Reading Festival 2010

**Published September 2010

I’ve got this theory that whoever it is that’s up there allocating fate and cosmic irony was having a right old laugh this year. After years of having to brave the pouring rain GLASTONBURY saw the bluest skies imaginable; READING on the other hand run afoul of a downpour Wednesday evening leaving the campsite swampy enough to test the thickest of Wellies. Still, we soldiered on. Most of us had endured scumbag touts, dodgy websites and obscene ticket prices to get us through the gates and a little slime wasn’t going to dampen our spirits, no matter how much it looked like the Mud Flats of Alaska.

Friday’s party atmosphere at the main stage was eventually kicked off by gypsy-punks Gogal Bordello who's terrific presence made all concerns about the weather seem completely trivial. Later Biffy Clyro’s Simon Neil shocks everyone with his Hulk Hogan-esque bleached beard and pink trousers. I’m just happy to hear an appropriate mix of their recent balladry and their pre-Puzzle wackiness.

Next (maybe the performance of the entire weekend) it’s Queens of the Stone Age. They’re on mindblowing form, it was like somebody unleashed the Kraken and made it sexy. Their set was stuffed with fan favorites like ‘I think I lost my headache’ and ‘Misfit love’ and some obvious (but no less perfect) choices like ‘No one knows’ and ‘Go with the flow’. Finally after busting out one last guitar storm in ‘A song for the Dead’ Josh Homme smirks down the microphone and simply says ‘Guns ‘n’ Roses’. There’s scattered laughter in the crowd, who know already that the other ginger bloke’s band who are up next aren’t going to match that in a million years.

They could have at least turned up on bloody time though. Guns ‘n’ Roses (or Axl Rose and a few mates) wandered on stage 58 minutes late, by which time a sizable chunk of their audience had wandered back to the campsite. Everyone else had to sit tight while the band waded through songs from their recent turd ‘Chinese Democracy’ and the occasional hit before embarrassingly their set was cut short due to a noise curfew. Needless to say, seething hatred radiated from the population for the rest of the evening. Axl is about as cool as wearing socks and sandals to a wedding reception.

Most of Saturday felt like a build up to the reunion of the ultimate ‘will they, won’t they’ band, The Libertines. They did show up however, punctual as a German train and to the opening music of Vera Lynn’s ‘We’ll meet again.’ It was a great set and despite a certain members tired history of unreliability they truly pulled it out of the bag. ‘Time for heroes’ causes such a riot in the first fifty rows that they had to momentarily stop playing due to safety concerns. Wonderful.

A surprisingly small bunch stuck around to watch Arcade Fire’s headline slot. Presumably everyone else wanted to watch some predictable drum-and-bass at Pendulum on the NME stage. Didn’t matter though, it just meant that the informed minority had a better view of one of the best live bands on earth. Some highlights (of a flawless set) were ‘Intervention’, ‘Mountains Beyond Mountains’, ‘Power Out’. Then finally, because any other choice would have just been silly, ‘Wake Up’. It was bold, euphoric and so pleasing to see them playing the space that they’ve deserved for so long.

Sunday was a great chance to relive the music you loved in your early teens. Now you’re older and maturer you make out like you’re only going to see Limp Bizkit and Blink182 because of some ironic double standard. When truth be told, this music makes you want to refuse to do your homework as much now as it did ten years ago. Limp Bizkit eventually won everybody over and was hugely entertaining.

Anyone who ever listened to Blink182 throughout their teens probably knew already that their live performances were among the worst, but this little fact didn’t seem to stop most of the festival wanting to see them play on a stage way bigger than their music was capable of filling. It was true though, their performance was terrible. Tom Delong constantly got his own lyrics wrong then even stopped singing altogether to point out that he ‘sung the last verse super-badly.’ It didn’t matter though, if anything the set was saved the complete stupidity of it. That and them putting an end to the weekend with their rendition the old classic ‘Family Reunion’ - You’ll have to look up the lyrics yourself because I’m certain they wont let me print them in this publication...