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| Sunday 27th June, 1999 |
| It's Sunday and I'm laying in my tent listening to that familiar Glastonbury sound. Rain. It's pouring and the weather forecast people did predict it. I struggle out of the tent and head for the awning that Mark has erected and sit there drinking tea and discussing which acts to see. |
| The rain is now a fine drizzle there is a fair wind blowing so it should clear up. Inside the site I catch a comedian called Guy Collins who is performing all sorts of juggling on a small stage with an eager audience waiting to see him make a mistake. He then turns his attention to rope walking, the end result is that he has a 13 year old boy called Jake lying under the rope and he is going to juggle knives. The audience could have selected balls , but they didn't. At the very point of starting the trick he decides to get a guy who has been holding one end of the rope to lay there instead. |
| I'm off to see Baka Beyond, Jane is staying to witness the bloodshed. If anyone wants a tip about playing festivals, here's one. Don't be first on. The sound for Baka Beyond was awful to start with, a guy who I think is the manager of the band is jumping around in the audience trying to inform the security people that the sound is bollocks. |
| Once it's sorted Baka Beyond are fine. I saw them last year and they impressed me, this year they seem to have been promoted up the ladder, might explain why they are on the Jazz World Stage. Their world is one of tribal dance and traditional cultures with the mixing of the two the blend is definately hot and spicey. |
| Another tip. Don't drink out of plastic cider bottles someone else may want some. I'm all for giving, but this guy jesters to me he would like a drink.Fine, I offer him the bottle which is a 95% full two litre bottle of Scrumpy Jack and he guzzles it down his gullett like it was the last drink he was ever going to have. Well it was the last one I had from that bottle. I told him to keep it. I later saw him looking at the label,he was most likely wondering why he had guts ache. |
 Jane
turns up and informs me that there was no blood spilt when Guy Collins
finally walked the tight rope. If you ever want diversity then Glastonbury
is your scene. At the Wise Crone Cafe there is a band called Howling
at Ravens, trouble is the sound is howling at them. Feedback etc reminds
me of Donal's story concerning the Octopus and the Uillean Pipes ( Check
spelling ).There are two members of this band playing them and the man
on the sound desk is struggling to get the sound right. |
|
Then I'm at the Main Stage for Yothu Yindi. Complete with didg's and Aborigines they are Australias answer to Osibisa. But better.It's amazing get an Aussie band on and all the flags come out and all the crap that goes with it. All the jingoism, I just hope they treat there native country men with the same sort of respect at home. |
| Later That Same Day |
| After the treats dished up by Yothu Yindi who in my opinion could blow Oribital away any day I thought I would make my first ever visit to the Dance Tent. Michael was my guide. The atmosphere is heavy with the sound of bass & drum. I suppose this is how my parents must of felt when I was playing Hawkind at full pelt back in the early 70's. |
| I feel like an outsider, a stranger in a dance land. The sound is very inner city to me. But the people who are in there are really into it, shouting in time to the DJ's as they play their stuff. Me, I'm off to find a beer tent to sink a few beers, my first session of the festival. |
| It's Sunday and it's my first session , I must be getting old. So I down a good few strong lagers and I'm studying the hats, there are green ones, orange, blue, grey, baseball, black, rasta, red and blue, khaki, stupid, conical, and white ones. Days I use to spend watching colours that I now see in different lights. |
| Dodgy.It was my first visit to the New Band Stage. The location was different to last year. Dodgy have a new line up. Janes watching Al Green, I'm interested as Dodgy have a new line up. But to me they don't come across as well as they use to. Perhaps Pete Brennan was right, then again perhaps I was expecting to much from a band who I believe have the potential to make it really big. the new singers vocals sound flat. Perhaps next year. |
| Sha la la la le is playing as I look for Jane, the Reverend Al Green is sounding pretty good as I wander through loads of people who are watching him.Then he is doing a Van Morrison song and I can't find Jane so I decide to hang around and watch The Corrs ( Yum Yum ). |