Hackney Weekend :D

[evilduck]

I went on Saturday and had a brilliant time. It was very well organised, although a bit of a rip off that they didn't put stage times up so you had to pay £7 for a lanyard. We just took a photo of someone elses and used that all day. Jack White and Kasabian were the highlights of the day for me, then we left before Jay-Z and avoided all the packed trains

[the wonderwhy]

Wow. Such an awesome day yesterday- Bombay, Ben Howard, Florence, Dizzee all awesome, but Rihanna just blew me away. Before last night I wasn't a massive fan, but straight away I was dancing and having the time of my life. She was seriously good, needs to be headlining something bigger in the next couple of years...

[LondonTom]

The Saturday was a decent enough day out in East London actually, better than I expected and I thought the the lay out worked really well. Only major queuing I saw was at the bar and laddies near the dance arena! Could have done the lanyards a bit cheaper, and if I hadn't seen Jack White the night before would have been a bit miffed at his 45 minute set...but I did the idea of everywhere else closing for Jay Z and allowed me to catch about half his set before we decided to leave and get out before the crowds!

Nice atmosphere there to mostly, apart from the dance tent, but that was a bit shit as Nero were fucking poor. Not sure what I was expecting, but reports of them just playing a fecking cd seem about right , left after 2/3 songs.

Other than that everyone else I intentionally caught was brilliant! DJ Fresh showed how to do live dance music and i was really impressed!....Emeli Sandé done what I expected of her, the vaccines are actually pretty decent live! Kasabian was awesome and loved strolling up after vaccines even having time to get beer and still got a decent spot near the front! Jack White gvae an amazing performance, and Jay Z proved to better than I thought, would choose him over something I liked or pay to see him, but he would be an option at another festival after that!

But yeah I had a lot of fun, and saw some great acts (and bits of example/ed sheeran and nicki minaj from a distance I would rather forget!)

[iPaulo xD]

Was a good day, but the parking situation was terrible. had to walk 4 miles to the car..

[fairy_]

[quote name=iPaulo ' timestamp='1340713575' post='3799200]

Was a good day, but the parking situation was terrible. had to walk 4 miles to the car..

[LondonTom]

To be fair they did say there was going be no car parking...and there is plenty of decent public transport in the area.

Maybe they could have had a park and ride further then again, i guess cost for a free event.

[The Mean Bean]

Stumbled upon Rihanna's set on the telly, never really been a fan before, but she looked like she delivered a brilliant performance, a couple of years ago I was calling people idiots for buying tickets to her shows, I'm eating my words now, I'd actually quite like to see her.

[amfy]

I only caught the very end of her set - but the audience bouncing for "We found love" was quite something. I also loved how much she looked to be enjoying it, and how she looked a bit like one of your mates who'd got up there and couldn't quite believe how well it was going! I prefer this Rhianna to the over sexualised one that we so often see.

I caught a fair bit of this event on the telly over the weekend and there were some really good moments. It has got better and better over the years, and Radio 1 clearly have significant pull to get some top names in.

I'd still probably leave this to the younger crowd. I could enjoy it definitely, but I also feel that I'm not who it's aimed at. Lots of festivals have a very mixed demographic regardless of the bill, but this one feels a bit like the grown ups should stay at home! This is a good thing.

Fantastic to see such an "up for it" young crowd at every act! Yes there was still some of that standing and filming everything on your camera thing going on, but also a hell of a lot of jumping around! The coverage included enough audience shots to get a real feel of the atmosphere - it was a great watch! I am still looking at odd bits on the radio 1 website - you can re-watch pretty much any set.