FESTIVALs

: 08 August 2018

Back from the ever wonderful Cambridge Folk Festival. It was my 13th time there and Cambridge remains my favourite festival. A lovely site, a nice size festival, super friendly atmosphere, draught Guinness, clean toilets and best of all – the music.

To my knowledge this is the first ever entirely dry CFF I have been at, and not only was it dry but there was a heatwave on. I did not mind this at all, though it did get incredibly hot at Stage One in the evenings. Tap water was readily available at various points around the site.

: 07 August 2018

The long established Cambridge Folk festival changed its weekend to a week later this year, throwing many regulars that we know out of the equation for attending. The event must have been close to sold out though judging by the size of the crowds over this sunny and extremely hot weekend.

: 02 August 2018

Last weekend’s Womad Festival offered a huge variety of music and an equally diverse range of weather: First two days of heatwave, which meant it was too hot to be in a tent after 8 a.m. Then an in-between-day with clouds and some showers and finally gale force winds and heavy rain that came at tents horizontally. I consider myself quite an experienced festival camper yet I have never had my tent flooded before. Apparently the ground was so dry that the rain could not sink in. My stuff wasn’t half as muddy as it sometimes gets, but definitely much wetter.

: 26 July 2018

Lime Wood is the flagship hotel in a chain of ‘Pig’ boutique hotels across Hampshire and the south west. Strong supporters of live music, they put on a series of daylong festivals during the summer under the Smoked & Uncut banner.

: 05 June 2018

Having spent the weekend in Victoria Park in East London with all the pollen and 'wacky backy’ smells it could throw at us, we are still marvelling at the quality of bands on hand over the Saturday and Sunday.

: 14 February 2018

Beat The Streets is an all day festival devised to raise funds for Framework, a Nottingham charity dedicated to bettering the lives of homeless people. Over 80 acts from the East Midlands came together on 10 stages in Nottingham for this worthy cause.

: 02 February 2018

The Temple Bar TradFest is in its 13th year. Always on at the same time as Celtic Connections, the Dublin fest is similar, but smaller. One of the assets of the festival are its unconventional venues: Churches, the Town Hall, Dublin Castle, the House of Lords. These places do not have bars, so audiences listen well.

: 09 September 2017

My first time at the End Of The Road festival in Wiltshire. Friends had been recommending this festival for some years. The line up never had too many must-sees for me, so I decided to go as a volunteer. I could work for my ticket and would not be too upset if I missed any of the acts. This worked out really well; Wicked Events are a very well-organised and fair organisation to work for.

: 09 September 2017

FolkEast is set within the grounds of Glemham Hall just North of Ipswich. The festival arena has five stages, four of which are indoors and mainly seated, the main stage named The Sunset Stage is the one outdoor standing area. Unfortunately I could only spend one day on the site, but here are thoughts on what happened.

: 26 August 2017

Beautiful Days 2017 had a line-up I could not resist. The festival is organised by the Levellers at Escot Park, an estate near Exeter. It is a pretty setting, hilly and green, at least at the start. Mark Chadwick from the Levellers said on Sunday night that they have yet to have a dry festival in the fifteen years they have been running it. Folks come prepared for this though and nobody bats an eyelid at the mud.

: 25 August 2017

Thursday

Set in the heart of the Black Mountains in South Wales, our annual adventure was underway as the gates opened at 10am on the Thursday. Dry to establish base camp (which is always great) it was nice to explore the site and settle in.

Green Man is full of fun, like when around 9.30 pm one night I am ordering a coffee. The assistant said "why are you drinking coffee, there is still alcohol on sale", fair enough!

: 23 August 2017

The story goes that the Tramlines organisers are bidding a fond farewell and handing over the reins to a new promoter in 2018. As such, their final throw of the dice was to consolidate the main acts (Libertines, Primal Scream, Metronomy, The Coral) to 3 outdoor stages and trust in the weather....What could go wrong? Oh.