Dry #
22 August 1998
Woken at 6am by some noisy scousers in the adjacent tent. I wouldn’t mind, but I was kept awake most of the night by people shouting “bollocks”, and to be honest the joke is starting to wear a bit thin. Oh well, never mind, it’s a lovely day and we’re off to see some bands sing some pop songs - hurrah!
V98 is a by and large a pleasant, well-behaved festival. As you might expect from an event sponsored by Richard Branson, it attracts a mix of youngsters and yuppies. Everybody has a mobile phone and cleans their teeth in Evian - how civilized. By around 12:30 we’ve pitched a place in front of the main stage and got the first round of beers in. The prices for food and drink are a bit steep (£2 for a burger, £2.50 if you want a slice of processed cheese on it), but you have to expect that really.
“Today’s music festivals are indistinguishable from conferences to discuss new developments in mobile phone design.”
– Simon Deee, Dddd fanzine
First band up are Headswim, about whom I’m totally apathetic, so I just relax, drink some Caffrey’s and soak up some sun. Next on, though, are Rialto, who I quite like, so I sit up and take note. Their songs are quite enjoyable, especially Monday Morning 5:19, so I resolve to pick up their CD if I’m ever in a record store unable to find anything else to buy. You know how it is:
“You can spot the vinyl addicts because after a while they get fed up with the rack they are flicking through, march over to a completely different section of the shop, pull a sleeve out from the middle of somewhere, and come over to the counter; this is because they have been making a list of possible purchases in their head (‘If I don’t find anything in the next five minutes, that blues compilation I saw half an hour ago will have to do’), and suddenly sicken themselves with the amount of time they have wasted looking for something they don’t really want.”
– Nick Hornby, High Fidelity (1995)
Feeder pop up next, and bore me silly. In fact we just chatted and drank and tried to ignore them. Not an easy feat. They were followed by the Stereophonics, who were OK, but didn’t really live up to the hype. Or maybe it’s just me?
By now it was about 4pm, and I was still waiting to see something really enjoyable, so rather than hang around for James, we trotted off to the NME stage to catch theaudience. Ah, how funny we thought we were when Sophie announced “Hi, we’re theaudience”, and we responded “No! We’re the audience!”. And young Sophie Ellis-Bextor is simply unfeasibly cute - especially when you consider who her mother is! ;)
I sadly missed most of The Dandy Warhols set due to being stuck in a very long queue at the beer tent. How annoying. But I was back to see the delectable Saffron of Republica bouncing around the stage - wouldn’t have missed that for the world.
A brisk walk back to the main stage enabled us to catch the undisputed highlight of the festival - Robbie Williams. What an entertainer. Then back to the NME stage once more for PJ Harvey. Unfortunately my mind begins to draw a blank here. I guess I really should have eaten something (apart from promotional Twiglets) during the day, but I was determined to avoid using the portable toilets. Unfortunately this meant that the beer kinda went to my head. When I woke up I was sat on the floor of the dance tent, where All Saints were coming to the end of their set. I staggered out and sat against a barrier. Eventually Jampot and The Wuss found me, and we slowly walked back to the tent, with occasional stops for me to, well, you know. Apparently whilst I’d been sat on the floor of the dance tent, a “thirty-something stocky bloke who looked like a builder and could trample any one of us” walked into me and spilled three pints of beer, before calmly walking off. Ooopsy. So, if you are that guy, I’d like to apologise, and say a big thank you for not trampling on me :)