So it was back to the main stage again, over all the nice straw that had been put down to counter the quite serious mud situation, for a bit of Sahara Hotnights. By an astonishing twist of fate, they now became my most seen band of 2002, as this was the THIRD time I'd witnessed them. Their previous shows supporting fellow Swedes Soundtrack and The Hives were both average affairs, but it became that bit more entertaining again the third time. Nice head-nodding stuff to open the final day.
On Nick's recommendation, we stuck around for the particularly underwhelming Vex Red, who were very poor. We both quickly agreed to move on. At this point we had the bright idea of going to meet The Hives at the signing tent. We got there really early, suffered an enormous queue, but the useless gimps only stayed for half the time they were supposed to, and we were far adrift of them when they buggered off. A complete waste of time, especially because within seconds I could have got quite close to them and took a photo. Instead I've got nothing to show for the effort, and The Hives had let us down badly.
Next up was a very brief snippet of Alec Empire but what a snippet it was! The volume was overwhelming and I decided immediately afterwards to see him do a gig and witness the spectacle in full.
The Hives almost made up for their rudeness at the signing tent with the best performance of the day. Howlin' Pelle Almqvist dedicated one song to himself, a lengthy mid-song freeze was undertook during Main Offender (I think), and Pelle pointed out that bands may be playing before and after them but The Hives were the main course, and we'd all purchased our festival tickets just to see them! Much of my efforts were spent on trying to get a shot of Dr Matt Destruction doing his thing on the video screen, and I eventually succeeded. Pelle also threatened to destroy us all if we didn't clap loud enough. Hate To Say I Told You So was the highlight.
Next notable act were The Cooper Temple Clause but we had to wait outside the tent whilst Rival Schools were doing their crappy thing.
TCTC were OK, but not as good as they could had been, probably because we were too far from the stage. The opener was good, hair was great, and Panzer Attack, Let's Kill Music and Been Training Dogs were dispatched one after another in the best three-songs-in-a-row of the festival. It was good although I wish I was closer to the action!
Next we made our way to the main stage where Ash were delivering just about the most perfect set imaginable. We were miles away but heard hit after hit after hit being unleashed. Every song I was shocked to recognise and this was great. Apparently they'd played a handful of songs at the start I didn't know but we'd missed those and saw the band at the peak of their powers. They stopped Burn Baby Burn to pay tribute to Dave Grohl, but it's him who should be paying tribute to one of our greatest singles bands!
Things then went astray as the line-up became weak. We saw some Span, who I have no recollection of. I think they were pretty good, but I'm not sure.
We kept wandered over to the main stage to keep a check on purveyors of whiny wank Muse, and caught them doing a few singles, including opening with the riff song, and delivering their cover version of Sexy Boy by Air. Not only did we have to endure what sounded like a pig being executed over the top of the music, but the music wasn't even quite in tune, although that could had been blamed on our distance from the stage.
We alternated the mediocrity of Muse with The (International) Noise Conspiracy who were slightly disappointing, as it wasn't quite the full-on rock show I thought they'd be. But they were watchable.
The festival then went out with a whimper thanks to Jimmy Eat World who played in slow motion. We were very quick to move on. The plan had then been Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and Foo Fighters, but this was torn to shreds by a sudden desperate urge to visit that one place you hope to avoid at festivals, so the day was terminated unexpectedly, with only a bit of Breakout heard from the distance when we were back in the tent.
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Fortunately though I made it to the (only remaining open) lavvies just before they were blown up, and wished the stewards good luck in looking after them, knowing that hours later they'd be running away in terror. Everyone else returned and we met a few new people and sat around a Stella-fuelled campfire. My final glow stick was activated, and I started to ponder the best way of using it, either ingestion or burning. This plan was ripped to shreds though as, for some reason, Jim chucked it away, completely wasting our light source and its infinite possibilities. Our attempts to get a Dr Matt Destruction chant going were also failing. Drinking was particularly civilised for me, as I had cool orange cups, mixer spoons and straws. What started off as Irn Bru with vodka was topped up with more and more and more vodka until it became a big glass of spirits. Meanwhile, Nick was dealing with the blue shit as it became know, which was definitely blue but ironically not shit. According to Jim and me that is. Because Nick says it was shit and swapped it for some Bacardi, which may then had got stolen.
Our fellowship split into two, as I spent most of the rest of the evening hanging around with fifteen year old smokers, which was a totally unexpected experience and left me unable to breathe for weeks afterwards. I spent a good five hours with them, and the time flew by! The campsite had really fallen apart now at the end of the festival, with things having degenerated into an overwhelming mass of mud, particularly where the water was which was quite unbearable. Things were starting to get a bit scary now in general too as it became clear a riot was developing over in the other campsite. If you ask me this was caused by frustration at how clustered together the toilets were. The police came out in force and sniffer dogs came along but fortunately were not released near us. A V2000 moment came upon me as I urged everyone to come and join the riot, but my call was wisely resisted. We also took a cool group photo, shown below.
Apparently I missed some memorable moments this night, as Coomsby had for some reason got into the habit of shouting "Shit tent!" at a tent which admittedly was quite awful and then throwing Stella cans at it. Since then, the labelling of objects as shit and the throwing of Stella has become our thing, but I wasn't quite with it here. The time crept up to 6am, and bedtime beckoned, after everyone else had naturally not lasted as long as me. I had vowed the previous night that I would be going to bed early to ensure I would be staying up late for the final night, so had been true to my word. Sleep was impossible though thanks to a police helicopter flying overhead again and again and again which was horrible. I'll never be able to watch Treasure Hunt again! By the time I woke up, Jim and company had already left, and hadn't woke me up since I looked quite dead. We looked out on the post-apocalyptic landscape, saw a few tents on fire, and were eager to pack up and go, saying bye to Mike and friends before making our way towards the train, which we nearly didn't get on thanks to people blocking the door!
And that drew a violently successful fifth festival for me to a close. The fact our meet-up hadn't fallen through was a wonderful surprise, as these things usually do, and enough memorable performances to warrant the journey had taken place. Sadly though the festival trail would be missed the following year, despite me buying tickets to Benicassim in Spain. But, thanks to appalling unreliability on everyone's behalf, culminating in National Express cancelling my coach tickets in a colossal fuck-up that was entirely their fault, this fell through. Also, thanks to Radiohead fans, who I suggest should be banned from ever attending festivals in future, the original plan of Glastonbury came to nothing as it sold out (on April Fools day of course) within hours. I wish I'd just gone to V2003 now, which confirmed some top acts at the last minute. I chose to boycott the 2004 festivals in protest at the Benicassim scandal, and found no-one willing to go to any decent festivals in 2005. Although going to a festival is one of the greatest experiences this life can throw at you and should attract unbearable excitement and commitment from all, the great festival adventure would not continue until 2006...
SONG OF THE DAY: The Hives - Hate To Say I Told You So
