GLASTONBURY 2002 – Saturday
Up and away by five to ten
for the sake of Radio4, and for all my camping-mate harrying (I’m not sure of
the late-for-radio entry-etiquette, but I don’t wanna risk it), we arrived at
the Cabaret Tent well before the 10:15 start – there being NO-ONE around to
slow us down, given the hour – Roger & I had time to buy milk from a
helpfully-just-appeared tractor (50p! the cheapest pint onsite!) before making
our way into the LOOSE ENDS arena, just as introductions were being made. (I
believe I may have accidentally 
skipped to my place when I heard the name
Ross Noble[1].)
Also guesting this morning are Steve Gribben – who plays us a song about
‘Reefer Madness’ – and Glenn Tilbrook of Squeeze – who doesn’t – the
astonishingly dull (Mrs Jonathan Dimbleby) Bel Mooney being terribly Right On
about organic foods, Arabella Churchill who once contemplated a face-lift after
having been marooned at sea for 13 hours (I thought this was because her skin
had suffered terrible prune-wrinkling during her submersion, but apparently
not), and John Otway, who looked accountant-normal until his guitarist started
strumming, at which point he ripped his shirt open and began flinging himself
about epileptically (and elliptically) singing his One Hit. Last up (?) was
Ross; asked to talk for seven minutes (and 
preferably about the festival), he
surpasses himself. Topics covered include, in no particular order; the
surround-sound Glastonbury percussion (lending the entire festival a sluggish
‘Countdown’ feel), his sleeping arrangements (his caravan is sinking into the
mud, where it could germinate, leading to a flourishing caravan city in 2003),
a giant caravan-loving pig (with a deep-bass-throbbing heart-beat), the pigeon
on a stick (currently causing him much bemusement[2]),
decoy flamingos (he owns one, and was lucky to snatch it up), almost being
blinded by a pinging Otway button (perhaps lost on the radio audience but hey),
the BBC Balloon (as flown by a man known ‘intimately’ by one of Ross’ fans),
and the fact that last time he was here he was scheduled against Bowie (and so
played to one man who hated David, and a dog – in Ziggy make-up – who’d
probably have quite liked to have been there). In fact, it’s all going terribly
well, until Ross announces he’s to be on in this tent at 6:00, which is before
the show goes out on Radio4, thus revealing ‘Loose Ends’ to be pre-recorded and
Ned Sherrin to be a liar…
From there to the theatre
fields, for the sake of some poetry, following the progress of the
multi-coloured balloon being dragged to a small string enclosure in the centre
of the field, as it 
slowly picks up pace, and is manoeuvred
around in a circle via dextrous use of rope. (“It’s like riding school training
lessons for people who are afraid of horses…”) Soon, it is swarming with kids.
We watch, transfixed, as we realise the secret to children’s entertainment
(previously thought to a tortoise on a stick – get yourself to the Kids Field
for more information) is a giant inflatable ball which they can a) chase b) lie
down in front of. Roger & Nigel wander off (Ani DiFranco is on the Pyramid
Stage), and even though I’m half an hour early for the act of my choosing (now
I’m here I’m staying put) I head into the Theatre Tent… and fairly speedily
turn round to come back out again. Well I can’t be doing with the puppets. So I
sit outside it, serenaded by a song about poor baby who was flushed don the loo
(can you guess what they rhymed with ‘loo’…?), watching the world go by. Which
means, for every knot of people in baggy jeans or twat-hats, there are Nora
Batty tea-ladies or ball-gowned Cinderellas. Within minutes, I’m passed by two
acrobats, a duck, and three men in full Cavalier velvet breeches regalia, one
being pulled along in a chariot suspiciously reminiscent of a wheeled armchair.
I’m also half-listening to a man behind the hedge telling children about the
wild animals he has hidden from view (“who wants to see my tiger?” “whooo”
“she’s in here somewhere” “whooo” “oh no – kids, my tiger’s escaped!”
“aaaargh”), a man who I later learn had been accosted the night before by an
irate mashed-out hippie, demanding he set the animals free, refusing to 
(fuck off or) believe there were no
animals, as the gorilla could be clearly seen. This story was told by JOOLZ,
the poet from round my way who’s hauled herself from slumber to be with us at
11:45 in the morning, to tell us tales about waving at Ice-T from a forlorn
pavement puddle and the cheap jewellery her home town advertises as providing
“style like Beckham, price like Bradford”. She reads out five chunks of bleak
numbing prose – on becoming inured to the sight of teenage prostitutes, on the
wretched unhappiness of feral children brought into civilised captivity, on
freezing with frostbite on a Calgary bench because in the ice-crystal cold
there’s a glimpse of dancing angels – but it’s interspersed with wry chirpiness
(and a sly observational way of going about things that always reminds me of
Victoria Wood). She mocks the onsite over-40’s to be found wiggling
enthusiastically outside a funky clothing shop to loud dance music (when they’d
secretly prefer an Adam Ant soundtrack), expresses sympathy for anyone pitched
in the 
Beirut area of the campsite beneath all
the fireworks, and thanks us for our early morning applause (harder to glean
than from a late night audience, who’d “clap anybody juggling wet fish”). Ah,
but it’s the least she’s owed…
Past the inflatable
penguin enclosure and back to the tent for a spot of lunch, via a couple of
stalls; 6 earrings & a Terry Pratchett later, I find myself stuck in
traffic behind a Massive Ali G as I go (no really). Frosties-fuelled sit down
for an hour or so, and then back down the corrugated metal tracks to the
Cabaret Tent (where I, in the company of one Ross Noble, was able to
contemplate the spectacularly dangerous stepladder antics of JOHN OTWAY),
briefly following two lads en route who were berating their friend for
remembering to bring the beer BUT NOT the bananas…
Now. I last saw BEN NORRIS
supporting Tommy Tiernan, when they came to Bristol (& mocked the Tim Roth
H&M adverts) around eighteen months ago. Then, the most memorable 
portion of his set was, as today, the
Shakespearean porn material. Though I now realise what the Watershed gig was
missing; there’s nothing like sitting in a tent next to an eight year old (with
a clump of toddling munchkins down the front) to really give a kick to lines
such as “I’m like a soak-ed sponge and have cometh thrice.” And this for a set
being recorded for radio. (I’m not sure how much of it can/will be used, when
the main concession to public broadcast was a sprinkling of circuitously polite
phrases such as “lady place”…) Norris seems bent on winning the audience over
with cheeky laddism – and exhortations to inflict terrible cruelty on the Naked
Chef – but he’s at his best when rays of a sarcastic intelligence are allowed
to shine through; admitting he’s “on the periphery of lad culture” because of
his use of words like “periphery”, wondering over the etymology of “mugging”
(as hitting people with your spare-change cup is truly “pro-active begging”),
or bemoaning his ex’s accusation that he’s a procrastinator (“I had to go and
look it up…eventually”). So much better’n stagnating jokes as old as the
front-row audience…
And then – after a brief
theatrical interlude whereupon two drama students braved the storm of
indifference to portray the lives of bouncers and the myriad
simpering/beef-caked fools they encounter in a night’s work, courtesy of HOP
THEATRE – a singing Yorkshireman took to the stage, armed with an acoustic
guitar and the power of 
poetry. Perhaps RORY MOTION doesn’t
really own a coal-fired Fender Stratocaster as he promised us. Still. He is
well capable of paraphrasing Ted Hughes (teeth…dark…ouch…pike), playing a
xylophone with his head (and the aid of some specialised headgear), singing an
ode to Daz in the style of Pink Floyd, and finding the fun in fungus (“you call
it ly-ken, I call it litch-en, let’s call the whole thing moss”). (Which more’n
makes up for the what if Kerouac had been from the Dales – would “On’t Road”
have achieved cult status? – joke…) He finished with a re-working of the
‘Arthur And The Lion’ poem, in which young Mr Ramsbottom ends up in a rave
instead of the Big Cats enclosure, but suffers for it nonetheless. Given that
the greater proportion of the weekend’s performers have mentioned getting
ripped to the tits on various pharmaceuticals, it was quite pleasant for
Motion’s drug references to come wrapped in a rhyme scheme…
Motion was followed by the
musical BROTHERS KALAMARI, of whom my notes say nothing. Instead, I have a tiny
scrawled ponderance over why every single CocaCola purchased over the course of
the weekend has been intended for drinkers other than our English summery
selves; German bottles, Polish cans, and Season’s Greetings papery pint cups
bearing the grinning fur-trimmed face of Santa Claus, all of which (the festive
ones in 
particular) should do excellently well in
confusing the already addled of brain. As (seamless link coming up, be
prepared), presumably, would the sight of a blond Ozzie fireball, in
caterpillar combats and a salacious skinny-fit t-shirt, striding through the
audience to throw empties at the sound-engineer (“fuckin’ spacker!”) for
playing the wrong introductory track, hissy fitting until he gets a second
introduction from the compere, who’s ambled back out onstage, muttering “and
they told me he did contemporary dance”. Ladies and gentlemen, BRENDON BURNS.
Confident to the point of cocky fuckwit, but still capable of coming across as
likeable, he gets his point across by being the loudest and sharpest in the
room, bile-spitting at a goodly selection of subjects. (“Who says Scottish
people are tight? ‘Hey! Don’t throw away that sheep’s stomach…’”) Eminem comes
in for a vituperative tongue-lashing (“saying ‘all faggots can suck my cock’ –
I do hope they call him on it”), as do Liverpudlian snobs (“Liverpool’s
cultural elite” being equable to “the world’s least gammy leper”), Coldplay (“a
mid-afternoon band”, surely) headlining when you’re wired, suspiciously
accent-less Bristolians (neutrally voiced when they’re in the oo-ar county of
Somerset) and comics 
who bemoan playing to an older audience
(like you can shock the Peace & Love generation). Old material gets an
airing (the fun of fisting, the joys of fatherhood…) but this is tempered with
the new (including a, uh, delightful tale about trying to shag a melon), and
the knowledge that he’s playing three sets over the weekend (I missed the
panda-fluffer & singalong days) and is trying not to repeat himself. All
this, and the time taken to define irony for our benefit…
And just when we were in
the mood to laugh (“is this my room now? am I everyone’s daddy?”), had been
tickled in all the right places and were ready to give it up in quite a hearty
fashion… we were given IDA BARR.
Imagine a big man in a
nice frock. Imagine Sean Cullen’s Dame Sybil, but without the war-spy
reminiscences or leatherette clutch-bag. Imagine Vera Lynn taking on Eminem.
Mmm-hmm. Keep pulling that face.
It was an excellent
premise. And a lovely dress. But it isn’t enough to have a funny idea –
music-hall songstress re-interpreting today’s modern music – there needs to be,
well, you know, jokes to sustain things too. Somewhere. Added to which, THERE’S
A TIME AND A PLACE FOR DRESSING LIKE A DAME AND FLASHING YOUR ANKLES IN A
COQUETTISH MANNER WHILE TRALALA TROLLING AROUND THE PLACE TWITTERING ABOUT
MUSIC-HALL BUT 
LATE-AFTERNOON IN A TENT AT A FESTIVAL – AFTER
A MAN GETTING A LAUGH JUST BY USING THE WORD “SPACKER” HAS JUST BEEN ON – IS
DEFINITELY NOT IT. It all left me wishing I had a tumbleweed, that in moments
like this I could bowl it across the room. (So much subtler than a heckle’d
FACKORF. If not kinder.) And this just after Brendon Burns had urged us to give
crap acts stick. (We’d heckle comedians who weren’t pushing the right buttons,
so why not the duff cabaret turns?[3])
As it was, I had to make do with settling into my newly purchased book. (Which may
have been somewhat rude, but less so than me leaving; it being a Terry
Pratchett, it guaranteed at least one person in the room was giggling…) And
feeling faintly resentful that anyone who’d been in to watch Brendon, anyone
who’d just ambled in to see what was happening, was being given no incentive to
stay. (Think how empty their lives are now! Think! Mourn! Go on! Weep!) All
those people Ida Barr drove away – think of her as a humming pod planted in the
loam, and the audience as unhappy fleeing moles – never got to see a man
delighted to demonstrate how to move as though in a dressage competition (ie a
pissed horse). They never saw him steal the yellow cloth of an audience-member,
fashion it into a sari, and pretend to be the Dalai Lama (“let’s get ready to
be humb-errrrrrrrrrrrrr-le!”). They missed out on the chance to “take a
photograph of a bloke wi shit hair pointing at a hole”. Their Glastonbury was
without ROSS NOBLE. Who, for those persons uninitiated (who I haven’t yet
coerced to a gig), is a monkey-obsessive with a sunny disposition who hails
from Cramlington (oop North), and a vividly imaginative and anecdotal comedian
with the ability to 
create an entire set just by bouncing off
his audience. He appears to be able to be funny about ANYTHING (though at the
moment he is quite obsessed with both Angel Delight and Mexicans). Anyone who
missed his set is now lacking instruction on saluting in a Sombrero (carefully
and from a distance, else “you’ll chafe your fingers on the wicker”). Or the
fun to be had from getting a massage in the Healing Field, and then asking if
they do any, nudgewink, extras. Or the chance to request encore-material about
toothpaste. (“Are you just shouting out stuff that you need? ‘Fuck it, I might
be able to convince Noble he’s a small grocery shop’.”) Other festival-goers
might have chosen to see the likes of The Spoon Wizard (Glade, 5:30), but it
can’t have come close to the glory of uniting a thousand people behind a
declaration of “I’d happily kill Craig David with a brick.” The audience
(having heard his music) don’t even need a reason. Though they’ll happily go
along with: “he hasn’t even got the common decency with that haircut to put a
bit of cheese and pineapple on it.” This, and the accompanying physical
depiction of a flailing – but still singing – Craig David being battered by a
lynch mob (“Craig David…with a dead leg…Craig David…massive internal
injuries…I’m crawling awaaaay”) meant the audience left beaming.
Heading over to the Pyramid
Stage, humming David’s death song…
Waiting for Starsailor to
stop busking and leave the stage to be emptied, looking for two-tone
fans in the requisite colours, and becoming fixated by the sun hat before me,
to which was affixed a Water Aid badge, proudly declaiming the wearer to have
used a Water Aid toilet. (I know why you get well-done-children stickers &
such like at the dentist, but congratulatory Just Taken A Shit badges? Really?)
Almost as absorbing as the corn-circle head in the melee before me; the lower
ring burnt-earth 
brown, the crown the sickly yellow of
oxygen-starved grass, lending his head the look of a particularly rough bit of
campsite. Then saved from further musings by the shy arrival of THE WHITE
STRIPES.
Just the two of them
(red/red, red/white), an organ keyboard (red) and the clattery drumkit
(strawberry cream swirls); the rest of the stage black, empty, uncharted. Jack
White with a microphone centre stage, and one by his ivories, but most often
preferring to use the one by the drums, to sing staring into the eyes of the
girl he introduced as his “big sister”. Banging their way through ‘Hotel
Yorba’, yippy-skipping with ‘Astro’, wailing melancholic into ‘Jolene’; their
pared down backwoods guitar-skittery sound filling the field as you wouldn’t
think possible (they seeming best suited to smaller enclosed spaces[4]).
Lyrical duties mostly taken by Jack – who talks like he sings, and wants us to
go straight home and hug our mothers – but with Meg getting a chance to take
the scarlet lady vocal on ‘Rated X’. As good as they should be, as good as they
could be; I can tell that we are gonna be friends…
Can you guess where I went
after that? You can’t? Are you sure? It rhymes with Tavare Bent…
Already, I’m conscious
that I’m spending an inordinate amount of time in the comedy arena,
accidentally watching an inordinate amount of firey juggling – when each day
there are hundreds of bands & DJs & other performers out there in need
of attention – but then, there’s much duffness in the line-ups (particularly on
the Pyramid Stage), and if I can sit down to watch people without my vision
being obscured by bums, a sedentary evening where the entertainment comes to me
is going to win…
Arrived as VENUS (Dutch Diablo-expert) was making use of a
semi-clad man in her onstage juggling ‘antics’; only when her helper returned
to his place in the audience did I realise…
a) he wasn’t a particularly ineffectual assistant (but ordinary
bloke without socks on)
b) the pile of clothing in front of me was not the result of a
spontaneous combustion no-one really wanted to mention.
Thereafter, I got the
weekend’s first (and only) “don’t do that… I’m epileptic” response to my camera
as I attempted to snap STEPHEN K. AMOS, now in a large & slightly
unrealistic wig[5], who spent
much of his time repeatedly saluting 
the rastas. When not ignoring the
compere’s Comedy Mandate and dispensing primary-school advice to the tiny
attendees clumped before the stage while the sound of tubular bells echoes from
outside. Or introducing other acts. Like ROBIN 
INCE (comedian, actor, professional
‘friend of Liquid News’), highly excitable due to having just met John Peel,
and willing to share his most vivid festival memory (Ince, not Peel): the sight
of a naked man attempting to use his genitals to help him stay on a bucking
bronco. Happily chatty, he also took the time to discuss his favourite
combination-tribute groups (The Beautiful South Park and Run ABC amongst them),
worry about the Chuckle Brothers ( “you wouldn’t trust them with kids, would
you?”), bemoan REM having become a “lighter band” (even the petrol-spray fun to
be had doesn’t compensate), and mock the ‘backs against the wall’ advice of
extreme homophobes (necessary given that “the gay penis is so sharp it can
penetrate cotton and denim”). All most congenial.
Following a reappearance of The Wig and its wearer, and a brief
discussion of shit jumpers – Amos is dutifully wearing the sensible one his mum
gave him, but is planning on leaving it here – there appeared (“probably one of
the most accurate comedians working”) NICKY WILTY (“I smoke a little bit…just
before I buy clothes usually”), who was so funny I scrawled the word COCONUTS across my notebook and then instantly
forgot why. And then the three-piece OLÉ, a troupe of Mexican waiters headed by
a tanned Oliver Reed (who could juggle with his own mouth), who were heckled in
Spanish, despite their ability to play until their instruments set on fire.
After a brief game of ping-pong (for which an audience member was issued with a
paddle, and keepy-upy was played between that and the three onstage guitars),
and a final quick-fire strum-along, they departed.
Now. With Olé – slightly
more exotic/esoteric act never likely to joke about cats, dogs or toasters (or
have previously done so) – having just left the stage, and the general rule
being 
cabaret-comedy-cabaret, the audience
could feel fairly confident they were about to be met with some stand-up. Faces
full of flummox, then, when out walked SIMON MUNNERY, visage obscured by a
silvery bucket helmet, shivering in an orange velvet smock (longer at the front
‘n the back, terribly queer) with bat-belt attachments including a magnifying
glass and a large ball (papier-mâché) and chain (metal). At least the newly
(& vocally) worried man at the back who’d been expecting the Urban Warrior
knew 
Munnery was a comedian. Though after a
few of his League pronouncements (‘all men are brothers: hence war’) people
began to warm to him. (Or at least to realise he wasn’t just a freaknut
unnecessarily preoccupied with “scissors which move of their own accord”.)
Taking off the bucket helped as well. In that we could actually hear him
properly. (Though the sight of the biscuit-beige flat-cap topping off the luminous
outfit I could probably have done without…) He did some new jokes. (Shock.) He
did some old jokes. (Horror.) He even explained about his own festival ear
troubles, which meant, persistently and throughout the day, “I keep thinking
I’m hearing Billy Bragg about a mile away”. My personal highlight was the
Munnery-Dylan classic ‘I Fancy You’ (“come on admiiiit that you doooooooooo”),
performed with the aid of a harmonica, in full-on Bob-bleat. And the
thousand-odd non-plussed faces which accompanied it.
“Are you ready for 3 hours of maybe hell?” is
the crowd-whipping cry which heralds the arrival of CRAIG CAMPBELL, our new
compere; a Canadian (who no, does NOT fuck moose) in the lazy-arsed festival
goer’s equivalent of a miner’s helmet… a sun-hat with torch-attachment. After
the dispensation of some sage festival advice (monged people, “sleep on your
tummy”), he brings out the next act. Who is not the man I was expecting. But.
Phil Kay’s fucked off. (If he was ever here to begin with. No-one says.) In his
place we have TOMMY STAID. Who would like people to get loaded before they
visit car-boot sales (it eases the haggling process), and who is very fond of
staplers[6].
He was followed by JACKIE T, who twiddles a glowing 
Diablo
around the darkened stage, in front of an art-student film projection, to the
tune of ‘Pull Up To My Bumper Baby’. Which, given those criteria, was very well
done. (Over the entire weekend, I didn’t see anyone do a better job of
twiddling a glowing Diablo around the darkened stage, in front of an
art-student film projection, to the tune of ‘Pull Up To My Bumper Baby’[7].)
The thrilling pace (ahem) was maintained by those continually-grinning THE
DANDINIS 
(described
by Roger as resembling “young Christians”, albeit ones who juggle to praise the
Lord). Such acts were in no way a preparation for the misleadingly named
GREATEST SHOW ON LEGS. Which involved three ‘older gentlemen’ engaging in a
smattering of performance art (live bad haircut anyone?), and other dubious
entertainments, including the rhythmic covering of their faces in elastic
bands, playing ‘In The Navy’, setting 56 (?) batteries worth of jittery toy
animals to Riverdance, and wearing large stained pants. Or no pants at all. As
they did for the Balloon Dance finale.
It all looked like this:
The word I believe you’re looking for is
‘Bejaysus’.
Craig Campbell returns to the stage, naked but for his boots and
torch-hat (leading to a heckle of “get your intestines out!”), and blithely carries
on nattering, as though we can’t all see his 
shapely calves (and everything else), as
though it isn’t Arctic cold. Just as I’m contemplating capturing the moment on
film (is it wrong to take advantage? will they even get printed?), Brendon
Burns comes out with a razor and starts shaving Craig’s pubes – which answers
my dilemma – before realising what he’s onstage doing and running off with a
yelp. After which it was something of a relief when IAN COGNITO came onstage –
he, at least, was fully clothed. Doing mostly the same material as yesterday,
mind, but fuck it, he had pants on. (That does him a disservice, actually. He
made me laugh at least once[8].
I love the idea of fitting multiple Chubb locks to your door, but then never
securing all of them, so as to ensure any lock-picking thieves will find, for
every two they undo, another two click closed.)
Now. I’d like to say that
the last thing I saw in there before shivering off to my own tent was MISS
BEHAVE, stalking the stage in pin-stripe PVC, sliding a rose-stem through her
pierced tongue before swallowing a sword and making a stage-invader kneel at
her whim. Sadly, it’s not to be. She was the second to last act I stayed awake
for. The very last thing I saw on the Cabaret Tent stage, on Saturday the 29th
of June was Craig Campbell – now available in trousers – arguing with an
audience member (Dutch) over how many people there are in the world who speak
Dutch (6 million? 9 million? no-one knew or cared), before being inspired to
detail (in detail) the shit-eating he once witnessed at an Amsterdam sex party.
And to think I could’ve gone to see The
Stereophonics this evening…
>>> SUNDAY
Last revised: 13/07/02