Wavefore excels
Entry posted by 5co77ie
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Considering the last 'beep beep' festival I went to was overloaded with chavs and zombied trancers and Ket heads and seemed to involve wall to wall advertising, I've tended to shy away from them since the glory days of the late Eighties and early nineties and yet here is Waveform to re-affirm my faith in dance festivals - well done Family Gathering youknow how to do your festivals. Okay so the line up boasted some great old school names Banco De Gaia, Eat Static, System 7 and the real Ozrics (Dream Machine).
Dream Machine were amazing, finally I got to see them and anyone who says the band who still carry the name Ozrics sound like those tunes of yester-year are wrong - here is the incarnation of that sound and god it so works with flute. Whoever said they could never hear it need to see this lot and then tell me they could never hear it. Like the old days it was, mental stuff! Ozrics without flute really isn't the same - these boys were fantastic! and with Paul Didge too it were proper great. Then most of them stayed on stage for Zub Zub which had me dancing in the sun while throwing giant frisbee about - lovely.
The organisers of this the first eco-sustainable dance festival organised by the Global Undergound and the people who do Sunrise and the Glasto Greenfields. clearly really know what they are doing and god they're good at putting on a festival. They planned everything out we'd want for the weekend, seven main stages offering a selection of dance styles, I'm too old to know my trance from my psy - if i like it i listen, that's it. Although Feed Your Head sounds were there in abundance. Then there were lots of other little domes offering more choice, fantastic food, great visuals and lasers and shit loads of good drugs floating about. Loads of happy hippies and psy trancers, crusty jugglers, a high dreadlock count and Sunrise real ale and cold cider. Chai wallahs for all nighters and a wonderful vibe - really great - mental salve for the mind it were.
Eat Static on the Saturday were awesome and followed by some crazy hippy stuff which had me in stitches and was well received by those into their shakras etc - "switch off your mind and open your heart.... you are a wave....form!" It had me smiling and was the worst rhyming in some time - hippies ehh gotta love them. Crystal skulls and Stonehenge and all that - world peace started that night with 350 or so countries also joining in the synchronised dance - personally I'd have had Eat Static do the whole thing.
Told the Eco Rangers to target the No2zers who were leaving the metal pellet things and their balloons all over what was an otherwise clean site. Christ they annoy me almost as much as Ket heads with their total lack of keeping the place clean at a festival which underlines a leave no trace policy.
Managed to get up after minimum sleep on Sunday morning to catch Eat Static but have to say I was drawn to the all night partying of the Ninja Hippies were better.
But what a terrific weekend end to the festival. Lovely time camped with Clive, Lucy and Chocky and demolished our cider allocation around the fire at night and of course the lovely Midnight was there too - helpfully filling in my poor knowledge of recent developments in the underground dance scene and informing me of line up changes etc. Met some lovely new random people around our fire. Discovered some great music to listen to - like Sub Source and Sunfish (sun theme there?) - and really got into the hi energy of Ninja Hippies.
Loads of festie characters and familiar festie faces, even a cat, happy kids and a great music programme from full on Friday to chilled Sunday - They really knew what would go with what and after some probs at the start and a late kick off they really got it organised. Sounds like it'll be even better next year.
Mirror System - Steve Hillage were awesome in Eartheart and at the time i had no idea it was hime! Thanks to Midnight I discovered it was. and talking of that wasn't System 7 excellent too. Shame it was so badly attended by efesters - as it's an awesome location, fantastically planned and executed. Best way to end a festival and lovely weather too - bliss! Bit cold at night - good job i brought the fire. The best in old skool dance parties has been brought bang up to date in a lovely setting by the river. We have another festival we can be proud of right on our front door.
To be honest I enjoyed it more than Beautiful Days, not just because of the lack of mud but also the audience - okay the music was a far less wide spectrum but the green credentials brought with it the mellower more chilled and colourful festival goers, resulting in a better vibe than this year's BDays. A local version of Sunrise, Glade and Eastern Haze - I'm told - no longer do I miss going to them.
For me though it lacked the wide spectrum of events offered by Shhhhhh, which has a similar crowd, but it was just as much a party as Endorse-It which had music I'm more accustomed to.
So the festival season falls like this:
Bestest: Shhhhhhh
Gotta go back for the party: Endorse It, Waveform, Beautiful Days.
Loveliest festival over a widest spectrum: Glastonbury, WOMAD, Wychwood.
Nice local footprint and new music: Respect, Ex-folk, Urban Lawns
By comparison rather mainstream, but having the big names: IOW and Guilfest and half of Glastonbury.
Best for kids: Shambala, Beautiful Days, Wychwood - we don't take Z to Glasto.
Festie List 2007:
Endorse It Indoors - April - Sunny scorchio
Exfolk - May - Sunny
Urban Lawns - May - Gale force rain
Wychwood - May - Sunny
Isle of Wight - June - Scorchio
Glasto - June - Big Mud
Respect - July - Sunny/Cloudy
Guilfest - July - Sunny til Sunday
WOMAD - July - Wo-mud more like but late night rain
Endorse It - Aug - Lovely
Beautiful Days - Aug - mud, wind and rain
Shambala - Aug - Sunny Scorchio
Waveform - Sept - Sunny
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