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Gig Reports |
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Gig Report
Little Massive Stage, Glastonbury Festival - Fri 25-Jun-2004 |
We arrived at the site on Thursday, on a nice sunny evening.
No traffic probs, just straight in and up with the tents, then on to the business of drinkin, and watching the mighty Pronghorn in the Lost Vagueness field.
FRIDAY:
Today we were to headline the LITTLE MASSIVE STAGE.
This stage was intended for local talent, and we knew a few of the bands who shared the bill with us, not least Badger’s old band, KILL VAN HELSING.
It’s a sad thing that the organisers didn’t recognise the Little Massive as a stage as such, it couldn’t be found in any of the programs i saw. Of course, without sounding biased coz we played on it, it’s stages like this that don’t operate under the influence of such dire bullies as the NME and other publications that TELL you whats cool, rather than let you decide for yourself, so it’s usually the place where the more interesting bands can be found, rather than those that promise journalists free charlie and whiskey in return for a good review.
Cheers to Money Shot for puttin on a good show that day by the way, good to meet you chaps.
The problem with Friday was the drink, plus Guy hadnt showed up yet, he had to work on Friday so we were all a bit nervous as to whether he would make it on time.
Both myself and Badger had to spend a sunny day at Glasters and try and not get drunk, as the performance that evening might have been another Cheese & Grain disaster. It was as tough as it sounds.
But we did it, and come gig time everything was hunky dory.
Now then, we knew we’d be up against Oasis on the Pyramid stage and the Chemical Brothers on the Only Good Music If Yer Off Yer Tits stage, but we also found out we’d be up against crusty hippie folk stalwarts The Levellers on the Avalon Main Stage, which was right next to the Little Massive.
Nik the friendly soundman asked us how loud we wanted to be, to which the obvious answer was ’ As loud as you can get it. ’
When we were setting up the tent was empty, when we took the stage it was still empty, so Badger yelled over the mic before we started, ’ All you cunts outside get in here and hear some decent music, fuck the Levellers they’re old hat anyway...’ or something along those lines.
This brought a few in, and then a few more and so on and so on.
So it was great, all good fun, jumpin around and the like.
After the gig, we were told the Levellers had sent someone over to ask us to turn it down as ’ they were trying to do a headline slot over there ’, which thankfully Nik said no to, and also they apologised from the stage for the ’ racket ’ going on next door.
Fuckin result.
But as happy as pissing off the Levellers made us, celebrations were short lived as we then went straight
to the backstage bar to do another gig, and this is where my memory goes, all i know is i woke up in my tent, with just a hangover for company.
SATURDAY: Mostly a blur, but Toots & the Maytals were fantastic.
SUNDAY: The big one, playing the Avalon main stage. I went to the bar, which was our unofficial headquarters, and found out that Badger had gone on a bender on Saturday and returned at 5:30 in the morning covered from head to toe in mud.
He mumbled something incoherent and collapsed in the back of the van.
When i woke him half one Sunday afternoon so we could play at half three, we discovered a Post-It note attached to the back door of the van. The note contained a name, Giles, and a phone number and a vague reference to a car.
Apparently, whilst pissed, Badger had talked a bloke into driving him into the tent on top of this bloke’s funky car, and from there Badger would leap onto the stage to rapturous applause.
Anyone in their right mind would think, ok, it was one of those pissed up ideas that i can go and laugh off with the bloke, and then concentrate on playing.
Not Badger, not only did he decide to go through with the idea, he elaborated on it.
Now, he would be driven in on the car, with a team of security staff cordoning a section of the crowd off to make room, with loud intro music blaring and strobe lights, and
he’d be in full costume, consisting of an old German Great Coat, a full on alien mask, a straw hat, a leopard skin thong, and he’d be brandishing a skull staff too.
As Guy said, he’s certainly got his ego in check.
All of these plans were made with maybe an hour to go, surprisingly, the Avalon staff were delighted to help and didnt mind the last minute disruption at all.
The time came for the intro music to start, only for the soundman to discover Badger had given him the disc case but left the disc in the van.
We were already eating into our set time, so me and Guy said fuck it, just get him on, but no, this stunt was all or fuck all.
All of a sudden it started, and in he rolled. Even this pessimistic person has to admit it looked fuckin great, especially when he lost his footing and fell off the car.
He disguised it well though, and hopped the barrier, only to find out he couldnt climb onto the stage and needed a friendly soundman to help him up.
Of course, me and Guy felt like a coupla roadies just shuffling on stage and picking up our instruments to play, but all credit to Badger, he pulled it off and it looked great.
The set went great, people jumped around, lapped it up, i can safely say now it could not have gone any better. Dare i say the best gig we’ve ever done.
Thanks to all that bought CDs and shirts, hope we made some friends out of yous.
Hope they ask us back next year, and that it’ll be sans mud. |
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