My bigass V2008 report

[kaliha]

So, to carry on from my last post, I left Stratford straight after breakfast to get a train back to Brum and from them onto Wolverhampton where my charriot awaited me to take me off to the V Festival.

It was £10 to park! That's just extortionate.

Leaving the car in a muddy field we headed off down to the arena. Because I was sensible I'd donned wellies was was happily splashing through the puddles. His Lordship on the other hand was in his trainers and not very impressed.

As we walked down His Lordship suddenly went "That's Gwen!" I looked around trying to spot my best mate a bit confused until His Lordship added "her from Torchwood!" I didn't see her but His Lordship is convinced it was she (which is a bit strange, isn't she filming Torchwoo! S3 at the moment?) He even said that she had the little gap in her teeth and everything.

Got in really easily although there was a monster queue of people with wristbands queueing to get in, but only two people waiting in the ticket queue. Hoorah!


It was very muddy.


All this was green, green grass yesterday. It wasn't actually too bad near the stages, but all the main through routes where just mired.

Currently playing in the background are The Futureheads (Hounds of Love in fact).


It's Shed 7!! It's like it's 1993 all over again. OMG! (I didn't even realise they were still going).

This year V had a really nifty little mobile phone widget you could download that had all the band/group times and stages on so you could plan your band viewing, it even let you know if there was a clash. Brilliant.


His Lordship was a bit put out by all the mud.


The Hold Steady. I liked them. (They apparently don't like Muse though)


I liked the keyboard player's curly moutache. Sadly the photo didn't come out very well.



There are stalls selling EVERYTHING! That's a fiver though.


The lovely Paul Heaton ex of the Beautiful South and his lyrics on a music stand.


The blurriness on the stage are the Dykeenies. I think they are Scottish. I don't know what gives it away. The lead singer had very nice arms. They were okay.


It's Maximo Park! Paul Smith looking a lot more dapper than the last time we saw him (see my ATP2008 report) in a natty purple suit and a shirt he'd obviously stolen from Harry Hill. (What are the chances of that happening?)


By where we were standing a big pool of mud had formed which people were diving into with hilarious consequences. His Lordship was disappointed by the lack of female mud wrestling.

After The Park had finished we went to get some food (donuts to share, they were nice but were 4 for £3, noodles for me and an Australian kebab for His Lordship and we went up a hill a bit to one of those little enclosed food areas with tables and chairs and 'performance artists' There was a strange little band singing that Doctor Who song from the nineties.

We watched The Kooks from a distance whilst scoffing our grub.


I was surprisingly unmuddy. Unlike most of the attendees.


The Empty Child was having it large.

(Are you my mummy?)


A poor abandoned hat.


Fear my brilliant photography skills! This is the Stereophonics. Honest.


It's Kelly from Stereophonics! I really enjoyed the Stereophonics set. They played a lot of really old stuff (they opened with The Bartender and the Thief *\o/* the crowd went crazy) we even got a Thousand Trees and Boy in a Photograph which I've not heard them play live in literal years!


Setting up for Muse they kept having Windows errors. Lol.


The opening was very The War of the Worlds. I don't think Jeff Wayne would have minded though. Then it moved very neatly into Map of the Problematique. I saw singing my little heart out.


Yay it's Dom. Sadly the only photo of him I managed to get. In the big white glow at the front of the stage is Matt blasting out Supermassive Black Hole.


All the dishes moved around and flashed and had stuff projected onto them. it was really ace. I think this was Dead Star.


The Best Song called Newborn no matter what His Lordship says.


"Lasers"
This is Hysteria. The crowd went balmy, bouncing around and stuff.


A bit of Butterflies and Hurricanes - I cheered, I love this song.


A rubbish picture of Chris. Butterflies and Hurricanes is very long, so I took a few pictures from it, plus I liked the black and white pictures on the screen with the green and blue light show.


See?


I'm not sure which song this is. I don't think this is in order. I think this is Take a Bow which was later on in the set.


Can you spot tiny!Matt? These are definitely out of order, this is Space Dementia.


A very rubbish picture of my favourite bit in Feeling Good (obviously performed a lot betterer than when I did it).


You could spot all the people in the crowd who first got into Muse via Time is Running Out because they went crazy when it started.


Stokholm Syndrome. I likes this song.


More Stockholm Syndrome. However, this song will be forever marred now thanks to the Scouse girl who squatted down beside me and started peeing on the ground. :/ I called her a dirty fucking bitch before walking off. The toilets were fifty yards away. Actually she wasn't the only one up to that sort of mischief. We had the misfortune during the day of standing near two other sets of Scousers (blokes this time) who were just peeing on the floor where they stood. I am very disappointed in the Scouse people, at least everyone else goes off to pee against the fences or a handy tree.


Take a Bow had bonus 'Bliss Balloons' which got caught in a gust of wind and ended up behind the stage again. It was like V2000 all over again! Ahh, the happy memories.


Plug in Baby! I leapt around like a mad, crazy thing.


I think this was the very start of Knights of Cydonia. We didn't stay to watch because we wanted to get back to the car to go home. It was cold and wet and I was getting nippy. Plus His Lordship had to get up for work at 5am the next morning.

We got back to the car for about 11.10pm, It was 1.51am before we left Weston Park and we were less than 500 yrds from the exit onto the A5, I could see it from where the cat sat. The traffic management is is absolutely awful at V.

This is probably going to be my last V festival. I'm sick of tired of the minority of grotty people who go to it and just spend their entire stay being absolutely obnoxious and the hell of getting out of the car park. (Remind me that I said that the next time I go okay).

Comments

[th-esaurus.livejournal.com]

It was so unmuddy at Hylands I didn't even have to wear my wellies. Ho ho ho.

[--kali--.livejournal.com]

:p

The mud gave it that added festival feel. It was a bit like Glastonbury only a lot smaller :D Plus every music fan should suffer a horrible, rainy, muddy festival of hell to make them appreciate all the really good non-muddy ones (like Summer Sundae or ATP)

[th-esaurus.livejournal.com]

I was glad because it would have made me miiiiiserable ):

[--kali--.livejournal.com]

I put up with it because my reward was going to be over an hour and a half of Muuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuse!

[sadiebee123.livejournal.com]

ahh, i need to see muse again sometime, somehow! i saw them not long after absolution came out in the basement of this dark little club, and while it was quite fun it certainly didn't have all of the epic lights and screens!

festivals always seem to have their share of gross people. good bands, though! good thing you brought your wellies too. :D

[acestar.livejournal.com]

Were you around during the Lostprophets set where a couple of girls streaked in the mud puddle? Ian Watkins declared that it was a 'proper festival now' in that gorgeous Welsh lilt of his.

Ah, Muse. Your photos have made me grin like a loon all over again!

[aknockout.livejournal.com]

AHH MUSE LOOK SO GLORIOUS.


Haha that Yorkshire pudding stall sign is so stereotypically British. SAUSAGE AND MASH!

[livii.livejournal.com]

Great report! And Hex would tell off all those Scousers giving him a bad name...

[circe-tigana.livejournal.com]

you win at muse.

why won't they play a gig on my kitchen table? WHY?

[--kali--.livejournal.com]

muse win at being Muse. I've heard tell that they've done a song with Mike Skinner.

[circe-tigana.livejournal.com]

they have. they claim it leaked accidentally. all a bit of a lark apparently.

i am looking for excellent slightly manly pictures of dominic howard btw as i want to base a character on his appearance. any recs?

[blythely.livejournal.com]

it's a bit rubbish, it is, but hilarious.

[blythely.livejournal.com]

Their set sounded like a wishlist come true :D Yaye for enduring mud and pee for wee rock gods!

[--kali--.livejournal.com]

I was a bit sad at the lack of stuff from Showbiz but on Tuesday Jo Wiley played Unintended on her show which made up for it.

[blythely.livejournal.com]

lololol I can't think of Unintended without thinking of the ~~~~~emo~~~~~ video.

[moobub.livejournal.com]

Oh wow, mud ahoy! when i last went in 2005 it was so hot and dry, i got burnt within 20 mins of crawling out my tent. Stereophonics.. mm*drools* Thousand trees is one of my favourite songs too

[chicklet73.livejournal.com]

I know you were utterly knackered after this, but wow - it really does look like fun! Even the mud. (said, of course, by someone who didn't have to be in it, right?)

Also LOLing at the Windows errors...*snerk*