Glastonbury 2022 - overcrowding rumours & thoughts

[charlie.light]

1 minute ago, Sawdusty surfer said:

Have a crackdown on liggers

Sorry my sound thick but what is a ligger lol 😂

[Sawdusty surfer]

1 hour ago, charlie.light said:

Sorry my sound thick but what is a ligger lol 😂

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ligger

[Pinhead]

2 hours ago, charlie.light said:

So how do you rectify this, keep all crew out the gates and only allowed in for shifts.no one would volunteer with that deal. 
 

the crew are an integral part of the festival, without them there is no festival. 

Did I say that? Nope - crew make the festival happen. I implied however that there was seemingly a lot of crew around site this year. Years ago there was a bit of a crackdown on the number of mates of crew accompanying staff which caused a bit of upset. Perhaps this year more concessions were passed out, perhaps as encoragement after 3 years off, dunno.

[gooner1990]

I forgot that I had taken this…Weds early evening from our campsite which was behind the park…that hill is seriously busy! 

[Neil]

On 7/5/2022 at 7:27 AM, Kizzie said:

My next door neighbour who is Liverpudlian 🙄 didn't have a ticket for this year. He considered going anyway.

He told me on the Tuesday evening just as we were setting off for Pilton that 40 people had gone in through the 'tunnel' the night before, so Monday before the festival. 

I just nodded sagely and thought what a load of bull. 🤔

Can't be true can it?

he told me yesterday that he didn't go in the end cos he couldn't be bothered with the shady stuff, so i guess the way-in wasn't as easy as he'd firast said.

[Old_Johno]

15 hours ago, Pinhead said:

Did I say that? Nope - crew make the festival happen. I implied however that there was seemingly a lot of crew around site this year. Years ago there was a bit of a crackdown on the number of mates of crew accompanying staff which caused a bit of upset. Perhaps this year more concessions were passed out, perhaps as encoragement after 3 years off, dunno.

Anecdotally, there’s always been an element of this with all festivals, the pays not great to run a smaller stage so the crew get 15 crew bands instead of the 10 they actually need for the build, and sell the rest/ give them away as a perk. It doesn’t ‘cost’ the festival anything directly pre festival when there’s no cash flow, and keeps the crew happy. 

If money gets tight for the organisers they start clamping down on stuff like this as they’d rather have the extra cash from ticket sales, rather than happy crew. 
 

Gotta be a bit of balance. 

 

[Pinhead]

2 hours ago, Neil said:

he told me yesterday that he didn't go in the end cos he couldn't be bothered with the shady stuff, so i guess the way-in wasn't as easy as he'd firast said.

I though they filled that tunnel in - used to be an old culvert under the fence in the SE corner somewhere didnt it?

[Skip997]

10 minutes ago, Pinhead said:

I though they filled that tunnel in - used to be an old culvert under the fence in the SE corner somewhere didnt it?

Last I knew about that culvert, which I used once myself, is that they put a very substaintial grill over it to block entry.

[Crazyfool01]

9 minutes ago, Skip997 said:

Last I knew about that culvert, which I used once myself, is that they put a very substaintial grill over it to block entry.

Yep there was a grill over If it’s near a ford about 1km from gate c I walked out that way to retrieve a bag from the woods !! 

[Neville Street]

3 hours ago, crazyfool1 said:

Yep there was a grill over If it’s near a ford about 1km from gate c I walked out that way to retrieve a bag from the woods !! 

I guess without the hat on 🙂

[Crazyfool01]

14 minutes ago, Neville Street said:

I guess without the hat on 🙂

Yeah it was the only time it came off … was left in the care of the bag owner 

[gooner1990]

I do wonder if some of what's apparently gone on is being privately acknowledged by GFL and next year might see a lot less bodies on site as a result of things being tightened up.

 

[moogster]

2 minutes ago, gooner1990 said:

I do wonder if some of what's apparently gone on is being privately acknowledged by GFL and next year might see a lot less bodies on site as a result of things being tightened up.

 

I'm sure they go through lessons learned after the festival.

Regarding people being sneaked in by volunteers/workers, wouldn't there be some supervisors who would keep an eye on that? Or are they just too busy/disgruntled themselves as to spend time on this? 

[gooner1990]

4 minutes ago, moogster said:

I'm sure they go through lessons learned after the festival.

Regarding people being sneaked in by volunteers/workers, wouldn't there be some supervisors who would keep an eye on that? Or are they just too busy/disgruntled themselves as to spend time on this? 

You have to wonder whether some supervisors were in on what's being suggested.

I think we can all speculate what was going on, some have the view that it was just nice weather, 3 years off bad programming that caused it....others (myself included) think that there was also an element of people getting in either via crew before the event started or by other means.  

Either way I would be shocked if the powers that be aren't aware of it as the moaning has been on a mass scale and I would assume a lot of people who don't use this forum or social media have also let their feelings known by email to the organisers.

Someone I used to know (and used to attend the festival with) years ago went this year and she messaged me as she knew I was there this year too and first thing she said was about how busy it was. I came back to work and a guy from another dept first thing he said to me was 'my friends went and came back complaining it was too busy' all my friends who had been before said the same.

There's no getting around it that it was very, very busy in most parts of the site at most times, we saw massive queues for the temple at nearly 4.30am on the Saturday night....2019 I walked straight in at that time.

Something doesn't add up to me, but its fine I just personally think that if we see a repeat of that in 2023 you may start putting a lot people off (myself included) there are other festivals out there that you don't have that sort of 'busyness' 

[moogster]

I'm wondering if we had more first timers than in the past. I saw a lot of young folks who although they could have been there with a parent before, really seemed like it was their first time. As a first timer (young or old) you may want to "do all the classics" and maximize . So you go on e-fest, ask what's on Thursday, read "WG and greenfields". That's what you do. Not being uncool and having a nap in the Woods. Then you HAVE to do the SE corner, not listen to some rando around a fire in GF. You HAVE to party at the Legend, because you can see that unknown band ag BBC/WG anytime at your local club.

When I arrived on Thursday and I saw the amount of people in the greenfields, I headed to T&C, which was busy but doable, and then had a nice SIT DOWN drink at Cockmills. Not the most glamourous and advertised part of Glasto: plenty of space. 

 

[gooner1990]

35 minutes ago, moogster said:

I'm wondering if we had more first timers than in the past. I saw a lot of young folks who although they could have been there with a parent before, really seemed like it was their first time. As a first timer (young or old) you may want to "do all the classics" and maximize . So you go on e-fest, ask what's on Thursday, read "WG and greenfields". That's what you do. Not being uncool and having a nap in the Woods. Then you HAVE to do the SE corner, not listen to some rando around a fire in GF. You HAVE to party at the Legend, because you can see that unknown band ag BBC/WG anytime at your local club.

When I arrived on Thursday and I saw the amount of people in the greenfields, I headed to T&C, which was busy but doable, and then had a nice SIT DOWN drink at Cockmills. Not the most glamourous and advertised part of Glasto: plenty of space. 

 

That's the thing now though isn't it, things that you previously could just do, now you (and I did this too) are thinking 'hmm where is likely to be quiet' it shouldn't really be like that (and hasn't in the past!)

One thing I will agree with is that no one really spends time at their campsites anymore, you feel like you're missing out too much on what's going on by not getting the full 'Glastonbury experience' by sitting around drinking/taking drugs or whatever, loads people are now out and about....I'm sure that adds to the 'busyness' !

[Yokel Again]

Just thinking back to the Euro's final, is there something a society that comes along every once in awhile where you suddenly get an increase of people on the blag etc? 

[gooner1990]

1 hour ago, Yokel Again said:

Just thinking back to the Euro's final, is there something a society that comes along every once in awhile where you suddenly get an increase of people on the blag etc? 

I went to that as well, that was more drunk and coked up twats intent on causing as much trouble as possible, with then a %age of them barging their way in to the stadium.

This seemed more organised if what some of what is being suggested is true, I was watching Robert Plant Fri afteronon and a group of people (all early 20s) suddenly came past us in the crowd (I was near the back) all looking quite shifty (looking round constantly, walking quickly) with day bags on and when I looked at their arms none of them had wristbands on...if I was to guess I would say someone had got them in and they were making their way into the crowds so they didn't get noticed!

[compactdisc]

54 minutes ago, gooner1990 said:

I went to that as well, that was more drunk and coked up twats intent on causing as much trouble as possible, with then a %age of them barging their way in to the stadium.

This seemed more organised if what some of what is being suggested is true, I was watching Robert Plant Fri afteronon and a group of people (all early 20s) suddenly came past us in the crowd (I was near the back) all looking quite shifty (looking round constantly, walking quickly) with day bags on and when I looked at their arms none of them had wristbands on...if I was to guess I would say someone had got them in and they were making their way into the crowds so they didn't get noticed!

I came towards the end of Robert Plant, and there were security stood in a line along the entrance to the Pyramid Field (bottom right entrance), spread a metre or so apart. Had no idea what was happening, but probably looking for this lot! They were dressed differently to the lot I'm used to seeing too. Red polo's instead of blue.

Edited July 8, 2022 by compactdisc

[gooner1990]

4 minutes ago, compactdisc said:

I came towards the end of Robert Plant, and there were security stood in a line along the entrance to the Pyramid Field (bottom right entrance), spread a metre or so apart. Had no idea what was happening, but probably looking for this lot! They were dressed differently to the lot I'm used to seeing too. Red polo's instead of blue.

Could well have been! 

I was stood on the left hand side (as you look at the stage) towards the back, probably a bit further back than the 2nd set of speakers and they came across in front of us having (probably) come from the back path...they disappeared into the gap in the hedge that is used for the toilets next to the cider bus...it was quite close to the end of the set as well.

The funny thing was the more they tried to look inconspicuous the more they stood out, if they had just walked past normally I wouldn't have taken any notice of them, but the funny walk and looking around constantly caught my eye.

[fred quimby]

37 minutes ago, gooner1990 said:

Could well have been! 

I was stood on the left hand side (as you look at the stage) towards the back, probably a bit further back than the 2nd set of speakers and they came across in front of us having (probably) come from the back path...they disappeared into the gap in the hedge that is used for the toilets next to the cider bus...it was quite close to the end of the set as well.

The funny thing was the more they tried to look inconspicuous the more they stood out, if they had just walked past normally I wouldn't have taken any notice of them, but the funny walk and looking around constantly caught my eye.

Oddly I saw a girl with no band on, however, she did have it on here ankle. Not sure how, I assumed she got it off her wrist and pop it on her ankle.

 

On the point if crew tickets there maybe something in it as 2 people we were with bought theirs from the lighting crew as they were not paid due to budgets so got tickets to sell on. Now I do not know whether that was what normally happens with them, or the got extra

[morph100]

14 minutes ago, fred quimby said:

Oddly I saw a girl with no band on, however, she did have it on here ankle. Not sure how, I assumed she got it off her wrist and pop it on her ankle.

 

On the point if crew tickets there maybe something in it as 2 people we were with bought theirs from the lighting crew as they were not paid due to budgets so got tickets to sell on. Now I do not know whether that was what normally happens with them, or the got extra

I saw a guy in my local pub arrange ten or maybe slightly more tickets through crew in May. Seemed fairly well connected though, gave some info which wasn’t out and later turned true.

[DeanoL]

How was the crew bar provision this year? I've always been amazed that there are bars and even stages just for crew at the festival, though it occurs now if there were fewer this year, or they weren't as good, that puts more crew out in the public areas?

[CaledonianGonzo]

Was only in one and it was like a palace. It was busy enough but there were still leather armchairs to sit on and day beds to lounge on.

Plus entertainment from 3 x DMC World DJ Champion JFB, who's probably the most impressive turntablist I've ever seen, no queues at the bar and decent-looking food options.

[balti-pie]

1 minute ago, DeanoL said:

How was the crew bar provision this year? I've always been amazed that there are bars and even stages just for crew at the festival, though it occurs now if there were fewer this year, or they weren't as good, that puts more crew out in the public areas?

Seemed as good as 2019, you can pretty much always rock up and find seats (in the times that I went) and that’s what I’m after for a staff bar - a decent pint, a seat and a bit of time away from hullabaloo (until such a time as I want back in, obvs) 

only criticism is the beer choices ran out early doors, the crafty stuff in tow&hitch and broken Britain went quite early . . . As in by Thursday, quite early