10 things we learnt at Bestival
- By Matt Proud -
- Sep 11, 2012
1. Too much dubstep
This year’s Bestival line-up was, both on paper and in person, an absolute joy to behold. A fantastic mix of acts ensured that there was something for each and every one of the diverse crowd. However the number of times you’d walk into a tent and hear dubstep was utterly infuriating, there’s nothing particularly offensive about the genre, but at times it felt like we were drowning in it. Although it might all be a distant memory next year, Trap is on its way…
2. Getting old sucks
One day, you'll walk in to a festival feeling like you could still pass as young, only to walk away a few days later feeling rusty and ready for the scrapheap. The boys look evermore boyish, but you don't and you'll soon never understand why they're all wearing those funny little hats and those funny patterned trousers. One moment you were tearing around the festival hoovering up everything in sight and the next you're content with an iced latte and, as a real treat after dark, a lovely warm free-range beef and organic vegetable pastie. Kill me. Kill me now.
3. No natural splendour, no festival licence
Bestival is located in the centre of a grassy-green bowl and surrounded by miles of luscious countryside… there's even a huge wood right in the middle of the site with huge net hammocks and loads of scary things going on too. Therefore, lakes, rolling hills and thick forests should be a prerequisite for UK Festival licence granters granting all future UK-based festival licences. If you don't have natural splendour and things to climb up, in or out of then it's just not getting rubber stamped from now on, OK?
4. Pack pants, not much else
When you're packing for a festival, you only need one pair of red pants to last you for the full weekend and a fresh pair of socks for each bleary morning as a treat. Everything else in your bag is futile and unnecessary, except for your favourite Ray-Bans, which mask your tired eyes and should never, ever leave your sight.
5. Hang out with The XX
Not everyone knows how it feels to be in the coolest, bestest band in the whole-wide-world a few moments after they've played their only UK festival appearance in the same week as their awesome new album has been released. That's why it's always important to seize the moment when you get the chance to hang out on the side of stage with 66.6% of The XX to watch the remaining 33.3% (the wonderful Jamie XX) perform a late night set to a fully-functioning roller disco #rockDJ.
6. Tuck into the buffet
Bestival is a buffet. A wonderful buffet like the one your Mum does at Christmas and invites the neighbours over just to show them that a better buffet's going on next door. The wonderful blend of headliners (with Florence, New Order and Stevie Wonder plating up as the weekend's turkey, ham and beef) and vast array of colourful little tents, bars and clubs are studded jewels in the hillside, each waiting to be discovered, divided and devoured.
7. Can I have your number?
If you're sozzled and you get some hot girl's number as you're leaving a club, it's definitely still fine if you forget that you just got it off them and then, almost immediately, head back in to hunt them down to get it again. Yeah, sure… get it twice - that's what playing safe really means y'know? She won't find that odd at all and she'll definitely call to meet up the next day.
8. Chances are, you're going to get robbed
Even if you don't believe in fate, or god(s), or any greater being at all (other than Morrissey), it's still not recommended to tempt the Powers That Be with an irreverent smugface quip such as "In all of my many festivals, I have never had anything stolen from my tent". You will only return to your tent a few hours after said smugface quip to witness post-apocalyptic scenes from the Topman Christmas-sale as your strewn denim shirts, denim jeans and denim wet wipes lay dejected amongst the crestfallen canvas chaos. Someone has stolen your fake Ray-Bans and your spare Blackberry charger.
9. Be careful on the toboggan run
It doesn't matter how excited you are, how many Cool Runnings in-jokes you make to yourself whilst you queue or how seriously you convince yourself that you could go pro if you had the time: you are only as good as the person in front of you when you ride the big metal bobsleigh track which entwines the south side of the Bestival site. If the person in front of you is dressed as a peacock, has a 'bad leg' and is terrified of speed then the chances are that the £4 you just spent would have been better spent on a pint instead. SHE RUINED MY GOLDEN CHANCE.
10. Stevie Wonder doesn't love you
If Stevie Wonder ever calls to say he loves you, he's probably dialled in error (he won't have your number) - though he definitely means it if he calls you twice.
By Matt Proud. Tweets at @mafyoo
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