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[+] SUNDAY
Ooh, the last day of music! Bah! After 4 days on site without a shower, Sunday rolls around with the promise of a shower 36-hours away, but also the end of festivities, and for me, another day closer to returning to full time gainful employment. Waking early due to bowel movements that refuse to follow the "eat bread and Pringles" rule of clogging up your digestive system, I discover that squeezing out a Mr. Whippy in a freshly cleaned toilet with integral water dispenser, disinfected seat and no queues is akin to waking up in a British Republic. A dream that will never happen. Instead, the shit-suckers have just been round, and already someone's piddled on the seat and a little red fuse waves at me from a fresh mountain in the pit below. This is the festival experience. We start the day with coffee at the Tiny Tea Tent, easily our favourite cafe at the festival. Perched a field up from the One World Stage, this mostly outdoor cafe serves properly brewed coffee out of jerry cans, and allows a relaxed atmosphere to pervade, as everyone reads the free daily Q-magazine newspaper of on-site activity (major real world news headline - Saddam Hussein captured in Crete lounging by a hotel pool; we believe it for 3 days) and discounted copies of The Observer. After giving the Viking a bit of good muffin with my by then chocolatey fingers, we wander along to the One World Stage to watch The Dhol Foundation, simply because we like the name. And what a way to start the day! These bearded Sikh drummers have just flown in from Bombay, and urge us to put our hands in the air and push up, uP, UP! as we jig from foot to foot listening to the 10 drummers drumming to a lush Qawwali-like backing tape. With only 50 people watching, the majority of whom were dancing, this is an intimate gig, and the lead drummer even pulls a pose as I take a photo of the band. An excellent way to start the day. Invigorated with push-up energy, we decide, after a beer, to miss out on The Waterboys so that we can wander around the Lost Vagueness and Avalon fields. Me and the Viking almost get involved with a mass 'wedding', but as it will clash with ADF decide not to. The Viking looks disappointed. We check out the used car part-sculptures in honour of Joe Strummer. Almost take part in a ballroom dance class. See a wicker buffalo in the after throes of either charging down or giving birth to a drunk hippy. Walk past Smelly, a legend from my Brighton Uni days, who still looks his same crusty self. Watch BigBroGlasto for about, ooh, 30 seconds, before deciding that life, never mind the festival, is too short to watch 10 hippies trapped in a caravan. We miss music on the little stages in those cosmic environs, and attempt to watch something in the Circus tent, but mimes of putting make-up on don't draw us in. A falafel in pitta draws us back to the main music and market areas, in time to get to the Pyramid Stage for our next appointment with Dr. Music. Dr. Music prescribes shouting, anger, dubnobasswithmyheadman, heavy metal guitar solos, rapping, shouting and more dhol drums. Asian Dub Foundation take to the stage and get the field dancing. The Viking loves their fusion of sounds because she's a good girl and listens to her master's voice in musical matters. Some Telegraph or Daily Mail readers behind us boo the ADF boys when they dedicate Fortress Europe to asylum seekers, and in my dreams I turn around, punch the bigots in their eyes, and deliver an heroic speech defending asylum seekers' rights to live without fear of oppression. In reality I tut, and then wander over to the toilet to wee away the corporate U.S. beer I just drank and reflect on my own hypocrisy in continuing to eat Nestle chocolate. ADF rock by the way, and they're going to get better. I want to hear some colon-crunching, cloaca-clasping dum'n'bass beats, so we wander over to see DJs Krust and Die's new project, I-Kamanchi. Fortunately for the Viking, the schedules have been altered, so we get to hear 30 minutes of Terri Walker's urban soul, whilst sipping more corporate beer and munching on a small amount of cookie. Terri entertains, and at least we didn't accidentally overhear Cerys Matthews, who I was told used to fly over farmhouses and sing a lament to the recently deceased, wailing banshee that she is. Don't think it's true that, though. A difference opinion on the next few hours sees the Viking camp at the Other Stage. We both watch the beardy loveliness of Grandaddy, following which the Viking stays to watch a pale shadow of Robert Plant strut his over-inflated ego on stage. Why the hell the drugs didn't work I never know, but as a survivor of several heroin deaths, Dave Gahan appears to think he has meaning in the world. Depeche Mode are bad enough, but having extra product from this weak-chinned dwarf is taking the biscuit. I flee to watch some Texans instead. Calexico are on the One World Stage. Calexico play some Love. Calexico have horns. Calexico are very very good. I talk to an old hippy guy, who proudly sports a Grateful Dead t-shirt and is bemoaning the prog horrors of Yes, who described four-dimensional realities with a tortuous guitar solo earlier in the day, that wafted uncalled-for over our ears having escaped from the One World field on a gust of wind. Self-indulgent w**k it maybe, but I'm surprised at a Grateful Dead fan discriminating against it. I was under the impression that the west coast tie-dye maestros could onanistically knock a few self-proud spurts of fretmanship off the wrist as well. "The crowd actually shouted out for a bass solo" the old dude tells me, as he pulls electronic recording equipment from his jacket, in order to adjust the sound level in readiness for Calexico. "Been taping festivals since the Isle of Wight in 1970 - I saw Hendrix there" he tells me, waiting for the awed response. I reply that my Dad was there, and he used to be in a band which won a competition judged by John Peel. So there. After Calexico root me back in the country, I rejoin the Viking to listen to Sigur Ros. Unfortunately a tray of chilli noodles proves more important, as do the heavy clouds drifting in. We retire to the tent to don waterproofs and pick up our warm night clothes, having previously suffered near-freezings the previous few nights. Of course it studiously fails to rain (save for a pitter of 1 minute of water later on), so we look silly in canvassed legs and jumpers. Arse. Even more Arse is the fact that, as we walk to the tent, we hear the ethereal beauty of Sigur Ros getting naturally mixed with the lumpen stadium rock of punk-traitors The Manic Street Preachers. When someone like that is on such a large stage, you really need to whisper the words "target practice" in people's ears. Which only leaves one act left. Sunday is the day, traditionally, when Eavis puts on a novelty pop act to burst the music snob bubble of lots of the festival goers. And so with this in mind, I allow the Viking to drag me to see not Sugababes, but music traitor, sucker of Satan's chod and generally 3rd most punchable man in pop, Moby. I pretend to enjoy the show (polished pop songs for people who think he's still dangerously techno). Moby plays the hits. Yay! Moby has cool lights. Wooh! Moby challenges his DJ - winner of the DJ of the Universe award 1988 - to a mash up of turntablism on the decks, with all the faux-modesty ("I really can't play these things") expected from an Orange ad. Liar! Moby plays some half-decent drum'n'bass for 45 seconds, which has a strange effect, as the whole audience of pop fans stop bouncing and look perplexed, whilst my knees start bouncing. Luckliy, he launches into one of his famous songs that all the weekenders recognise. Phew! Moby plays Creep, for all the staid Radiohead fans, to the great delight of the crowd. Moby plays bongos. Moby plays guitar. Moby plays keyboards. Moby can do anything. Anything. Anything except retain his credibility as the black worm of Beelzebub's seed crawls around his innards and starts growing into his brain. Moby leaves the stage to rapturous applause, to stand in line behind MC Hammer, Vanilla Ice, Robbie Williams and U2. Purveyors of some of the worst music and excesses in pop, Moby joins my list of Pop Stars In Need Of Euthanasia. Act now to save music, destroy your Moby records. (note: does not apply to the Viking, who would kill me if I suggested she destroy her Moby tunes) [+] MONDAY Those darn noodles bite back. I pack the tent with Montezuma's Revenge ringing in my cheeks, and then wait 4 hours at Castle Cary train station, whilst the station staff herd us like pigs. Considering the number of staff put on to cope with the festival crowds, it's amazing that none of them have any idea when any train bound for London might be coming in. When we eventually get onto the platform, an empty train arrives, the driver doesn't know where he's going, the deputy station manager doesn't know, and a 10-minute investigation ensues whilst everyone tries to figure out what to do with the train, the driver saying "I'll got ta Reading if ya wan', just tell me!". Several bedraggled people almost hijack the locomotive. Eventually another empty train arrives, and we get back to London sometime after 6, where I discover that most of my tan stays on following 10 minutes under the shower. Another year, another Glastonbury, another cracking festival. Next year - Roskilde listen up! The bastard son of your invading Viking hordes returns, one millenium late. Astro intends to take on Denmark, with Scandanavia's biggest music festival in his sights... Previously: Friday brought vaudeville and ugly fat Mancs: A1096760 Previously: Saturday brought UFOs - the song machine came down: A1098461 See Festival sights: A1106542
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