Glastonbury 2008
- Thread starter pagan
- Start date
david dissadent
New Member
True, I reckon Ive gotten over the shock at the changes this year now and am more ready for hoards of Radio 1 roadshow types next year. But no real guarentee Im going yet. Still not decided but leaning against going.William of Walworth said:
Moving too fast, just catching up
If you understand my frustrations, perhaps you can understand why that particular time I did 'pull rank' as you seem to be digging at me for, over Top Cat's posts. He hasn't been since 1990, and most of what he said earlier is ignorant shite. There are plemty of valid criticisms to make of Glastonbury and you and I can and loads of others can make them, so can people who have only been once, but 1990 and not since!??!!
He's out of touch.
William of Walworth said:
wiskey said:
If you understand my frustrations, perhaps you can understand why that particular time I did 'pull rank' as you seem to be digging at me for, over Top Cat's posts. He hasn't been since 1990, and most of what he said earlier is ignorant shite. There are plemty of valid criticisms to make of Glastonbury and you and I can and loads of others can make them, so can people who have only been once, but 1990 and not since!??!!
He's out of touch.
david dissadent
New Member
You mean, other than me ?wiskey said:
wiskey
Albatross Admirer
William of Walworth said:If you understand my frustrations, perhaps you can understand why that particular time I did 'pull rank' as you seem to be digging at me for, over Top Cat's posts. He hasn't been since 1990, and most of what he said earlier is ignorant shite. There are plemty of valid criticisms to make of Glastonbury and you and I can and loads of others can make them, so can people who have only been once, but 1990 and not since!??!!
He's out of touch.
he was also in some ways correct.
anyway it was only a small comment and you could have ignored it.
anyway, dont dwell on it
TopCat
Putin fanboy
William you really give me the arse asserting that I have no right to make criticisms about the bloated middle class wank fest now known as Glasto.
I think you get so tetchy because you know that so much has changed and you don't like to admit that you only keep going by wearing blinkers.
We can row more over a beer at Endorset.
I think you get so tetchy because you know that so much has changed and you don't like to admit that you only keep going by wearing blinkers.
We can row more over a beer at Endorset.
JTG said:yes. TC doesn't go to Glastonbury and WoW does. They are both very happy for it
And TC and I get on fine at Dorset too, so the circle comes full triangle ... or something ...
Sorry for losing it. Like yesterday I'm not too well (rotten cold) and because of that I have a rare two days off work with time to kill, but this thread has moved very fast today. I missed some of wiskey's other comments, until catching up properly just now.
JTG said:
Tis a fair comment. I'm as guilty of chatting obsessively about the thing in the months off as anyone, both here and elsewhere.
I probably (I think?) disagree with wiskey (and moose) about the extent to whch groups of internet-linked friends/networks have affected the festival, who's to say times wouldn't have changed massively, in ways we can't imagine anyway, without the net? And without mobiles? The changes mobiles have brought about have been far more extensive to my mind. Without either though, there'd still have been other changes, and we still adapt.
It's hard for me to separate the positve changes to my personal festival experiences that net interaction has helped bring about, from other impacts the net might has, which perhaps I don't see so clearly as a result of the good it's done for me.
I miss some aspects of the old days, the chaos, the madness, the dirty random sound systems, the dodgy parties out of the back of trucks, the little shebeens selling who knows what from rickety self constructed benders and from vans, all that.
But times change and I always look for the positive -- I've had miserable periods in my life, but I've rarely been miserable or lonely at Glastonbury, even during mudbaths, and I look forward to a better than ever one next year. Working will make more difference than I can even anticipate myself, I reckon.
But I'll adapt, I always do. And some things will stay the same, they do as well. Man.
TopCat said:
You're only seeing the thing through one eye, and from a distance. You're also hugely inaccurate about all sorts of aspects.
Ignorance ALWAYS makes me tetchy, I'm a fucking historian and value accuracy! Your rant is about as accurate as a conspiracy theory .... and wildly exaggerates the (at root valid, in PART) criticisms that others (not just me) who know more from more direct experience can make, by sounding so overblown and ridiculous.
You can comment all you like, but expect to be contradicted by those who've been more recently than you! As in more recently than 17 years ago ...
We can spare this for now though. Mine's a pint of that Badger Golden Ale they had down there ...
TopCat
Putin fanboy
Well it's no surprise that I have not been since 1990. Seeing the security (who were totally backed by Eavis and co) beating the crap out of travellers and festival goers left a bitter taste in my mouth even though I manged to get a few licks of retaliation in.
I still remember well the glasto of the 80's and the current setup makes me quite cross.
I still remember well the glasto of the 80's and the current setup makes me quite cross.
TopCat said:
I'm hardly defending that am I?
I wasn't there in 1989 or 1990, but have read up a fair bit about it, have even chatted to a couple of people who were there and close up ... also I've read Glastonbury Tales and Andy Worthington's book.
The way security behaved in 1990 was unforgiveable, end of (and the same people were never employed again, I believe one or two individuals were prosecuted too??). But even one or two of the Travellers themselves have gone on record admitting that there were a few within their number taking the piss big style and in criminal terms, I mean really, sometimes with violence and threats, not just ganja etc. Two wrongs don't make a right of course but there's more than one side to the story.
There have still been Travellers back at the fest since, in numbers, I've seen them and hung out in their fields. right up to 2000. The reasons why many of them were very definitely excluded after 2000 are many and complicated (and I do miss some of those reasons, those 17K sound systems!
),But anyone walking though the Green Crew Fields vehicle spotting
at Glastonbury now, and who's aware of crewing structures in parts of the festival, and the Mutoid Waste Company still being there, and the Tree Pirates, etc., will know that Travellers and ex-Travellers still contribute to the set up pretty significantly and positively. I know quite a bit about what Travellers have brought to the festival and in some cases still do, and how much the Fest would have lost through them not being there.Deliberately not mentioning the vexed issue of Lost Vagueness
-- another thread or set of posts there methinks It's not nearly as bad as the impression you've received and the stories you've heard.
To be fair to you, I know a fair number of people who have stopped going and in many cases their reasons while many and various do in some cases overlap with yours (although most have been since 1990 ...
) I respect them and some of their reasons, disagree with them about others. that's the way of it.
Moar later!!
firky said:
Gladiators, mate!
(
)wiskey said:
To be honest the only thing that miffs me slightly about (ex)TOS losing its official status is I've put in a good deal of work, both at the festival & since, in doing some fairly major upgrades to that little piece of work. I still plan to get it online shortly but it's highly unlikely to reach its target audience now as I don't anticipate there will be any way of linking to it from any official information that the newbie audience it is primarily aimed at are likely to stumble across in 2008 and beyond. A pity really because it’s had nearly 40,000 hits over the last couple of festivals & I still get messages of appreciation. I guess I see it as my parting gift to the festival & all who sail in her before I ride off into the sunset so it would have been nice if the target audience were actually able to see it.
Will put a link up in here when all the updates are complete.
only one or two?William of Walworth said:
fuckin hell. that was a proper riot and there were loads of travellers who more or less forced it to happen.
I was in the circus warp tent all weekend.
they refused to stop the music between friday night and monday morning.
On tuesday morning I went to sleep with my head in a bass bin.
my mate noticed and put some music on.
I just smiled and went back to sleep
Tort said:
I really want to see those updated FAQ's when you've finished them.
They will be very useful ...
Wiskey was right, they're just what people need. I'll be good to have a link here, and if you don't mind I want to add a link to them to the Glastonbury entry on my 'Festival Season 2008 : Some dates and details' thread when I start this in January.
Fully credited, obviously
Pavlik said:only one or two?
That I've read accounts about (and had accounts from people I've talked to). There were clearly more ...
fuckin hell. that was a proper riot and there were loads of travellers who more or less forced it to happen.
I was in the circus warp tent all weekend.
they refused to stop the music between friday night and monday morning.
On tuesday morning I went to sleep with my head in a bass bin.
my mate noticed and put some music on.
I just smiled and went back to sleep
By the sound of that, it reminds me of 2000, though happily no riots then. Loads of dirty phat systems right up to 17K in the Travellers field, pretty continuous from Thursday night into Tuesday. No wonder Eavis was subjected to prosecutions, but he had major problems controlling them .... The party was wild
but they really took the piss that year. A ten year anniversary do!
TopCat said:
When exactly was the guns thing and where?
NOT denying it, you are definitely right in general, some right thugs have been employed by MF (sometimes indirectly
)I don't think anything either Pavlik or I said denies that security can be and have been right thugscum. I have also said what happened from them in 1990 was unequivocally out of order.
But there were definitely two sides to things in 1990, not that that excuses what security did that year, just that a minority Traveller element may have made it easier for the uniformed gorillas to kick off and given them a pretext to kick off -- like I say though, unforgiveably. Not sure it's sensible to deny that -- if you are -- more than a few Travellers admit this themselves.
I've reaearched loads about this and also have a clear if indirect understanding though, after all the 1980s history since the Beanfield etc., why some Travellers became very and justifiably alieneated from authority. But they were also joined in the 1980s by some out of control and quite hardcore Brewcrew elements.
As for wild beyond control Traveller-dominated partying (tho' thankfully riot free and mostly violence free) you want to read up on the post Glastonbury chaos of Treworgey, 1989!!!
Still sorry I missed that one, though ...
William of Walworth said:As for wild beyond control Traveller-dominated partying (tho' thankfully riot free and mostly violence free) you want to read up on the post Glastonbury chaos of Treworgey, 1989!!!
Still sorry I missed that one, though ...
The toilets got blocked & everybody had to shit in the woods. Hardly what I'd call chaos.
TopCat
Putin fanboy
Queen asks Eavis about Glasto mud
Glastonbury Festival founder Michael Eavis has collected his CBE from the Queen at Buckingham Palace.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7094643.stm
Glastonbury Festival founder Michael Eavis has collected his CBE from the Queen at Buckingham Palace.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7094643.stm
