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Mighty Hoopla, Cross The Tracks, Wide Awake & City Splash festivals, Brockwell Park - discussion

DJWrongspeed said:
I like to think U75 has a hold on reality. People have been getting trashed at festivals since whenever. Quite what Britpop has got to do with this I've no idea. Fine if you want to refer to internet / smart phones et al.

People were getting wankered and chatting at the Beaulieu jazz festival nearly 60 yrs ago....
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I wasn't around 60 years ago, but I have been going to gigs for over 30 years and feel I've experienced enough to have a view on how the way gigs are attended has changed.

I've also been getting 'trashed' at gigs for that long too, and I don't have any issue with people altering their state to get into it, if they are getting into it (I once had a long period of sobriety and it took me quite a long time to adjust and start enjoying live music straight). I can get trashed without bothering others though, or thinking I have a right to walk over people or shove them out of my way to get past them.

I've always gone to gigs to see and hear the musicians, not to hang out with my mates. I would go with mates, and we might even share some thoughts during a gig, but I don't chatter away like I'm sat at work bored and passing the time until I can go to the pub, and for the first 10 years of my gig going life this wasn't something I noticed at shows.

It was during the 90s that I found more people were going to gigs in a group and having a night out as if they were in the pub. I recall the Jazz Cafe having their STFU sign painted on the column of the main stage. Kraftwerk at Brixton was an example where loads of people were just nattering away, Sigour Ros at the Astoria, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club at the Forum. I just noticed much more of it from the mid 90s onwards.

I'm off to All Points East at Victoria Park today, so I'm interested to see how the audience differs. I shall compare and contrast both events.

I shall try to keep a hold on reality, just for your benefit.
 
mauvais said:
This thread makes me chuckle. Because of what a cool hipster I am and, like, always have been, I went to Field Days like ten years ago when they were in Vicky Park, and the organisation was always shit, there were noise restrictions that meant it was too quiet, and it was always full of 'millennials' before that was even a thing, behaving as described. It was alright though.
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Same, I've been going since... 2008 I think? There were definitely plenty of teething problems in Victoria Park, but I've felt like Field Day have generally done a decent job of managing them. It's always been a bit chaotic but rarely this bad.

On the positive side, I think they got the sound levels spot-on this year (decently loud in the tents, but not overly annoying from nearby houses), and they organised enough stewards and police to manage crowd control very well as far as I could tell.

The problem really has been the size and layout of the site. Putting the Barn where they did was obviously a terrible idea and caused some genuinely scary overcrowding (though fair do's to FD for de-escalating that at least) but then where else could they have put it? The site was clearly too small for the bigger crowd on Saturday (the ground was looking absolutely destroyed in places too) but you'd have to be brave to the point of recklessness to argue that the answer is fencing off even more of the park in future.

So frustrating, because Friday proved that you can do festivals at 20k here and make them work, contrary to the evidence of Sunfall last year. I really hope there's a way to make that smaller capacity work financially and have Field Day come back. Sadly, I suspect that a combination of dissatisfied customers, fence-jumpers, overcrowding and damage will mean that either they decide to decamp to Gunnersbury, where they can surely squeeze more punters in, or it'll become politically untenable for Lambeth to do anything but turn them down.
 
pocketbear said:
The problem really has been the size and layout of the site. Putting the Barn where they did was obviously a terrible idea and caused some genuinely scary overcrowding (though fair do's to FD for de-escalating that at least) but then where else could they have put it? The site was clearly too small for the bigger crowd on Saturday (the ground was looking absolutely destroyed in places too) but you'd have to be brave to the point of recklessness to argue that the answer is fencing off even more of the park in future.
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I felt genuinely uncomfortable trying to get into the barn. It was hugely crowded and the stewards appeared to have lost control for some time. Mashed up twats were pushing themselves to the front and it would only have take a few people to fall over in the crush to have a real problem.

The day before was fine. Yesterday was too crowded.
 
Reiabuzz said:
I love the way my thread title mysteriously keeps changing
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Nothing mysterious about it: it's just that it makes sense to put the two festivals together seeing as they're on the same site with the same set up, vendors etc.
 
Field Day has nothing to do with the organisers beyond the festival you're attending this afternoon other than being on the same site. Still, your site :)
 
Reiabuzz said:
Field Day has nothing to do with the organisers beyond the festival you're attending this afternoon other than being on the same site. Still, your site :)
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Jeez. It's the same layout, same PA systems, same tents, same vendors, same security and even the same PR company with the event taking place in the same park one day after the other, so it makes perfect sense to talk about them in the same thread.

And it makes sense to compare the two festivals seeing as they're using the same facilities.
 
editor said:
Jeez. It's the same layout, same PA systems, same tents, same vendors, same security and even the same PR company with the event taking place in the same park one day after the other, so it makes perfect sense to talk about them in the same thread.

And it makes sense to compare the two festivals seeing as they're using the same facilities.
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They're the same company, just branded differently: at least according to Field Day when I asked them. A quick check on Companies House when this came up on Twitter yesterday revealed that Field Day's founder Marcus Weedon is a director of Mighty Hoopla Ltd, who are owned at least in part by Waxarch (and who are owned in turn by Global).
 
hungry_squirrel said:
It does look deliciously camp. I thought about going but can't handle it after the rest of the weekend!
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Loads of gay men attending, by the looks of it! They all wanted to say hello to Acorn the dog who I was walking. I heard Cottoneye Joe and Barbieworld blaring out as I walked past the fence. :D

There was security on the door of the Commercial this afternoon and all drinks were being served in plastic glasses. The staff were very over Field Day and couldn’t wait to get back to normal. :thumbs:
 
Due to some acoustic wizardry, we can hear it quite clearly in Streatham Hill. The roads south of Palace Td. The sound is bouncing back off our houses, which are on the crest of the hill, I suppose.

Heard the whole of Lily Allen earlier.
 
I enjoyed today the most of all. Great vibes, smaller crowd than yesterday and some really fun acts. Given the mix of people and the area's history of accepting 'outsiders,' it felt quite 'Brixton' too.
 
OvalhouseDB said:
Due to some acoustic wizardry, we can hear it quite clearly in Streatham Hill. The roads south of Palace Td. The sound is bouncing back off our houses, which are on the crest of the hill, I suppose.

Heard the whole of Lily Allen earlier.
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I’m near Elm Park and I turned off my own music and sat in the garden to enjoy Lily Allen. And I did the same for part of TLC’s set too.

We heard very little yesterday, just the rumour of the music from time to time.


ETA

Once when I was in Athens I sat on the balcony with my aunt to enjoy the entire Rolling Stones concert in the nearby old Olympic stadium. Sounded great, and the fireworks were good too.
 
Nanker Phelge said:
I wasn't around 60 years ago, but I have been going to gigs for over 30 years and feel I've experienced enough to have a view on how the way gigs are attended has changed.

I've also been getting 'trashed' at gigs for that long too, and I don't have any issue with people altering their state to get into it, if they are getting into it (I once had a long period of sobriety and it took me quite a long time to adjust and start enjoying live music straight). I can get trashed without bothering others though, or thinking I have a right to walk over people or shove them out of my way to get past them.

I've always gone to gigs to see and hear the musicians, not to hang out with my mates. I would go with mates, and we might even share some thoughts during a gig, but I don't chatter away like I'm sat at work bored and passing the time until I can go to the pub, and for the first 10 years of my gig going life this wasn't something I noticed at shows.

It was during the 90s that I found more people were going to gigs in a group and having a night out as if they were in the pub. I recall the Jazz Cafe having their STFU sign painted on the column of the main stage. Kraftwerk at Brixton was an example where loads of people were just nattering away, Sigour Ros at the Astoria, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club at the Forum. I just noticed much more of it from the mid 90s onwards.

I'm off to All Points East at Victoria Park today, so I'm interested to see how the audience differs. I shall compare and contrast both events.

I shall try to keep a hold on reality, just for your benefit.
Click to expand...
Under the new order the STFU has gone (as has the jazz tbh) and it really needs reinstating. Its like a busy pub in there ... Puts me off going back to some degree. With louder having it acts it's bearable, but any softer moments is embarrassing as well as annoying
 
I could hear Mighty Hoopla clearly yesterday over a mile away, im happy for those who went were seemingly allowed to enjoy a day with music loud enough.

I cant help but wonder, will there be the same amount of fuss about the noise from a camp pop festival than the predominantly house/techno music from Field Day on Saturday? Why was yesterday tolerated to go louder?

I went on Saturday and had a good day out. the weather was great and the security getting in was nowhere near as bad as i had expected, i just got the wand waved at me and a brief pat down, which is as extreme as it should be. There was one very disinterested sniffer dog handled by even more disinterested handlers as you walked through after the search, nothing on the scale as to what id read about on Friday.

The music was nowhere near loud enough, but this is to be expected at London 1 day festivals (with notable exceptions of Junction 2 and Arcadia, but they are run by people who really know what they are doing), and is nothing new. The Barn was chaos from early on in the day, went in about 3pm and it was already uncomfortably packed. Attempts to access the stage later on in the day were swiftly aborted on approach to the tent when it was clear the situation had worsened as the day progressed. The main stage was programmed to close early, which is something i have never seen before at a 1 day festival, no doubt this was to appease Herne Hill nimbys- well done guys! This most likely contributed to the crush later on at the Barn where arguably the biggest act (Four Tet) of the day was scheduled to play, perhaps he would have been suited to the main stage where there was shit loads of room, had it been open.

The stewarding and access was handled well, with portaloos from Brixton town centre all the way down to the entrances. There cant be too many complaints about that.

Drinks prices were even more scandalous than id feared. best value drink i could find was a 500ml can of Magners for £5.50, pints were £6.

Good crowd i thought, lack of wankers and creeps.
 
Living in the flats opposite the lido I maybe the closest physical resident to the festival (though not main stage). The noise didn't bother me that much. Friday I listened to some of Erykah Badu but later with the windows shut watched a film and it was just a slightly muffled hum. I also went for a swim in the lido in the afternoon and it was fun to hear the music whilst the lido was very empty too. I think the height of the stages maybe carries the music a distance - but it really wasn't loud. Now and then a car with souped up bass speakers will drive past the house and the rumble will shake the cladding and window frames of our flats. The festival was not even close to that.

As for mess, crowds and blocking up the park - thats my main concern. Well they were very professional and a quick walk about this morning seems to show that the area outside the festival has been cleaned thoroughly. The crowds leaving the festival were friendly and seemed happy drunk - not falling over or vomiting or pissing everywhere. Nobody on my lawn. I had a pint in the Prince Regent when the crowds were leaving and they were a decent lot.

Saturday I got resident ticket and went myself. They were blessed with the weather. I've went to a lot of out of town festivals, parties and raves. My main impression was that the tents were too quiet and that the sound on the main stage was very poor quality. This was typified by the Barn which was poorly situated, booked some of the bigger dance acts, very crowded but had a really really crap sound system. I approached a couple of times but never went right in because the vibe/density ratio was so low. I enjoyed Thgundercat and Gainsbourg and some of the stuff in the Resident Advisor tent. I despaired of humanity during Kurupt FM "performance". I especially liked sitting in the tree ring on a log drinking my beer and watching the stage as the sunset set.

All In all I'd be in favour of them getting another chance. The security, setup, organisation has seemed pretty professional. They maybe need to reorganise a few stages. They didn't need bugged out and resident advisor (a house and a techno tent (lose the house - DJ Boring??? Yeah!)) - make one bigger and better. They need to move the Barn to have a clear entrance and exit on opposite sides and improve the sound. Maybe book fewer DJs and give them a bit longer. This dependent on them tidying up the park in short order and getting off.
 
Kurrupt FM is meant to be a pisstake really, a bit of fun. It was quite funny watching posh youngsters dancing and singing along in a rude boy manner, as is the persona of the act itself.

The Resident Advisor tent was the one i found myself in for the last hour or so, thought it was decent! nice production and Daniel Avery closing the place with style.
 
jimbarkanoodle said:
I went on Saturday and had a good day out. the weather was great and the security getting in was nowhere near as bad as i had expected, i just got the wand waved at me and a brief pat down, which is as extreme as it should be. There was one very disinterested sniffer dog handled by even more disinterested handlers as you walked through after the search, nothing on the scale as to what id read about on Friday.
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The confused pooch got all yelpy at my friend's bag and she was subjected to some fucking extreme rudeness from the door staff who clearly thought she was heading up a major drug cartel. They found precisely nothing and were utter arseholes about the whole thing. Shame because they'd been pretty good up till then.
jimbarkanoodle said:
Drinks prices were even more scandalous than id feared. best value drink i could find was a 500ml can of Magners for £5.50, pints were £6.
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After the festival the week before - where you could only buy shitty little cans for a fiver, £6 for a decent pint almost seemed good value. But still an almighty rip off. This whole craft booze thing is a right cash cow for the brewers. Some tiny cans were going for £5.30, FFS.
 
Friends of Brockwell Park have invited residents to give their feedback. Most of it seems pretty positive thus far, apart from Saturday's dangerous crush:

 
"I cant help but wonder, will there be the same amount of fuss about the noise from a camp pop festival than the predominantly house/techno music from Field Day on Saturday? Why was yesterday tolerated to go louder? "
Was it actually louder? People seem to be saying so. I live about .9 of a mile from the mainstage, measured straightline. We could hear that it was happening on Saturday, a faint undertow, but I put yesterday's clarity down to different weather conditions - wind direction , humidity, temperature causing rising heat, which would all affect the way the sound travelled.

Not that I would dream of complaining about the noise we heard - it was over by bed time and way better than the in-car sound systems that regularly grace us with a flash of the owner's music choice.
 
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