Music festivals
Perhaps it’s the old curmudgeon in me but I find the idea of spending any time in a field with thousands of other people absolutely abhorrent.
Firstly, I’m not a fan of fields. I accept that they serve their purpose but when fields were first made they were designed for growing crops or perhaps staging sporting events in. Nobody ever thought ‘Wouldn’t this be a brilliant place for people to congregate in large, sweaty numbers?’
Secondly, I’m not a fan of thousands of other people. I like my personal space. It’s well-maintained, highly cultivated and alluringly musky. I do not want the odour of Mickey from Carlow and Janet from Whitebog to mix with it.
Also, when there are thousands of other people it means your chances of being surrounded by absolute cunts is greatly increased. There are already far too many cunts as it is, why bring about more cuntosity on yourself?
Thirdly, the filth. This is 2009. How is it possible that with all the technology, awareness and knowledge we have music festivals require people to revert to the stone-age when it comes to moving ones bowels and showering and such?
I find it difficult to go for a poo anywhere but my own bathroom (the only real exception to this is in decent hotels which tend to have good clean toilets with fully enclosed cubicles and not those ghastly ones with a mere partition on the sides and space for people to look over or under the door), so the idea of having to have a brown baby boy in a portaloo dripping with the piss and shit of a thousand cunts makes me sick to my stomach. I’d rather watch Amy Winehouse get pounded by Brian Cowen.
Fourthly, the music. It’s all crap. Where are the legends like Mr Mister, Cutting Crew, Glass Tiger and Living in a Box? Kings of Leon? Kings of all our fucking songs sound the same because the singer does that yodelly thing with his voice, more like.
On the plus side the fact that so many people will be down at this weekend’s festival of setting tents on fire and vomiting down people’s throats means town is slightly less full of cunts than normal.
You’ve got to count your blessings, see?
July 10th, 2009 at 9:26 am
A good place to drop a bomb then.
I, for more or less the same reasons, wouldn’t go near oxyegen. But what about the electric picnic? Isn’t that better and a bit more civilised? Anyone been?
July 10th, 2009 at 9:27 am
Your getting old twenty ..getting old …
“get off me lawn yee blackguards”
I think most people go to those festivals for the drugs
July 10th, 2009 at 9:43 am
Yeah I’m with you. I find the cinema tough going at times, what with my hatred of the public and their popcorn chomping ways, so something like Oxegen would fill me with dread and violence.
July 10th, 2009 at 9:45 am
There is not one bit of that I don’t completely agree with. Except the Cowen / Winehouse spectacle. I would do pretty much anything not to witness such horrors.
Last time I went to anything of the sort was REM in Slane mid 90s.
An 18 hour day or something, all told, to see some disinterested cunts do and hour and fifteen from half a mile away.
Gah.
July 10th, 2009 at 9:47 am
True, when the fuck did you last leave your house / hovel / cyber-nerve-centre / basement / virtual home?
You sound like shit-brick from American Pie who has to go home to poo. I never understood the queasiness people have about pooing in public places. Admittedly some bogs are better than others but all this drivel about the sanctity of your bum is a load of shit. Some people hover over the bowl for fear of touching cold steel or porcelain. Other freaks lay out individual sheets of paper in order to protect their arses and from WHAT I demand to know!!!!
Whoever died from sitting on a potentially germ-ridden toilet seat? Wipe the piss off by all means, but you’re not making dinner or performing surgery, so shut the fuck up and get on with it. Here’s a few things that everyone should look in the mirror and acknowledge:
1. You have had your own shit on your fingers.
2. If you’re a divil, you might even have had other peoples’ shit on your fingers.
3. You have had dog shit on your fingers.
4. You have possibly tasted shit in the ill-advised and drunken throes of passion some time or other.
So the next time you need a shit, don’t panic, just go to the bog and take a shit.
Now pissing in public is completely different. I can’t piss with people standing beside me, or at least 90% of the time I can’t. Stage-fright they call it. Mega-psychological it is too. Anyone know a cure?
July 10th, 2009 at 9:49 am
I think we should talk about shit all day long.
July 10th, 2009 at 9:50 am
Great quote from Team America: World Police.
“You fuck this up, I’m gonna cut your balls off and shove ‘em so far up your ass that when you shit, you shit out your balls and your balls are covered in shit.”
July 10th, 2009 at 9:51 am
Oh, I hate the cinema as well. Stupid people eating their fucking dinners.
Grover – I think the last big thing I went to was Bowie in Slane (87?) – although I did see some people in a stadium after that. Might have been REM in Lansdowne Road?
Now pissing in public is completely different. I can’t piss with people standing beside me, or at least 90% of the time I can’t. Stage-fright they call it. Mega-psychological it is too. Anyone know a cure?
Yeah, there’s a Benny-reversal operation you can get. It’s expensive though.
Pooing in public mings.
July 10th, 2009 at 9:53 am
Team America is fantastic.
July 10th, 2009 at 9:55 am
Other freaks lay out individual sheets of paper in order to protect their arses and from WHAT I demand to know!!!!
That’s me.
If you have to ask the question “from what” then you’re clearly a filthy bastard
July 10th, 2009 at 9:58 am
Cowen should be so lucky.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:02 am
oxegen is a complete rip off. much cheaper to fly to a festival in europe. better conditions and better bands to.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:06 am
Oxygen is too close to Dublin. It attracts knackers in droves. Electric Picnic was good until the all the Foxrock girlies heard it was safe to go to. Then that was overrun by coke snorting guffawing wankers.
The only way to do festivals is in Spain.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:16 am
I used to work every summer in Glastonbury for cash, but then they started cracking down on drinking all their booze when you’re supposed to be working and being on time and other such nonsense so I’ve given it up.
We had our own toilets and showers etc that weren’t absolutely disgusting too.
I’m reluctant to poo in public toilets alright, but after a pint or 10 i can get over it.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:19 am
19 Major is always having to poo in pubs and what have you. I always say ‘Why didnt you just go before you left the house?’
He never has a good answer.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:21 am
Interesting you should say that HM, was just reading about the festival in Pamplona. I think I may check it out next year. I couldnt go to a weekend festival as I cant shit without me book in hand, and cold porcelain.. Major, the post is very George Costanza..
And what about this Character in Catch 22
Major Major Major Major, Major?
July 10th, 2009 at 10:29 am
And I thought I was the ONLY grump in Ireland that hated music festivals! Good post. Nothing to do with age either – I hated them when I was a flagon-hugging teen too. Much prefer to watch on TV.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:30 am
Supergrover, I was at Slane in 1995 as well. Don’t you remember when everyone started throwing thousands and millions of crushed-up paper cups in the air? It looked like a blizzard. That part was good.
July 10th, 2009 at 10:49 am
I never got a chance to go when I was a teenager, but I’d say at that age it’s great crack. Sure there’d be non stop riding in the the camp site
July 10th, 2009 at 10:54 am
Giving Oxygen a miss due to the amount of knackers it attracts. I dunno what the story is with them but when they get let out of the city the only want to set everything on fire.. little bastards. I wonder if that’s why the Dance arena is the only concrete building in the place.
Going to Castlepalooza instead, only 2500 people, less of a percuntage, hot showers….. and flushing toilets Twenty! Much more civilised! Even opted for the treat yourself ticket, tent is already pitched, sleeping bags and mats provided, bottle of champagne and box of chocolates on arrival and breakfast in bed on Sunday morning with the papers! Now that’s slumming it!
July 10th, 2009 at 11:42 am
90 quid for the regular tickets but the “treat yourself” tickets are sold out, how much were they?
July 10th, 2009 at 11:56 am
Dazed from lack of nourishment and sleepless nights, half-deafened from crashing explosions of noise, diseased from sleeping in filth and drinking unsanitary water, clothes smelling of rot, fleeing from burning homes, crushed by desperate crowds…..
…it’s amazing how much outdoor concert goers and Bosnian refugees have in common.
July 10th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
fuck festivals in ireland. if going to be up to tits in muck and filth, might as well be with some hot eastern european bird, as opposed to our homegrown turkeys
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/holiday_type/music_and_travel/article5982028.ece
July 10th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Hey Morgor, 299 for the pair. A bit more pricier but worth it I think.
July 10th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Jack, sounds pretty good alright.
Perhaps i’ll go next year…
July 10th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
I’d rather rip out my eyelashes than be stuck roasting in the sun at a festival.
July 10th, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Liss Ard, Co. Cork 1998. Best ever. Toilets had fancy lamps and carpet and everyone shared the same bar and restaurant. Lou Reed munching a salad beside you is pretty surreal as you sit there stoned off your mallet holding a GLASS of wine.
July 10th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
The electric picnic looks fucked this year, Creditors meeting in Skylon Hotel today, on at the minute, so could be liquidation of the non alcoholic type.
Where the fuck is Leon?
Hate all outdoor gigs, fuck that muck & shit, way too old. Wont even stay in a shit hotel anymore. Going to Leonard Cohen in the O2, seated gig, indoor, bar & decent toilets & no fuckin knackers other than the cunts that work there.
21st Centuary, indoor, spoilt cunt me, I hate public transport too, in fact I think it’s the public part that I hate.
July 10th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
Just don’t be one of those lighter cunts.
July 10th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
Not enough power ballads …
July 10th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
Tell you who are shit in concert: Air.
French ponces. Purveyors of eight synth notes, crappo-mc-crap white suits and all-round shitness.
I think you have to smoke dope solidly for six months before you ‘get it, man’.
“I really dig the way they use different notes.”
“Yeah.”
Something else you should fucking never, ever fucking listen to again is ‘The End’ by The Doors. Fucking hell its bollox and if you’re not watching the climax to Apocalypse Now its excruciating. Check it:
Ride the snake.
Ride west.
The west is the best. Fuck. Off.
Come on baby take a chance with us…
And meet me on the back.. of the.. blue bus..
Motherfucker wasn’t singing, his drunk, stoned ass was learning how to speak.
The cat sat on the mat.
The cat sat on the mat.
Fancy that, a cat on the mat.
Pass the Southern Comfort.
Ride the 13a Northbound.
I think I feel a song coming on.
What a cunt.
July 10th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
You need to get stoned. Or we need you to get stoned.
July 10th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
MORGOR I remember the communal showers and hot tub at Glastonbury. Nothin’ wrong with that 20.
July 10th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
I quite like Air’s album (maybe two) but I’m not sure I’d dig them in concert. Unless I was stoned.
July 10th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
I am far too old to do any more concerts/festivals. And ever since seeing “Outbreak,” I’m not too fond of going to the movies, either. And those were the days before everyone insisted on talking on cell phones and talking to the characters on the screen.
But I am a big fan of dropping your load in a toilet that someone else has to clean.
The Spouse Sparrow refuses to go in anyone else’s toilet unless he absolutely must, and by god I really wish he would stop using ours. There is no reason why he cannot do his nasty business while we are out. Why save it ’til we come home? I can’t go in the bathroom for 2 hours after he’s used it, because it smells like the devil pinched off a loaf in there. And that’s with a high-powered exhaust fan in the bathroom.
It’s like that scene in “Dreamcatcher” where your man carks it on the bog. It’s not right, and it’s not on.
July 10th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
This is the place to be next week.
http://fiberfib.com/downloads/fib09-recinto.pdf
July 10th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
Oh fuck that’s huge
July 10th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Changed it to just a link.
July 10th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
The Kings of Leon guy sound scarily like the Ginger Hansard. Especially the high pitched whine that he does. Can’t listen to them anymore because of this.
MMN – You may be the first person I’ve heard that doesn’t like Air. Scandalous. Saw them play the Olympia a few years back. Legend stuff.
I recommend going to the crapper early at festivals. Its the only way to get a dysentry free dump at a festival.
”Other freaks lay out individual sheets of paper in order to protect their arses and from WHAT I demand to know!!!!”
Answer: Hepatitis A, E.Coli, camphylobactor cryptosporidium and smelly finger for some. Have you ever seen Mallrats?
July 10th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
The only way to crap at a festival is into a bag in your tent and then bin it. Can’t believe nobody else thought of that.
July 10th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
? I can’t go in the bathroom for 2 hours after he’s used it, because it smells like the devil pinched off a loaf in there.
No window?
July 10th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Not a bad idea HM. But you’d want to do it first thing in the morning and then stay away from the tent for the rest of the day.
July 10th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
If you don’t eat the seven euro burgers you’ll have no solid effluent anyway. It’s not like you couldn’t do with a weekend diet, Porky :)
July 10th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Do you ever wonder — when the festivals are over and everyone has gone home to recupperate, who and what kind of people they are who empty out and clean the porty potties? Do they have a sense of smell? And for how long does the stink stay in their noses? Now that is one shitty job fit for a politician.
July 10th, 2009 at 7:55 pm
Twenty — That’s not only with a window, but with the high-powered exhaust fan venting the stench out the window.
It’s fucking rank. The man’s body can convert scallions, vinegar, and Miracle Whip in to toxic waste.
July 10th, 2009 at 8:15 pm
I reckon a man’s shit smells so bad because we had to mark our space when we were cavemen so another fella wouldn’t come along and try it on with your wife.
July 11th, 2009 at 12:00 am
Still works, even in modern times.
Isn’t that right Peadar?
July 11th, 2009 at 2:20 am
It means EVERY town (in the cuntry) is less full of cunts… Nice..
July 11th, 2009 at 2:24 am
MMN:You are thinking of AIRSUPPLY…
July 11th, 2009 at 6:39 am
MMN?
MMN, gauranteed to be an “American” posing as “Irish”.
July 11th, 2009 at 6:42 am
Oh shitfebird, “guaranteed” means me.
July 11th, 2009 at 8:31 pm
“I find it difficult to go for a poo anywhere but my own bathroom ”
From a man that has been photographed merrily pooing all over the world, I find that a little difficult to believe.
July 13th, 2009 at 11:37 am
T-in-the-Park’s just ended. The lavvies there are legendary despite the Honey Wagons emptying them non-stop. What was revolting were the mad bawbags pissing against the same vans that were selling the food or right beside where people were eating.
July 15th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Never doing a field gig again. Ever. At AC/DC, heard way too many genitals flapping in the wind. Mind you, it could have been The Blizzards. It put me right off my lukewarm hotdog and warm-piss-beer.
And the Kings Of Leon? Don’t make me laugh. The Quo did way better in the ’70’s.
Seriously.
Ma Kelly’s Greasy Spoon.