an impressive line-up is undone by ned culture

Live at Loch Lomond 2008

Saturday 2nd to Sunday 3rd August 2008
Balloch Castle Country Park, Loch Lomond, Scotland, Scotland
£49 per day, £89 for weekend., or £119 for weekend with camping

It sounded so good. A festival set against the spectacular Loch Lomond with an impressive line-up for only its second year.

The tiny town of Balloch had been overrun by intoxicated incoherent festival goers, and it really didn't know what had hit it. An old lady pottered about the streets with a look of obvious disdain, and a boy racer repeatedly paraded around in his convertible mini like he was fixed to a Scaletrix track. It all became quite apparent that this weekend was something of a shock for the local community.

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The festival itself is crammed in the corner of the local park, just next to the Loch, but unlike he festival's northern competitor (Rock Ness) the majority of the Loch remains hidden behind the site's fencing.

Upon entry to the festival everyone is subject to a pre-fest sniffing by one of the police's snifferdogs. Once inside it becomes rather obvious that the Live @ Loch Lomond organizers have been keen to save on space as much as possible. For the numbers due to attend the site seems extremely small and compact.

The poorly received second stage festered around the corner and seemed to be largely ignored by most of the public. This was a great shame, as most of the acts I managed to catch on that stage were pretty impressive.

One of my main gripes with the festival was the attendees. The over 18s only tag meant that the event had become a binge drinking marathon of shirking responsibilities and getting so wasted that speech becomes impossible and any train of logical thought is displaced by brainless yelling and screaming. Now to the average person that isn't much of a problem, but Live @ Loch Lomond seemed to have drawn in the remainder of the ned culture(non educated delinquents or chavs for the southern readership), whose ASBOS restricted them from going anywhere near T in The Park.

As my mate tried to unsuccessfully convince one of the aforementioned neds that "can you not kick mud at me" wasn't the literal translation for "lets start a fight", I begun to realise that this place was great if you were either totally hammered or had a brain that was less matter, more cabbage.

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As far as my attitude to rain and mud at festivals go Â that was soo last year, but the thick coating of sticky mud that had lined the festival since the site's opening was never going to go away. A severe pelting of rain made everyone head for one of the dance tents, forcing the poor second stage artists to look like they were performing at an unfashionable charity gig for a disease nobo
Unlike most festivals, the arena and the campsite are set quite far apart from each other, which means that festival goers generally have to take a bus to get to and from the venue and the campsite.

Considering the festival is only in its second year the line-up is pretty impressive, with the main pull probably being the strangely placed addition of headliners the Sex Pistols.

The festival shares more than a few similarities with Rock Ness, with the same mix of predominantly dance acts and new indie groups. The best of Scotland's new up and coming bands were also gracing the bill, including Attic Lights, Figure 5 and The Down & Outs.

In the Scottish consciousness every new festival that sprouts up in their country is going to have to be compared to T in The Park and quite unfairly Live @ Loch Lomond is never going to match it. However, at almost half the price, with camping and two full days of acts it does have its place. It would just be nice if there was a little more to the site than just a few tents sprinkled around a small grassy area with the odd corporate logo splashed on top.

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