Supposedly the Horrors always request a surprise on their gig rider. On one occasion that surprise was a girl dressed as a cat hidden inside a crate. Even the band were a little shocked and said that they realised someone was in the crate and were a little scared to open it until after the show.
Usually you get three review posts from me for each day of the festival. But this year I am taking the lazy route. I will just be doing a single review of the whole shebang. Also it will be somewhat different from usual, this is born out of necessity as I just immersed myself in the music and the vibe and didn’t really bother to take notes. What follows is a departure from the norm for me and a bit of fun too. There is a list of the acts I saw and next to each there will be marks out of ten and one word to reflect my memory of that set. Some of these words may be obvious and others will be cryptic, if you want to know more about them please feel free to ask in the comments.
Day 1 – Friday 22nd August
Crossfaith 7/10 pretty
Red Fang 7/10 dervish
Rufus 8/10 nuts
Shambles In A Husk 6/10 shouty
Phil Nichol (comedian) 9/10 Eskimo
Deaf Havana 6/10 hair
Fat White Family 7/10 hype
Jimmy Eat World 8/10 veterans
Enter Shikari 9/10 banging
Vampire Weekend 9/10 headliners?
Jamie T 9/10 surprise
Bipolar Sunshine 7/10 happy
Metronomy 9/10 synchronised
Queens Of The Stone Age 9/10 party
Day 2 Saturday 23rd August
Jeff Leach (Comedian) 8/10 Ben
Marmozets 9/10 Heavy
Royal Blood 9/10 Bass
Peace 8/10 Magnificent
Hives 9/10 Entertainer
Foster The People 8/10 Kicks
Imagine Dragons 10/10 Thanks
Jake Bugg 9/10 Cool
Arctic Monkeys 10/10 Rocking
Day 3 Sunday 24th August
Glenn Wool (Comedian) 7/10 Canuck
Romesh Ranganathan (Comedian) 9/10 Brown
Billie Marten 8/10 Joni
Young Guns 9/10 Tunes
Papa Roach 8/10 Coby
Clean Bandit 7/10 Disco
Breach 7/10 Rave
Maverick Sabre 8/10 Soul
Schoolboy Q 3/10 Unauthentic
Kooks 10/10 Funky
Horrors 9/10 Pyramid
The 1975 10/10 Sophie
Disclosure 8/10 Fractals
To sign off I have a message for the festival organisers. It’s great that you switched the screens on the Main Stage to portrait view from their original landscape setting. However you need to fix the tech so that we can actually see interesting stuff on them. There were far too many shots of a singers ear, a guitarists arse or just a drum kit with no drummer in the picture. Also please move the fun fair back out of the main arena, it really doesn’t need to be there. All that aside this was one of the most enjoyable Reading Festivals that myself and my good friend Nick Horslen have been to. We have been attending them together for around 13 years and I went to my first in 1975. I’d love to hear what you folks thought of Reading and Leeds this year. Who do you think will headline next year? How about Iron Maiden or AC/ DC? I reckon Muse will headline. I’d like to see PIL on the bill too.
Here we are again, time for my annual pilgrimage to the Reading Festival with my good friend Nick Horslen. Collectively we are the Zimmer Twins a.k.a Bald Guy and Silver Dude. So what is on the agenda for us this year? well there are plenty of bands that we have seen many times before, particularly on the Main Stage. Friday on that stage looks very appealing, particularly Deaf Havana, Jimmy Eat World, Enter Shikari and Vampire Weekend all of whom we have seen before but entertaining none the less. There is a joint headline thing going on that day with Paramore and Queens Of The Stone Age. I’m not too sure about the joint headline thing but both are very good bands who I have seen quite a few times. Friday on the NME/ Radio 1 Stage has a couple of acts that I’d like to see. Notably Warpaint, Metronomy and Gerard Way.I really don’t want to miss Aluna George on the Radio 1 Dance Stage either. I can see some big clashes cropping up for us that afternoon! As for the Lock Up Stage I really want to see Brody Dalle. I am never going to be able to see everyone I want to on that day. Some tough choices need to be faced clearly. I haven’t even considered any of the other stages yet either! As usual I would appreciate any recommendations from you folks reading this, especially if it makes our hard choices a bit easier.
Saturday’s Main Stage line up also looks good and once again it features many acts that I have seen before; including Pulled Apart By Horses, The Hives, Foster The People, Imagine Dragons, Jake Bugg and the Arctic Monkeys. But I have to see DZ Deathrays on the Radio 1 Stage first thing on Saturday. I saw them at the Woolpack in York a couple of weeks back and they were awesome. Also on that stage on my to see list are Royal Blood, Cage The Elephant, Die Antwoord, Chvrches and Bombay Bicycle Club. Then maybe Architects on the Pit stage. Band Of Skulls and We Are Scientists on the Festival Republic Stage. I also want to pay a visit to the Alternative Stage for some comedy. Does anyone have the ability to clone me so that I can attend every stage? Please send me the details, what do you need? A DNA sample, blood, sweat, tears, a stool sample? just let me know because as you are all well aware; you’re never alone with a clone!
Sunday’s closing night on the Main stage is good, but at the moment I prefer the other days. Although missing Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Blink 182 would be disappointing. However Disclosure headline the NME/ Radio 1 Stage that night and I don’t want to miss them either. On that same stage on Sunday I also fancy Clean Bandit, the Horrors and the 1975. Blimey this doesn’t get any easier does it? Then of course there is the Klaxons on the Radio 1 Dance Stage. The Lock Up stage is headlined by the magnificent Gogol Bordello with support from the Frankly (Turner) un-missable Mongol Horde.
OK clearly I will enjoy loads of acts but I will also be disappointed at having to miss so many. I await your recommendations dear reader, along with your plans for cloning me. The Zimmer Twins will see you there!
If you squint you can just about spot the Zimmer Twins in that crowd!
We are now just over two weeks away from the start of the 2012 Reading Festival. Since I moved north to York in 2007 this has become my annual pilgrimage back south where I meet up with my good friend and festival buddy extraordinaire Mr nick Horslen. Undoubtedly soon to qualify as the oldest rockers in a field in Reading (our combined age is definitely over one hundred!) we have attended the world’s number one rock festival for many years. Although I live nearer to the Leeds end of it I won’t be going there until I can only move by Zimmer frame as I have always seen Leeds as the snotty young brother of Reading.
I have mixed feelings about some of the headliners this year. The Foo Fighters are always awesome an I doubt that will change this year. The Cure, who headline the main stage on the Friday night haven’t played the Reading Festival since 1979 so I’d like to think they’ll have something special up their sleeves for this year. It’s Kasabian that really concern me, I find them a little predictable and almost Spinal Tapesque, like someone said today I’m going to invent a rock band. I may be convinced otherwise but for me they come across as Leaden Zeppelin, Slightly Dark Sabbath or Shallow Purple. I am sure that there are plenty of you out there that disagree with that opinion, so feel free to comment.
There are some great acts lower down the bill on the Main Stage that for me are ‘must see’ performers. Those are; Florence and the Machine, Paramore, Eagles Of Death Metal, Cancer Bats and the truly stupendous Enter Shikari. The Kaiser Chiefs are third on the Main Stage bill on the Sunday, which I find a bit surprising. They have been lacklustre at best lately in my opinion, what do you think?
I am disappointed that I will probably miss Justice in the NME/ Radio tent as they are on the same time as the Foo Fighters. But there are a number of other bands and artists that I want to see on the NME/ Radio 1 stage; notably the Horrors, the Joy Formidable, Hadouken, the Hives, At The Drive In (who are on at the same time as Kasabian) and most of all Graham Coxon.
On the other stages I will do my best to watch Less Than Jake, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, Azealia Banks and Grimes. But of course I can’t ignore the often excellent BBC Introducing stage where Nick and I often pick a band with the wackiest name to see, but we are also open to recommendations too! So I’m currently considering Wet Nuns, Fish Tank, Dingus Khan and Attention Thieves.
Nick and I often meet some really interesting people at the festival and last year was no exception. In fact last year we met a great bunch of people, mostly South African, but with a smattering of Brits. One of the South Africans was a hilarious bloke called Jason Steyn. (Jason if you’re reading this let me know if you’ll be there this year). They shared their booze, we shared our food and supplied me with a Prince Charles mask! if those guys are back again this year and indeed if you want to meet me and Nick we will be just to the left of the front of the lighting/ mixing tower as you face the main stage, although obviously not if we’re at one of the other stages. You can’t miss us, Nick is very tll and grey haired and his festival nickname is Silver Dude. I am somewhat shorter, slightly older and have hardly any hair, my festival nickname is Billy Baldust. (Actually I just made that one up, but there will be a prize for anyone who comes up with a better one!
Anyway that’s enough wittering on from me. I would love to hear your comments on this post or indeed on any of my posts. I would also love to meet you at Reading and would be more than happy to give you a name check on my posts from the festival! Whetehr I see you or not I hope you enjoy yourself!
So after all those rumours from Blogland that Mr Bowie would come out of retirement and headline New Zealand’s Big Day Out Festival next year it has finally been announced that he was apparently ‘never really an option’. In other Bowie news I can report that his has a new album released in January 2010, well you can guess how excited I was when I read that only to find that it is not a new album but a double CD compilation drawn from shows on the Reality Tour from 2003………. Oh well one can always hope! Incidentally if you’re interested in the line up for the Big Day Out here is a summary of the biggies; Muse, Dizzee Rascal, Lily Allen, Kasabian, The Mars Volta, Rise Against, Peaches, Horrors, Girl Talk and Mastodon.
Lily Allen follows the advice of this blog or probably not!
On the subject of Lily Allen those regular readers among you will be familiar with this blogs ‘Lily Allen Naked’ experiment. The objective of which was to expand the number of blog views by attracting people who were searching for ‘Lily Allen Naked’. Obviously I have felt guilty about this for some time as there were never any naked Lily Allen pictures here, despite the fact that more than 600 people had arrived here seeking them. Although of course it might have been one person arriving 600 times, come on Tom own up! So if you’re among that group or you are that person or if it was you Tom then please accept my apologies and let me also give you some good news. Lily was clearly influenced by our experiment because she recently completed a rather tasteful nude photo shoot for GQ magazine. Click here to see a selection of those, rather good, pictures. I would also like to mention the countless other searches for naked pictures of; Eminem, Sting, Kate Bush, Katy Perry, Ronan Keating, Bryan Ferry among others and perhaps most bizarrely of all a handful of people arrived here while searching for Meatloaf naked…………….I mean COME ON! That is so wrong in many ways…………..WHY????? So in my humble opinion that brings the ‘Lily Allen Naked’ experiment to a close. So now all we need to do is think of what the next experiment will be. Any suggestions? I have a few on my mind;
1) Calvin Harris Underpants (Acceptable In The 80s)
2) Sugababes lingerie (Get Sexy)
3) Mick Jaggers Athletic Support (Let’s Work)
Mick Jagger, very much in touch with his camp side
4) George Michael flashing (I Want Your Sex)
George flashes his ring 😉
Although to be fair the last one has probably been done to death already! Anyway I do look forward to receiving your own ideas. I would also like to state categorically that I really haven’t been thinking about these for long. While you ponder them why don’t you enjoy the fabulous Lily Allen with “It’s Not Fair” Lily I know you have some very strong and indeed valid views abot downloading, but whatever your thoughts I and many others would rather you carried on recording!
As this is somewhat of a random post let me continue with a jolly good link that was passed to me by my good friend Nick H from the parish of Marlow. It’s a piece that the NME are running on line about the best gig you ever saw. Now that’s a really tough one for me. Obviously I would select at least one Bowie gig (probably 1976 at Wembley) plus Radiohead (at Lancashire County Cricket ground in 2008), Suede at the Reading Rivermead (hmmmmm when was that? Late 90’s methinks), Gene (the Old Trout in Windsor 1994). But if my life depended upon it I would have to say Parliament/ Funkadelic at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1978 a truly unforgettable concert experience! George Clinton and Bootsy Collins two cast iron geniuses in my opinion! Anyway to check out the NME link click here. What was the greatest gig you ever saw, I think we’d all like to know, wouldn’t we?
And finally for today I must draw your attention to the rather excellent C’Mon Son posts, if you click here you can see number 4 and boy does he deal brilliantly with uber twat Mr Kanye West for barging into into Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech recently! What do you think?
Hi people here is hopefully the first of three probably brief pictureless dispatches from the muddy fields of the Reading Festival. Well not too muddy actually but judging from my drive down from York I reckon Leeds could be very muddy! In fact the whole journey down was a bit of a nightmare thanks to a combination of rain, wind and roadworks. I finally arrived on site around 4.30pm and met up with my good friend Nick. He had already seen quite a few acts, including the excellent Temper Trap who I would have loved to have seen, oh well never mind there really is plenty more on offer. We decided to largely go for quantity today which as it turned out was sometimes at the expense of quality.
First Main Stage band I saw today was the Deftones, I wasn’t overly impressed actually, in fact I didn’t know they were still around. I’ll save the magnificent headliners until last as they were the only other band I saw on the Main Stage.
We were in the NME Radio 1 Tent quite a lot. Nick also caught Little Boots’ set which he said was very good, that was another I missed. But I did see the last part of the Horrors show, I thought it was ok but perhaps a bit derivative of many 70s influences, I felt a big bit of Gary Numan in there somewhere. Although obviously I can’t comment on which bit! Next up in here was the wonderful Jack Penate. A great set that really had the crowd and indeed the tent bouncing! This was followed by Florence and the Machine. She is something else. Supremely talented and very quirky with a great stage presence. How she climbed the stage rig with those heels I’ll never know. Her songs sound like she has listened to Kate Bush and Bjork and mixed that with a significant amount of her own talent. Her wardrobe appeared to look as if someone from Victoria’s Secret had dressed Stevie Nicks off of Fleetwood Mac!. We also saw most of the Friendly Fires set. Amazing band and I think exactly who Wild Cherry were talking about in the 70s when they sang “Play That Funky Music White Boy”. I also like Jamie T of whom we watched a couple of songs, I thought he was ok, he certainly knows how to play the audience.
On the Lock-Up  Stage we caught the Bouncing Souls a US punk band that have been around for 20 years but still sound fresh. We saw a couple of songs from Alexisonfire, I wasn’t impressed particularly. Later Anti-Flag were superb, mixing punk and politics in a good way and in a way that hasn’t been done since the Clash!
On the Alternative Stage we took the offer of free 3D glasses and saw 20 minutes of George A Romero’s (it was him wasn’t it?) 3D ‘Night Of The Living Dead’ We also saw one song from Everything Everything on the BBC Introducing Stage, they struck me as the Scissor Sisters meet Indie with a bit of Prog thrown in.
OK and finally we saw the whole of the Kings Of Leon show and never mind if your sex is on fire this band was on fire. I think I’d forgotten how many great songs they have. Probably one of the best headline acts I have seen here in all the years of coming.
On a separate note I reckon the flag ban this year certainly took something away from the atmosphere. What do you folks think?
Oh well now it’s time for a shower, a cup of tea and a leisurely breakfast before Day 2 of the festival starts. Shower? At a festival? I hear you say, well I’m not camping. I don’t do camping 😉 But to all of you who are I hope you were comfortable and that you don’t smell too much!
With Just A Hint Of Mayhem 