WOMAD 2002

Friday 26th to Sunday 28th July 2002
Richfield Avenue, Rivermead, Reading, Berkshire, England MAP
£85 including free camping. Fri £25, Sat £45, Sun £40. Concessions available

Firstly lets get the very few negative points out of the way. Yes, once again it was too damned hot, especially on the Sunday when hordes abandoned the main arena to seek shade by the river. The problem there being that the grassed areas had been fenced to prevent unauthorised camping/dossing outside of the festival grounds. You could still sit under the trees but were segregated from the river bank for the most part. The only other minus from last year was the absence of the Crystal Palace, which is apparently out on tour and was replaced by the somewhat soulless "Little Big Top". Those few minor points aside however, it was a superb weekend.

flags

The thing that really sets WOMAD apart for me, apart from its diversity of course, is the amount of effort they put into decorating the site. The silk flags that adorn the main arena were bigger & more colourful than ever and were changed daily to give a different colour scheme each day. It also seemed that the flags used last year were spread out throughout the rest of the site, adding to the ambience & the otherwise somewhat limited shade.

The Siam Tent had the same decorations as last year but as these are far & away the most spectacular I've ever seen at any festival, complete with fluorescent rotating spider webs, you couldn't really complain. The much smaller Village Stage had a superbly colourful backdrop behind the stage & they had also made a huge effort on the Rivermead Stage inside the Sports Centre giving the stage itself the impression of being set in a huge speaker.

The other thing that really strikes me is how incredibly kid-friendly WOMAD is. Not only is there a fairly substantial funfair but also several large marquees dedicated to all manner of arts, crafts, workshops and activities for the kids to take part in. They get the opportunity to parade the fruits of their labours in a procession around the whole site on the Sunday evening.

ferris wheel

We got there Thursday lunchtime & erected Tort Towers among the gazebos in the Family Field. A majority of stalls however didn't open until the evening when a lot of people congregated in the arena to meet & chill. There were several familiar names among the stalls including Manic Organic, Tiny Teas, Doodah & the Miniature Steamboats. I met up with William & Stig (who was working on the showers) and we managed to stumble across a crew bar where they did a decent pint of Ale. This turned out to be an excellent discovery as, although the entrance to the bar was kept deliberately discreet, there was nobody stopping Joe Punter wandering in for an after hours pint.

Friday saw the arrival of Kerplunk and once weÂd got his tent up we wandered off to see Issa Bagayoga (No IÂm not spelling all these names from memory!), a Malian whose music is a fusion of his countryÂs traditional instruments with modern electro beats. Next up in the Siam Tent was the truly wonderful Charles Zawose & African Fire, a 14 piece ensemble from Tanzania. "They will dazzle you with a no-holds-barred performance of drumming, fertility rituals and fire dancing" it says in the programme. And they did!

IÂm afraid we then got distracted for a few hours by the delights of the Organic Beer (and Cider) Tent. So next up for us was Mexican folk singer/songwriter, Lila Downs. I then went walkabout for a while, got collared into joining Greenpeace by a cute little hippy bird with hairy pits, before finally ending up back at the main stage for Ozomatli, who according to some boarders "rocked their arse" at Glasto. I have to say that after hearing so many glowing reports of them I wasnÂt overly impressed with their on-stage performance. It was only when they jumped into the crowd at the end of their set & carried on playing acoustically for another 15 minutes that you got the true anarchic spirit that they are supposed to generate. Maybe it was just the slightly more reserved nature of the WOMAD crowd that prevented them from being seen in their true colours.

First up for me on Saturday were Seckou Keita & The Jalikunda from Senegal. Again their sound is a mixture of modern sounds and native instruments such as the Giant Thumb Pianos which were in such abundance on the instrument stalls. I caught a little bit of Portugese songstress Mariza and some bizarre traditional warblings from the Bisserov Sisters from Bulgaria. I then took the kids shopping & suffice to say we came home with a car full of drums, shakers, pois, bubble guns, necklaces, friendship bracelets ad infinitum.

Los Cojolites are a band of Mexicans who make & play an array of various sized guitars & ukuleles. We sat on the straw bales at the tiny One World Stage while they plied their trade of traditional Mexican toons & dancing, quaintly hindered by the youngest member of their troupe who couldnÂt have been older than 4.

In the evening we took in the cabaret with Alessandro (the Menace from Venice) with his standout solo performance of Bohemian Rhapsody. He was followed by escapologist Dave Holder who some might have seen at Glasto getting out of a straight jacket in 2 minutes while riding a unicycle!!! Next up were Skate Naked. A couple of guys in thongs and worryingly devoid of body hair who indulged in a frankly crap performance of acrobatics & whip tricks. They spent the rest of their 20 minute stint telling the single heckler what a f**king c**t they thought he was which was a tad unnecessary in front of an audience that was predominantly pre-teen. We left!

Having deposited the family safely back at camp I met up again with Kerplunk and the very lovely Katarina (I have to say that Â sheÂs bigger than me :o). We listened to Andy Kershaw spin a few tunes then caught the very tail end of The Jews Brothers Band from New Zealand before retiring to the crew bar for a boisterous few hours of Guiness and Abba / T Rex singalongs. We hit the sack at about 3:30 but I was very tempted to head out again for the main camping area where I could hear a serious drumming session was in progress.

The heat forced us out of the tents very early on Sunday so we took to the shade of the Siam Tent where Little George Sueref (UK born of Greek parentage) treated us to some superb blues harmonica. Salsa Celtica did their mix of (unsurprisingly) salsa & highland flingy type stuff and I caught a bit of drummers Frititi before meeting up with the gang again for Misty In Roots. I have to say IÂve never really been anything more than aware of their existence in the past but following KerplunkÂs charge to the front their classic Reggae stylee had us all up & at it. We spotted an E-Festivals T Shirt in front of us & knowing that Webmaster Dik was in town, assumed it to be him, only to find out it was in fact his brother. The man himself did show up shortly afterwards - nice to meet you at last your Eminence.

I have to say the heat & the excesses of the previous 2 evenings got to me a bit after that so I spent a couple of hours down by the river. Caught the kids procession & a little bit of Chris Difford but I saw him last year and although he is excellent the kids werenÂt impressed with my rendition of "Mussels From A Shell" so we toddled off to the fairground. Thus far, I'd not ventured into the "WOMAD Club Thing", which replaced Whirl-y-Gig this year, but the evening's line up of Adrian Sherwood, Little Axe & Junior Delgado looked fairly impressive so we gave it a look. Sitting outside, however, we heard Alpha Blondy hit the main stage & decided to hell with it. It's a festival, it's hot, why go dancing in a sports hall when you can jig about to music like that under the stars? Alpha Blondy originates from Ivory Coast but his bandÂs tight and vibrant reggae sound could be straight out of Kingston, Jamaica. HeÂs been on the scene for over 20 years but is completely new to me & therefore as far as I was concerned definitely the find of the weekend.

The festival was brought to an idyllic close in the Siam Tent where Anoushka Shankar (RaviÂs daughter & every bit as good) treated us to an hour of the most gorgeous sitar music while we lay on the grass and stared at those fantastic illuminated decorations. Dunno about you guys but these are the memories that keep me going through the long cold winter months & champing at the bit for the next festy season to kick in.