the Park field and the Shangri-La area were reportedly waterlogged. If they have decent weather today and the drainage has improved then we should be alright come tomorrow.

Metcheck is looking pretty positive now. Won't be a scorcher but it's looking like being a bit like 2002 and 2003 - mix of rain and sun but neither too extreme. I can work with that.

Biggest worry at the moment is the worst rain coming at exactly the point tomorrow that I need to put my tent up.

Glastonbury Twitter is saying it's pretty wet underfoot at the moment onsite.

Also lol poshos.

Wombles should do Screamadelica

― blueski, Thursday, 16 June 2011 14:13 (5 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

http://thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01329/SNF17BIZWW-682_1329197a.jpg

Backstage at Glastonbury, sounds of struggling and mild imprecations fill the air...

BOB: Oof... get tae... Jesus fuck man, ah cannae get this fuckin' 'hing oan! Holl', Orinoco! Or whatever yer fuckin' name is, gie's a haun here.
MIKE BATT: Having trouble with your costume, Mr. Gillespie?
BOB: Too fuckin' right ah um! How the fuck did you manage to get through the 70s inside wan o' these fuckers?
BATT Well, I didn't actually wear one all the time.
BOB: Here, don't be shatterin' ma illusions, man! Next, ye'll be tellin' me Bernard Cribbins never wore wan.

fumbling

BOB: Come oan, ya bastard... fuck sake, ah'm sweatin' like a fuckin' rapist here, so ah um...

more fumbling

BOB: ... at last... noo, gie's ma heid ower, wull ye?.

even more fumbling

BOB (muffled): Here, ah've jist thoat o' sumthin'... how the fuck am ah supposed to shake ma tambourine wi' this 'hing oan? Ah cannae even fucking haud it wi' these... fuckin'... paws! And ma tambourine playin's fuckin' central to 'Screamadelica', it's fuckin' key, man, ah'm tellin' ye.
BATT: Uh, 'Screamadelica'? I think there's been some misunderstanding, the classic album we're playing in its entirety tonight is "Keep On Wombling"...

Bob rapidly removes head

BOB: Keep oan WHIT??!?!??!
BATT: ... Wombling... Mr McGee said...
BOB: McGee! Ah might ah known that wee rrrrrrrat wid be involved in this... baldy Orange bastard... here, ah'm fuckin' phonin' the cunt up...

Ringtone plays 'The Sash'

BOB: McGee, it's Boab, you fuckin' takin' the pish or whit?
muffled voice
BOB: ...aye...
muffled voice
BOB: ...aye, but...
muffled voice
BOB: ...hey, haud oan a minute therr...
muffled voice
BOB: ...ah'm no fuckin' daein' it!
muffled voice (expositional dialogue follows)
BOB: ... listen ah didnae leave a cushy number as drummer in the Mary Chain in October 1985 and form Primal Scream wi' fuckin' Big Jim Navajo tae get up oan a stage and fuckin' make a tit o' mahsel'...
muffled voice
BOB: ... ya cheeky cunt, ah kept you in charlie fer years and don't you forget it!
muffled voice
BOB: ... awright, fer weeks then! Jesus Christ, can you no' open yer mooth wi'oot mentionin' Oasis, man. Gie it a rest, Al, naeb'dy's impressed!
muffled voice
BOB: ... naw, you ur...
muffled voice
BOB: ... ah've tellt ye, ah'm no daein' it!
muffled voice
BOB: ... aye, well you jist dae that then... ya fuckin'... balloon!
muffled voice
BOB: ... listen, fer the last time, can you no' understaun plain English or sumthin'? AH'M UR NAE DAEIN' IT!

pause

BOB: ... and Fuck the Queen!

slams phone down

MADAME CHOLET: Two minutes, Mr. Gillespie.

Metcheck is looking pretty positive now.

I'm not sure how well my tent will stand up to those 266 mph winds.

http://www.metcheck.com/V40/UK/FREE/7days.asp?zipcode=shepton%20mallet

a bit like 2002 and 2003 - mix of rain and sun

both these years were pretty much wall to wall sun as far as i recall. 2002 had a bit of rain on friday morning and sunday night. 2003 was roasting for most of it AFAIR

2002 was the year of Saharan Gusts

Alba, stop checking the weather forecast. :-P

I remember 2002 being pretty rainy, although not a washout.

Quite sad really, that's the last time I went! And there isn't one next year so that means at least 10 years until I next go to one. If I ever do because most of my friends aren't up for it any more.

My prediction for this year's Babylon/You Got The Love Fuck Me Not This One AGAIN Televisual Ubiquity Award: Ed Sheeran - "The A Team".

Sad I'm not going to this. Vicky is. Mind you, I am such a moaner when it starts raining I'm not sure I'd be any fun.

I have seen a few snaps of muddy wellies and I can't wait. Feel simultaneously well prepared and massively disorganised, after drunkenly dancing around in the loft late last night looking for my waterproofs. Which were, in fact, somewhere more convenient.

Similarly I'm annoyed that after the first time I've ever bought a train ticket in advance I get a ring from a mate offering me a lift. Not sure whether I'll go in this evening or have a night at home (just outside Shepton) and go into the site tomorrow.

Unneccessary detail there.