Circus Field

Glastonbury Festival 2000 reviews

Circus Field
Friday 23rd June 2000

It's funny what you end up doing at Glastonbury when you've lost all your friends. I found myself drawn to the Circus field, the second most colourful place at Glasto next to the Kidz Field. I'd been told that there would be a Magic Roundabout trapeze show, and in anticipation of that, found myself amongst many wonders… including a carnival!

Carnivalnet had enlisted the help of a brass/steel drum band and lots of people in blue spangly-looped constructions to dance about to the background of the giant inflatable blue armadillo and pink crocodile…

So I joined in the dancing, until I got accosted by two spacemen who held me still while they probed my brain for naughty thoughts.

Take us to your leader!" shouted one.
"Which leader would that be?" I asked.
"The one who is responsible for this large gathering of people! There are many people here and we believe they have come to see the leader. Where is he?!" said the Spaceman.
"I think you'll find him at the farm." I said. "Be nice to him though. He comes in peace and his name is Michael."

They seemed satisfied with this information and they let me dance off in another direction.

My gaze was caught by the sight of three pieces of fruit running around the field. I thought they'd make a good photo, so I ran after them. "Stop! Fruit! I want to take a photo!" I shouted, but they kept running. "Oi! Fruit! Please stop!" I shouted again. The red one turned around and shouted back "Run for your life! Run! Run!" I ran fast enough to catch them up and asked them who they were. "We're the Glaston-berries!" said the red one, "But you must run! The blender's coming!!"

But treat of the day was Florence and the Blue Mushroom, a tribute to the Magic Roundabout by Aerial Enterprise, where Dougal and Florence wander into Zebedee's garden, and Florence experiences some weird psychedelic visions after eating mushrooms (cue the amazing static trapeze show). They pulled crowds in the hundreds, of all ages, but with a large section of the audience between the ages of 25 and 35, and the under-10 contingent left a little bewildered by the whole thing….

There's so much going on, that you blink and you miss things. How many of you saw the bug-eyed stiltwalkers who kept thrusting their crotch in people's faces? Or the Tea Ladies On Tour who served tea over the weekend to the audiences? Or the Glam Rockers with their p.a. system on wheels? And would it have been a Circus field without the clowns?

Get there next year, and leave the acid behind, it's really not needed!