Glastonbury 2007 Part 1

By now I'm sure you've heard the tales of death and leg-breaking mud, the horror stories of unimaginable proportions and are extremely glad that you didn't manage to get your grubby little hands on those much-coveted bio-metric tickets. Well then you sir, are a fool. For despite the mud and the constant rain (oh the rain!) it's STILL a fantastic out of this world event that really makes you feel special.

For this is the Festival of Mud. Even in years when it's sunny, everyone still remembers the mud. People are breaking their legs in the stuff, it's so sticky. It becomes normal to be covered in it, dripping and shivering waiting for a sun that will never shine to come out and dry you off a little.

For the last few years I have been earning my ticket at the festival by being a fire steward in the Dance and Fire corner. Fire Stewarding there is not like in most tents where you have to watch for people setting each other on fire with joints, we actually do have lots of fire around! We check the walkabout performers in and out during the day as well, so a lot of those crazy costumed people you see around have usually gone through our backstage. This year's fire show was more scarey and dangerous than usual, of which more later.

Wednesday

I have skived off work early, rushed through my minutes and had a frantic visit to Tescos to stock up on Pringles and chocolate. All my clothes, tent etc have been kindly taken to the festival already, I mock the hippies and their bags filled with rocks. We are lucky to find no-one at Bristol Temple Meads at all, just a half-filled lone coach waiting for us. For a bargain £15 we are given a slip of fragile blue paper that says RETURN on it and we pray that we manage to actually keep the thing dry enough to be recognised on the coach home.

The festival is practically full already. Of course, they must be here for the solstice, but really I think that people just want to get more for their pre-registration £150 lottery tickets. Normally on a Wednesday there is barely anything happening, just a few warm-up gigs in the crew bars, but this time there seem to be lots of tents with full line-ups already.

After finding out where my tent has been pitched (what luxury!) and admiring our amazing new stage we wander about, checking out what is new for this year and have a bit of a sit-down in the Groovy Movies tent that is showing some great old music videos. We leave when the DJ starts to impose arty wank on his captive audience, instead of the old jazz performances.

Somehow we wind up in the Jazz lounge where a trumpet player from Bristol is playing. It's great stuff, sort of trad vs acid jazz standards, impressive musicianship for the first thing we see. We pass by the Glitzy Baghags too, tearing it up in the Banyan Tree, an open mic tent that features a lot of great talent over the weekend. Hopefully we'll have time to come back here and hang out later on.

Later on in the evening, after putting up a bit of fencing to completely hide our backstage camping from public view, we visit the stone circle - which is rammed - for the only time during the festival. I suppose this is the place to be tonight, because everyone is planning to be here until dawn and the fire poi is well under way.

We leave at about 2am, just before the rain starts.

Thursday

We see an girl (Lianne Hall) playing electric guitar through a looper in a solar powered tent in the Healing fields. She is calming and does lovely songs. There is a bloke in the tent next door singing emo acoustic numbers and someone mournfully twanging a jaws harp by a tree.

By now the festival is rammed and it really has started. This year, Wednesday is Thursday and Thursday is Friday. What will tomorrow bring? We pass through the hippy fields and I shake off the philosophical thinking. We bump into some seriously deranged flower people doing some sort of Indian ritual in the tipi camp, digeridoos and drums. I bet they're all vegans but they're wearing leather. They are blessing the fields and celebrating love and nature and stuff. It's all a bit creepy.

Thursday's rain is intermittent and not too heavy. We cover most of the site, even venturing up to the new area - The Park - where I entirely fail to get up the big tower due to the queue being a mile long and me being short on patience. This year's version of the piss police are pretty entertaining, cheering men who emerge from the urinals as saviours of fish.

We try to look at all the art, because tomorrow is when the music starts and all of this miracle and wonder will become normal, the huge sandpit with amazing sculptures of naked people and lizards. The giant wicker dancers, not-so-Lost-any-more Vagueness, the anti nuclear wall of art, the Mutoid Waste crew building this years bizarre, grotesque creations.

In the evening we have our first taste of the fire show, as there is nothing really happening tonight they decide to do the dress rehearsal properly. We are assigned our roles, there are a lot of gas cylinders everywhere and we are supposed to watch them during the performance and switch them off if something goes wrong. We are shown how to do this, there is some discussion about who gets to sit by the biggest, hottest ones. We don't really know how to tell if something IS going wrong but Oh, you'll know! the mad German in charge assures us.

Some discussion later it is decided that this is actually too dangerous for us to do, we're trained fire stewards, not firemen and our job is to look after the crowd not the performers. If I jump over the fence and run, just follow me, I tell the punters nervously. I counted all the eyebrows on the crew though and there wasn't one missing - although those backstage might have painted theirs on.

There is an 'Incident' with Stuart Security, who are here because we're expecting large crowds for the fire show. Most of the crowd are sitting down, except where I am because there are a few big cameras around and you know what the paparazzi are like. So people start moaning at the back and ask the security man to tell people to sit down so everyone can see (Strictly speaking I should have been doing this, but give that we were at the edge I didn't think it mattered).

So this security guy gets to this particularly drunk bloke by me and asks him to sit down. The guy says he's quite happy standing thankyouverymuch, so the security guy (thick neck, huge arms, slightly mad look about him) says people have been complaining that they can't see. The drunk guy says, whatever and moves a bit closer to the man with the huge film camera next to him.

Security Troll starts screaming.

He uses a lot of colourful words to explain to the drunk guy (who can barely stand anyway) what he'd like to do to him and his mum. When the drunk guy, who probably thinks he's dreaming all this anyway, ignores him, the Troll grabs him and tries to force him to the ground. Hilariously, given his size, he fails and then the bloke sits down. THERE! I'm sitting down now, you happy? He shouts bravely.

Security Troll screams a lot more. I tell him to leave the guy alone and he swings round, eyes blazing. DON'T YOU FSCKING TOUCH ME! I'LL FSKING KILL YOU YOU LITTLE STEWARD CNUT! He yells. I flinch, a little but am saved trying to intervene further by the rest of the security trolls turning up and shouting at the poor drunk guy who is still sitting on the floor. They all stick up for their mate, who obviously must have been getting lip from 'this mouthy cnut', five huge trolls towering over a drunk - now terrified - man in a hat, who is cowering in the mud.

He is saved from all this by the security supervisor who whispers something in his ear and manhandles the Troll away. I assure him that if he wants to complain about it I'd be happy to get the guy sacked but he's too drunk to care. No wonder Stuart security have such a bad reputation if they treat festival goers like army privates. Don't they have any training in dealing with drunk people? Or is it all about screaming until you win and violence if you don't? A bit shaken and quite angry, I turn back to the show.

It is phenomenal, frightening and majestic, a bizarre story of mad scientists featuring 60 foot flames and a lot of water. The greatest pleasure from working this show is when the sirens die down at the beginning and they fire off the biggest flames. The noise is tremendous, the crowd cowers, even the nearby firemen jump and throw up their hands. The heat on us poor stewards down the front is incredible, albeit brief. Quite a nerve-racking experience all told, but the kinky outfits and big fire more than makes up for it.

Hot and bothered, we finish work at about 2am and sit around the campfire backstage for a bit. Everyone is a little bit shaken up but now we know what to expect it doesn't seem so bad, I'm sure tomorrow's performance will be fine.

Glastonbury 2007 Part 2

Friday

The vibrations of a huge samba band rouse me reluctantly from my slumber. They are the Carnival Collective and they are going to be our early morning (about 10-11am) wake up call for the weekend. Sure, they're a great band and I go to watch their set after my nice cooked breakfast, but WHO want's to be woken up by samba? The rest of the crew seem to agree as we grumpily struggle for coffee in our kitchen tent.

As the morning rain clears we escape the sunshine (what fools!) into a tiny tent to watch a hilarious Italian chef juggle various implements, including the obligatory rubber chicken. It is still sunny when we reach the Pyramid Stage, as Gogol Bordello kick off, but they soon herald the first huge downpour of Friday with some crazy Mano Negra style Latino punk. It's a good fun show, but the rain REALLY comes down. I wrap my camera in two plastic bags to keep it safe from the rain and endure the soaking.

At the Bandstand, Bill Smarme is playing with his band, a mixture of feelgood hillbilly country and blues. They sing to the rain and the mud and us poor sould standing in it. The audience thins as the rain picks up and there are only about eight of us left when Rose Kemp starts.

The set is marred not only by the rain, but one of the nearby stalls begins to blast out drum and bass just as I'm about to comment on how good they are at turning off their music for the little bandstand. Rose sings three songs a capella then gets off the stage as soon as she can. It is here that I discover that simply shoving my camera inside two Tescos bags is not enough and that it is somewhat broken. On the way to see Chumbawamba it goes through varying stages of brokenness, finally settling on the preview screen not working at all. We stop to watch a man swallow a sword.

Chumbawamba are surprisingly good, four-part harmony old English folk songs mixed with similar arrangements of some of their classic songs. The anarchists have grown old gracefully it seems, looking more like 70s Abba than anarchist punks.

Another gypsy band follows in the Avalon tent, Oi Va Voi who are more pop than punk, a kind of weird mixture of soul funk reggae and gypsy music. It's well received and pretty danceable. My mate was told to see The Cat Empire, so we wait for a bit but they seem to be really late and I can't hang around any longer because I have to rush off to see Toumani Diabate and the Symmetric Orchestra on the Jazz World stage.

Performance of the weekend. I know this as it happens, there will be nothing as good as this. The Allstars are from all over Africa and they all seem to revere Toumani Diabate, the performance being that they take it in turns to sit with the master and have lessons in musicianship. At the end of the quite frankly phenomenal performance, they all queue up to shake the great man's hand before leaving the stage. Incredible.

After a tasty dinner back at camp we settle into the evening's work. Bizarre dance group Zoid Productions perform second to last on the stage and I only get to see their freaky outfits from a distance. Before the fire show we have a 'performance' from the Festival Fire Swingers who are basically a bunch of random people who swing fire about a lot. Tonight they are accompanied by a sort of samba band that plays on bins and shopping trolleys and the like. Our job is to put them out if they catch fire, but it's tempting to run around with the extinguisher spraying each club and poi innocently shouting lookout! Fire!. The end of the show is a little performance by fire swinging group Solar, who have a few routines that look pretty.

I don't know, maybe we get de-sensitised to mere fire jugglers when there is so much other exciting stuff to be had. A couple of them are really good though and the fire whips look cool. There is a huge fire-breathing dragon up in the corner of the field that keeps eveyone entertained while waiting for the big show.

I am stationed in the middle at the front. This is a 'safe' six metres from the front rail and array of jets and hoses. There is some nervous shuffling as the girl who was there on Thursday said it was too hot and nobody really wanted to be that close. So I sort of end up there by default, ie I didn't pick anywhere else quickly enough. There is a girl standing next to me, right in front of the only six people in the crowd who are sitting down and she refuses to move, gets quite shirty when I ask and insists that she has been 'told' to stand exactly there, otherwise her film won't come out right. She ignores me when I point out that if it has to be that perfect, she isn't ACTUALLY standing right in the middle at all.

Five minutes into Eddie Egal's Pyromancer show and I'm watching the huge gas canisters under the front of the stage when there is a loud pop and the hoses start flapping about like crazy. The hiss of escaping gas is deafening and I'm standing there in my bright orange tabard with FIRE STEWARD written on it and a crowd of innocent punters behind me. The show hasn't really got going yet, we've had the big flames to start it off, but it's mainly water everywhere and the big crab thing is doing her dance. My mind races. I know I'm supposed to run up there and switch off the gas before something blows up but all I can think it what if it blows up?! There's six huge canisters there, if one goes, they all go. I'm frantically looking for one of the guys backstage (nonchalantly having a bit of a smoke) when their cameraman runs up and saves the day. So tonight's show has no brilliant display from the front, but it still has quite an impact.

Oh! The stories we tell around the fire! The drinking that commences after that shake-up! The weather has been fairly on and off today, maybe it's not going to be that bad after all.

Glastonbury 2007 Part 3

Saturday

Argh there they go again! Boom Boom Boom bang bang bang! Camping backstage has it's advantages too, but this? What TIME do you call this?

Oh, wait. It's 11am. Breakfast is bubble & squeak, tomatoes, beans and eggs. It's all veggie food in our camp, sadly. It's a good job I've brought a supply of pepperami to keep me going! I watch the morning performers go out, the tea ladies, pirates and amazing puppets (above) and I watch these kids skating on the huge half pipe that's been built next to our back gate. Folky tap dancers Shindig keep me entertained before I wander off to the bandstand again to support some more local Bristolians.

Bath band The Ash Mandrake Project are on when we arrive, it's drizzling again and they play some pretty unusual songs, a sort of cross between folky country and African music on djembe, guitar and flute. Jeremy Smoking Jacket play a great set, looping noises over which Rose Kemp's beautiful voice rings hauntingly out over the muddy field. A small damp crowd gathers and I promote the fire show to any fellow Chokers who will listen.

Then it's time for the big trek to the top field and the new section of Glastonbury, The Park. There is a queue outside the Orange phone charging tent a mile long. Surely it's not worth waiting now? Just come back later, losing your mates is what festivals are all about! Or used to be.

It's pouring when we arrive and we take refuge in the Stonebridge bar where they're having hip hop Karaoke. I mock the naughty fire steward who has her nose buried in a book for the entire 30 minutes we are there. Bad fire steward, what if someone catches fire? They do seem to be a bit overstaffed in the bar, something to do with the rain, I'm sure. We are driven out by some awful dance noise from the new DJ and go to check out Ed Harcourt, who is pretty good, he has some nice summery songs anyway and the rain stops for a moment.

A security jeep tries to cross the field - patches of which are foot-deep mud traps - and ends up going mostly sideways, spraying all the hippies behind it with thick, wet clay. The mud in this field is the worst yet, the field isn't very flat so you slide all over the place, I walk along clinging to the heras fencing, squashing the last, brave blades of grass into the mud.

When Ed Harcourt finishes I seize my chance to shine and begin to play a piano that someone has put under a shelter in the field. I do Le Moulin and a couple of other Yann Tiersen pieces, which receive a standing ovation and gather a huge crowd. Well not really. But a couple of people stop to listen and my captive audience (where there are seats, there will be people) all say it's very nice.

Lou Rhodes is amazing. She has such a uniquely husky alto voice and she sings beautiful songs. There is plenty of straw in front of the stage so we get to sit down (what luxury!) and the rain fails to put a damper on the music. It feels like the sun is shining and for a moment at least I don't mind that the rain is starting to soak through my coat.

Another long walk later, past the horrific guitar pop of Babyshambles on the other stage, we find the most impressive mud puddle yet in the Dance Village. This is all in the flood plains and there is a 15cm layer of light brown mud about the consistency of a milkshake that we have to wade through. There is a stall in the middle of the mud plain selling fresh croissants to dance fans. The techno and drum and bass is ringing out over the field but we're only interested in getting into the big dance tent, to see the great DJ Yoda.

He's alright I suppose, not nearly as great as he should have been, given that his last album is astounding. There are none of those songs here, just an empty stage and a demonstration of masterful video DJ-ing. He cuts up films and mixes them with old classic songs, the videos scratch when he does, it's very impressive. There is a big BUT though. The set is more geared towards getting cheers and being clever than producing a coherent soundtrack to dance to. Each piece lasts about a minute and just when you've got into it he throws a spanner in the works and does something completely different. It's all a bit confusing really. Still, I'm glad I saw it, the man's a genius but I wish he'd had some guests and done some proper tunes.

Maximo Park are shrieking away as we head home for dinner, pausing in the glade near some weeing people to see what Dreadzone are up to these days. Not much, by the looks of things - there was hardly any dub and it looks like this is another great dance band that's gone a little bit too pop. There is no queue at the Orange tent, see what could have been achieved with a little patience? Young people today, I don't know...

The drizzly rain clears up again for Eddie Egal, we've been telling everyone that tonight is the last night because, well, it is and there is a good amount of people here. Again I'm not quick enough and end up right in the middle at the front but I don't mind so much this time, as long as nothing starts hissing or blowing up. We've also just been told that Eddie has to use up all his gas tonight, and plans on 'having a bit of a play' with the gas until it's all gone about half an hour after the show, so we'll be working until about half past three tonight.

It goes really well. Nothing blows up, nothing goes wrong. The fire shower and the naked man running around being chased by girls with flamethrowers gets a few shrieks and laughs, the most amazing thing in the show is right at the end when a lone fountain is left on stage, with the top burning away. It's a wonder of science, I tell thee!

This is only the sixth time they've done this particular show and they've taken a few things on board like MORE FIRE and LESS p1ssing about at the beginning before the fire! when it's all finished we stand about in the cold, although it's still not raining while the performers mess around taking promotional photos.

They mess around with the gas quite a lot, everyone having a go on the buttons but they get bored after about 15 minutes and don't bother trying to finish off. The two girls come out and wave their flamethrowers around, little realising, or caring, that they show us their nipples everytime they reach up into the air. I'm sure that'll be on the extras in the DVD! The dancing and the sexy girls are all well and good, but what we really want is Big, scary FIRE!

One of the things about wearing the orange jacket is that everyone seems to want to talk to you, which is sometimes quite rewarding in a smug sort of a way. A man talks to me at great length about how he's come to every Glastonbury for the last ten years only this year he couldn't get a ticket so he wrote to Michael and complained and Michael said he was terribly sorry, here, have some on the house. He came to see the fire show twice. They're insane! A woman says, They MUST be German!

Yes, I say. They are.

Glastonbury 2007 Part 4

Sunday

At breakfast one of my colleagues, whom we shall call 'C' asks if she could come out with us today, to see bands that I've never heard of before. Of course we rejoice in the opportunity to evangelise although we're also entering uncharted territory with our first band of the day.

Babyhead are finishing up on the Jazz World stage as we arrive in time to here a couple of funky chords and a Thank You Glastonbury! The day's rain starts and we take refuge in a nearby beer tent that shocks me by not having any peoper beer left. I grudgingly accept some lager and we watch the rain come down while we wait for the gypsies.

Mahala Rai Banda are fantastic, they all seem to have great fun and play a frenzied selection of Eastern European reels and songs. There is some debate afterwards as to what could possibly be as good as that, we decide to forgo the Marley Brothers on the Pyramid and opt for the Avalon tent again.

We are in time to see a few songs by Jeff Lang, who plays slide guitar accompanied by acoustic bass. He is pretty amazing too, great solos and semi-acoustic slide blues rock ringing out in the usually quite folky tent. Lang is a happy accident, for we came to see electro-folksters Tunng, whom we recently missed a few weeks ago in Bristol. They are a funny bunch of hippies, but their songs are compelling and quite beautiful at times. A strange marriage of folky sensibilities and electronica, that's for sure!

We could have stayed where we were and got a good seat for Billy Bragg, but for some reason I think Dame Shirley Bassey is on an hour earlier than she actually is and we all trudge through the mud to the pyramid stage only to find that she isn't and we have to wait an hour, somewhere as I have no wish to hear James Morrison, although a little bit bleeds into my ears by accident.

In a fit of near-decision-making, we go to the Queen's Head in search of new exciting bands (brain still not working properly - this is a Q Magazine sponsored stage) and find it almost empty and playing terrible music. We decide to head home along the railway line to see what everyone else is doing. On the way a man runs past us shouting Naked Mud Wrestling This Way! He himself is NOT naked, I note, there is a decided lack of naked people this year, I couple of mud bras around but that's about it. So we go and have a look.

They're not naked either! It's quite funny and there's potential for nudity but we quickly get bored and drift away. Backstage we discover that everyone has already left to see the Dame and we rush off again, a bit weary now we've walked in a big circle.

The Pyramid field is completely packed, the sun comes out, Hey Big Spender is roaring out across the phenomenally large crowd and we come to a halt at a fairly good vantage point about half a mile away from the stage. I rarely watch bands from here, but there really is no way we'd be able to get closer than this. Periodically we get driven into by tractors and there is a lot of talking going on around us, but Shirley does us proud with some great songs.

Before the evening's work we check out the London Community Gospel Choir, play a really rushed set culminating in that old classic Oh Happy Day. They are still really good but it would have been nice to have had more than four songs. A light rain begins outside and I hang about in front of our stage, watching all the things I haven't had a chance to see yet, like Ceilidh band Cut a Shine who get everyone square dancing in front of the stage and turn everybody against me by demanding I join in to make up the numbers. Come on steward! They yell, Don't be a spoilsport! You'll be pleased to know that my professionalism stands fast and I decline politely.

One of the bands I've been hearing all weekend, playing twice a day on our stage and in the Belle Epoque tent is Siyaya, who are from Zimbabwe. They play mainly Marimbas and sound like an old 64-bit computer game playing brilliant African music. They do dances and little stories as well and really get you dancing. I have their songs in my head for at least a week after the festival.

Some girl sings some singer-songwriter songs, I have no idea who she is, but she claims to be able to play rock on an acoustic and promptly fails to do so, although her songs are pretty good. We have a brief fire show from the Solar people again, made quite exciting by one of them throwing her burning hula hoop towards the audience and for a second I think that I might actually have to use the extinguisher. It falls short, but it was a close one.

From here, the dance stage is all geared towards a performance from Bill Bailey. We're expecting a huge crowd, which will make a nice change as the rain has put a bit of a damper on things this time round. We rebuild the crash barrier so that people will be able to lean on it without falling over. The stewards are stationed inside this barrier so that we can rescue people if there's a crush. We've spent the last hour or so spreading straw all over the mud so that it's not too treacherous, we've all had our wee breaks and I get myself some earplug since I'm right in front of the speakers.

Finally, the The Jaipur Kawa Brass Band have a proper audience! It's 11pm and they do their last show to a record audience, which is great because they're incredible and the crowd loves it. Where have you been all weekend? I think bitterly. The Killers can't be as good as this.

There is a bit of a wait before the Great Man turns up, the compere is hounded with calls of Do A Dance! Do A Dance! as he tells people to make friends with the person next to you, give them 20p because it's the nicest thing you'll ever do in your life. Half an hour later, 20p is being passed around the crowd and spirits are high.

Bill Bailey appears, does a kind of mixture of old material and a bit of new stuff, the usual smattering of hilarious songs and jibes at the mudmonkeys. I am so close I can smell him. There is no trouble from the crowd, although a chant breaks out at the back about not being able to hear. It is p1ssing down again, but this time Mr Bailey has a proper roof over his head and so do I.

Later, after everybody has gone and this couple have stopped talking at me about how much they enjoyed themselves and did I see this and is this the muddiest one ever and how the wife has a congenital bladder disorder, we go to get drunk in the backstage theatre bar where an amazing blues band hammers the final nail into the coffin of fun. Or something.

There is an obligatory drunken mud fight which I DIDN'T START and about ten minutes of sleep before the rain drums me awake at about 11am.

Monday

We make it to the bus queue by about 1pm, trudging wearily through the trenches of an utterly destroyed farm. The cinema field is unsurprisingly mud-free, I doubt it was very popular this time round. The bus queues are inexplicable and confusing, it is still raining and our particular one doubles back on itself about five times. We only have to wait an hour and a half before making onto the coach, half sleeping for the two hour journey back to civilisation.

At Bristol Temple Meads there is a big line of discarded wellies, a sad testament to the effectiveness of Glastonbury's environmental campaigning. Oh sure, it all seems like a good idea out in the field, but when you get back to the city you just don't care anymore, do you?

Ah well, great fun was had by all. Three washes gets the mud out of my clothes and I settle down to watch all the bits I missed on the internet.