Beginning of long-term relationship or weekend fling?!
- Sep 02, 2008
When looking at the vast array of festivals the summer offers on these shores alone, the only way to find your own niche is to voyage relentlessly until no stone is left unturned (or at least until the following festival season when another colossal wave of up-and-coming weekend shindigs are destined to battle it out to get hold of any loose change on the credit card). V Festival, lying a stones-throw from the Reading Weekend has, in previous years, been some vague form of weekend of rest but with the draw this year of Muse, Hot Chip, Kings of Leon and The Prodigy, it blows the August bank holiday knees-up's retro metal fest out of the water both on eclecticism and on sheer fire power (fitting that Liam Howlett's The Prodigy should headline the 4music stage as it was they who proclaimed themselves to be 'Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned'- a statement that defines this year's V fest fittingly).
Carrying the baggage of an 8-hour jet-lag, a hangover following a somewhat debauched night mingling, kissing and cavorting about with the likes of Biffy Clyro, Pussycat Dolls and Duffy (all kissing involving Biffy Clyro's Simon Neil) as well as a mammoth mound of camping equipment that never seems as luxurious once all set up...
Beyond the gates of Hylands Park, all expectations are but blank canvases, awaiting musical strokes. Chelmsford serves up the expected (or at least the images portrayed by The Prodigy) with the addition of a Marks & Spencers. The eccentric beast that is this year's bill grabs attention from the moment of purchasing a slightly extortionate laminate and doesn't let go until Richard Ashcroft & co. strum their last; from Siouxsie's human interpretation of an escaped peacock parading through a scrap yard to Richard Hawley's versions of love songs that make Valentine's Day seem 100% respectable back to the Radio 1 A-list of The Pigeon Detectives and Scouting for Girls the mixed sonic sack holds something in store for well, almost anyone.
A feat with around the same probability as 2 days of sunshine at a British festival, a feat only foiled at the final hurdle. The heavens open just as the Chemical Brothers drop their last 'block rockin' beat', Kaiser Chiefs bellow 'Ruby' for the 89th time and The Verve's orchestra of several hundred synthetic violins synchronize, feeding the dying embers of their indisputable reign over this year's festival circuit. Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, whether consciously or subconsciously you're beating your heart out, word for word.
