Our train took me and Nick up to Leeds, past the twisted spire of Chesterfield Church (what the hell's the story with that??), then it seemed all set to be a smooth ride to the festival. But the "organisers" in Leeds had clearly never been told what the o-word meant, as the shuttle buses to the site were woefully inadequate and we queued for hours, by which time our first set of mates had arrived ahead of us. That is Jim, Becky, Farlie, Jim's sister and her fiancée: a big festival crowd for once! Once we finally got on the bus I guess it was all worth it because it was one of those cool double buses, with a second carriage and a cool rotating thing in the middle. Riding on the fantastic rotating thing was first festival highlight! We then got to the site and, after buying the festival programme and running times, were confronted by yet another appalling bit of organisation, as wristbands were being handed out on entrance, which led of course to yet another obscene queue. Clearly the efficient system of getting your wristbands later on didn't quite fit in with the shambles approach currently favoured.
All this incompetence had already got me decided that I never wanted to return to the site and put up with this again! But we eventually got in and, after being barred from one already full campsite, which our mates fortunately weren't on, set to the task of finding them. A lot of telephone communication, not helped by the general shitiness of my brick mobile of the time, and we eventually found Jim, which was a nice surprise. We were led to our little campsite, introduced to the gang and I set up the tent all by myself, now being an expert at it. A general remark of disdain should here be inserted about Jim's tent, which was shit. We also saved a bit more space for Mike in the vain chance he'd join us (with so many things open to going wrong, little hope was held). The lavatory situation was appalling it must be said, with no facilities on our site itself and a long walk required. After hearing they grouped them together even more the following year, the mind boggles, asking how such a feat could be possible.
A little bit of drinking followed, including me taking a good hour to get through a small bottle of cider, before finally registering my V2000 experience had made that beverage undrinkable. I also had the pleasure of buying an SFA bootleg (Further Rings Around The World, see Discography page), which was nice. The next notable event I recall was the arrival of Mike. Me and Jim set out, following very vague instructions and my increasingly bad phone. We arrived at a gate, went outside it and screamed for someone wearing a Hives t-shirt with blue hair called Mike. By some miracle, we found him, along with mates Mini Gav and Coombsy. We also had successfully saved a space for the final tent and our large circle, ten people I believe, was complete. A bit of hanging around and drinking some yet-to-be-infamous lager called Stella Artois courtesy of Mike's party and the first night was over. Sorry if all these details are boring, but I insist on writing all I remember to preserve my memory, and I'd be writing in a different style if this account were aimed more for an audience! And now onto the review...
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It was me, Nick and Jim at first (almost every band at the whole fest I saw with Nick I should add) who made it towards the main arena within listening distance of The Dillinger Escape Plan. It sounded really quite dire, but at least we were out of sight sitting behind some van and didn't have to watch them throwing shit around, which seems the appropriate thing for a shit band to do.
Things picked up ever so slightly for the also quite poor Amen, who did nothing notable enough for me to remember. By now we were watching the action, as is festival tradition.
The dire start to the day continued as I endured all of Hundred Reasons. Nick and Jim were very up for it, but the horror of the vocals and total lack of melody made it a non-experience, and my effort to mosh was terminated within seconds as nothing could get me into something this bland. Well at least I saw them and gave them the chance, and I guess they were the best of the day so far, for what that's worth.
Jim, being a big fan, then left us to get a good spot for Hell Is For Heroes. I guess me and Nick then retreated to the tent for a little while before returning to capture an incredibly short snippet of the aforementioned band and, being satisfied they sounded exactly like I'd imagined, moved on.
We then went briefly over to the main stage to catch literally ten seconds of NoFX. The big thing of this fest was us going within earshot of a band then walking on within a minute after officially being able to add them to my list of bands seen. Silly I know but I did wrangle this paragraph and photograph out of it didn't I?
Next up was the second stage to see Reel Big Fish, the band with the really crap name, on Jim's recommendation. First though we saw a good deal of The Shining who apparently had two or three members of The Verve among them. I guess, modest a statement as this may be, they were the best band of the day so far. But they got boring quite quickly, and were strangely overrunning. It seems that Reel Big Fish had pulled out at the last second, and this set had been extended to plug the gap.
We met with Jim again and finally saw a band with some talent. Not much mind, but enough to raise a smile and put on a fun show. Jim may had hated it, but Slipknot finally got this festival going, with typical loudness, stage antics and general spectacle. We found ourselves moving closer and closer to the stage as the show progressed, then Jim got bored and left. It must be said though that this was far from perfect by Slipknot standards. The act had mellowed a bit, and there was nothing as brilliant as making the audience sit down as was done at Leeds 2000. They also failed to play Wait And Bleed and Spit It Out, which was insane for a band with so few singles, and the only tune I recognised was The Heretic Anthem. Leave Slipknot alone everyone, they entertain you, which is more than 90% of artists can even manage!
Finally things were coming together!! The Offspring did just about as well as they possibly could, even if it wasn't as loud as it should had been. Pretty Fly (For A White Guy) was the obvious highlight, but I was surprised to recognise several songs, and enjoyed the mosh. Noodles also came up with quote of the day, saying they'd got his bars here... Noodle bars! That being either the best or worst joke ever cracked.
I'd decided in advance that The Prodigy were going to be the best band here and was totally prepared to enjoy it. In the end it was very good, but just wasn't loud enough. I recall my mate Tom and his reminisce of The Prodigy at V98 (I think) and how they were so loud he had to hold his eyes open. Sadly this wasn't the case here. I'd expected the loudest thing in the world, and for the band to be detonating nuclear bombs onstage but they didn't, which was a shame. But if they'd had cranked up the volume a bit I guess this would had been perfect, and it was only really in retrospect feelings of disappointment set in. Smack My Bitch Up and Poison were glorious, Baby's Got A Temper proved itself a totally sound single, and new songs Nuclear and Trigger were as good as they could possibly be, and a fantastic video screen which made Keith Flint spin round at times was a nice touch. Firestarter was the song I'd waited all my life to hear live, and I guess it could never had been as good as I wanted, particularly with an annoying extra verse added, but I'm shocked to report that Breathe was the highlight! The lightshow was spectacular and there's no doubt The Prodigy were the best band of the day. It's a shame that they went on to disown their exciting punk sound for when the fourth album finally came out though. The idea of seeing Guns N' Roses seemed laughable to me at the time, and the fact they were headlining above The Prodigy I considered an insult. Probably true even though, now I have got into G 'N'R quite a bit, I do wish I'd been able to say I'd seen them.
The perfect end to my festival day though was watching Spiritualized do Come Together. I had to suffer them doing loads of not-too-hot songs before, which weren't even from Ladies And Gentlemen, and the smoke in the air made me sleepy. But they played it in the end, and it was worth sticking round for since it sure as hell isn't worth paying £15+ to see them at a gig! I guess I should had gone back to see G 'N'R afterwards, who were overrunning massively, if it wasn't for the fact Nick had gone into previous festival modes and wanted to get back, annoyingly waking up the moment he returned to the tent of course. But no great loss anyway, The Prodigy were the guys who mattered!
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I was now very tired myself but was forced to stay up later than I wanted. Coombsy was raving about G 'N'R when they finally finished two hours or so over the curfew, making me wish ever so slightly I was able to say I'd seen them. It should be said at this point that all our attempts to get a festival chant going were failing despite some quality material. I guess that "ave it!" was the closest there was to a recurring shout. One day down, still alive.
SONG OF THE DAY: The Prodigy - Breathe
