# Festivals



## Wando64 (Feb 28, 2011)

Any of you with mobile setups attending any festivals this summer?

As I have to go to a few of them it would be great to know where to get a decent coffee.


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

This is my concern... Im off to glastonbury next week, im really hoping to find a decent coffee......


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## jeebsy (May 5, 2013)

There's plenty of things to occupy yourself with at festivals instead of coffee. Take an aeropress and some beans if you really must but I'd just get on with having a good time


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

Just shows how poncy Glastonbury has come.

Bring back the days of shitting in a carrier bag in your tent


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## Flibster (Aug 15, 2010)

I know that The Groundworks (http://www.thegroundworks.co.uk) have a stand at Rhythms Of The World (http://www.rotw.org.uk) this year.

First time in ages that I'll be able to get a decent coffee at the festival. Although it's 5 minutes from the house and I'm a steward so can come and go and fill up at home or Hermitage Rd.


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## froggystyle (Oct 30, 2013)

Dirty Burgers and Alcohol...

Nothing else is needed at Glasters!


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## Big O (Feb 25, 2014)

Almost read that as Birds rather than Burgers..


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## froggystyle (Oct 30, 2013)

Those also help!


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## jeebsy (May 5, 2013)

Spazbarista said:


> Just shows how poncy Glastonbury has come.
> 
> Bring back the days of shitting in a carrier bag in your tent


That's where Imodium comes in handy. Pop a couple on the way to the festival and you're good for a few days.


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

Yeah ive used the Imodium trick before.. I didn't go for like 10 days or something silly.... Nah im just gonna embrace those toilets..

I would still like a nice coffee at glasto, i cant take five days of booze now...


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## jeebsy (May 5, 2013)

10 days!! That must have been a monster when it finally came out.


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

Yeah i even texted my mate to let him know that i had gone.. Luckily it was a tescos public loo that bared the brunt of it...


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## 4515 (Jan 30, 2013)

If you going to Glastonbury see a short bloke selling Mexican food from an Airstream, say hello to my mate Haydn

You'll not get any discount, just say hello


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

working dog said:


> If you going to Glastonbury see a short bloke selling Mexican food from an Airstream, say hello to my mate Haydn
> 
> You'll not get any discount, just say hello


i will do, i live mexican food... So, ill say " hey haydn, working dog said you would give me a free plate of food and he'll sort you out the bill"


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Burnzy said:


> This is my concern... Im off to glastonbury next week, im really hoping to find a decent coffee......


If you head out from the Pyramid and "Other" stage areas at Glastonbury and head towards the Theatre and Cabaret fields the market area around there, it's the one that has the bandstand thing in the middle of it, always seemed to have the more interesting varieties of food and decent coffee, some of the other less mainstream areas also are a good source of better food and drinks. Overall the standard of the food vendors at Glastonbury has always been higher than the other large UK festivals for example you could buy a standard burger from a burger van for £3 or 10 metres away you could get an organic water buffalo burger on a good bread roll with a nice choice of sauces and relishes, mainly made by the vendors as well and cost £3.50, or there is Mexican food, Native American Food, Thai, Malaysian, Indonesian, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Lebanese, Moroccan etc etc.


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## 4515 (Jan 30, 2013)

Burnzy said:


> i will do, i live mexican food... So, ill say " hey haydn, working dog said you would give me a free plate of food and he'll sort you out the bill"


He knows I'm too tight for that. Who are you planning to listen to ?


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## froggystyle (Oct 30, 2013)

Best area i found for food was the greenfields, wicked veggie curry for peanuts!


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## 4515 (Jan 30, 2013)

Just heard my mate is near the john peel stage


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

jeebsy said:


> 10 days!! That must have been a monster when it finally came out.


He probably had to climb down off it.


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

froggystyle said:


> Best area i found for food was the greenfields, wicked veggie curry for peanuts!


Backstage catering at the Pyramid is the best area I've found for food







although I do appreciate it's not somewhere everyone gets to see, and with proper knives and forks not those shitty wooden things that break when you try and spear a fried egg with the fork. What is amusing about there and the main bar in that area immediately behind the pyramid is people watching and the behaviour of some of the z minus list "celebrity's" who are there ligging.


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

Yeah its one of the best festivals for food etc... I wasn't such a coffee head last time i went so will be interesting to see whats on offer... Yeah i tend to stay away from the pyramid area... I like the less commercial side of glasto also.... Yeah i had an awesome Mongolian fish curry from greenfields last time i went...

Thanks charlieJ i will certainly check that area out!

not 100% on anyone.... Once again i brought the ticket on the hope pink floyd or at least david gilmour would headline.... But i give up on ever seeing him now...

theres lots of decent blues, folk and stuff on the smaller stages this year, i generally avoid the bigger stages unless a legend is playing, so ill check out dolly partons jugs.... Ill give de la sol a look and the wailers im looking forward to seeing..... Other than that, ill go where the wind takes me....


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## froggystyle (Oct 30, 2013)

Apart from Metallica and Kasabian, i feel the line up is very poor this year, but then what big artists are out there at the minute!


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

The headliner is usually neither here nor there. To be honest its usually some anachronistic shit that is well past its sell by date. The beauty of large festivals is that you will see stuff you didn't know existef , and there is always so much good music you can't get bored.

I haven't been to Glastonbury for ten years, and that is partly because the last time I went I felt it had lost its edge. Its a gated-community for the wealthy middle classes now, rather than some sort of crazy biblical scene it once was. That's fine if that is what you want but I preferred the crazy non-corporate era


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Spazbarista said:


> The headliner is usually neither here nor there. To be honest its usually some anachronistic shit that is well past its sell by date. The beauty of large festivals is that you will see stuff you didn't know existef , and there is always so much good music you can't get bored.
> 
> I haven't been to Glastonbury for ten years, and that is partly because the last time I went I felt it had lost its edge. Its a gated-community for the wealthy middle classes now, rather than some sort of crazy biblical scene it once was. That's fine if that is what you want but I preferred the crazy non-corporate era


I think the Pyramid stage and "The Other" stage lost their edge long before that, there is still interesting stuff to be found outside those areas, "The Fields of Lost Vagueness" were one of my favourite areas, not that I ever had much time to be wandering other than later on after I'd finished my stint at The Theatre tent where I was in charge of the sound crew, and occasionally over on the bigger stages when an act I worked with played one of those. One particular headliner that I found utterly shite was Mccartney and that was when it all started to go wrong when Michael Eavis went into partnership with Mean Fiddler.


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## Glenn (Jun 14, 2008)

Looks like there will be Butterworths Coffee served by Hortisculptures at Glasto this year


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

I'm not sure Eavis had a lot of choice about the Mean Fiddler thing. The council weren't going to licence him.


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

There is that commercial side to glastonbury, but there is also another side to glasto, you can make your experience what ever you want it to be... The headliners are the last thing i care about... This years line up is really good, there is some class acts in the smaller tents...

It always has been middle class, but i went a couple of times before the huge fence to stop the jumpers... It was a free for all...multiple gangs of scallys robbing and beating, girls being raped, overcrowded, and dangerous place at times... Now its the peaceful place it once was... Its lost that edge, but i dont have to worry about my wife walking off to the tent on her own...


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Spazbarista said:


> I'm not sure Eavis had a lot of choice about the Mean Fiddler thing. The council weren't going to licence him.


There was a lot more to it than that, but what I know is insider information that isn't my place to tell, suffice to say that Mean Fiddler tried to stage a hostile takeover with all that that implies.

Although since the late 90's I've only ever been to Glasto in a working capacity, the last thing I have been bothered with during my hours off have been bands on the 2 main stages, what was the jazz World stage has been consistently excellent in terms of sound and the interesting acts on, Toots and The Maytals were simply sublime there in 2004. The Acoustic and New band's tents are always worth a visit, the Cabaret and Theatre ( now renamed Belle Epoque) tents always have some great stuff on in the way of interesting acts and great comedy in the Cabaret Tent, one highlight of the Theatre tent which always sees it packed out is the daily improv show along the lines of "Who's Line is it Anyway" with people Steven Frost, Paul Merton, Richard Vranch etc is well worth catching at least once.

I think that if you just go for the 2 main stages or the Dance stages then you have wasted a huge opportunity as there is so much more to the whole Glasto experience, and if you've never done it, it's almost obligatory to see the sunrise from the Stone Circle at least once in your life.


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

Yes sunrise at the stone circle is a must...


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

Charliej said:


> There was a lot more to it than that, but what I know is insider information that isn't my place to tell, suffice to say that Mean Fiddler tried to stage a hostile takeover with all that that implies.
> 
> .


I'm afraid you've been misinformed.

Melville Benn's (Mean Fiddler) involvement goes back to the late 80's/90's and in particular during the travellers riot. He was Glastonbury's operational manager.

The turning point for the festival was at the end of the 90's when the fences kept being heavily breached and the number of people at the festival was double that which the licence permitted.

Then Roskilde happened.

Then Eavis was refused a licence. No more Glastonbury.

He had no choice but to get some serious professional help in to provide security and an effective fence...that was a condition of a licence being granted... and he turned to Melville Ben. Ben took a 20% stake in return and they had a 5 year agreement which was renewed and ended in 2012. Towards the end of this time was the first occurrence of a licence being granted with no objections. During the initial negotiations with MF Eavis rejected the deal because he feared MF would change the tone of the festival.

The "hostile takeover" you refer to sounds like what Vince Power (the other guy in mean fiddler) did the get control of the Reading Festival from its previous owner. He, amongst other things, secretly bought the land the festival was held on.

What you have heard as 'insider knowledge' is in fact misconstrued gossip.


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Spazbarista said:


> I'm afraid you've been misinformed.
> 
> Melville Benn's (Mean Fiddler) involvement goes back to the late 80's/90's and in particular during the travellers riot. He was Glastonbury's operational manager.
> 
> ...


Nope what I heard was regards dealing with Vince Power and came from a pretty unimpeachable source that being Arabella Churchill who was in charge of all the circus, theatre and cabaret areas, the fence and other production management considerations were nothing whatsoever to do with Mean Fiddler as the fortress fence predated the Mean Fiddler involvement. Production management issues and the major detail for local residents of "noise nuisance", which was one of the primary licensing issues, the fence was simply put in place to make sure the festival conformed to the license stipulation regarding the number of attendees and control of these people. Production management for Glastonbury has been dealt with by a guy called Chris Beale both when he still was in charge at SSE Audio Group and later on by his consulting firm Chris Beale associates, all completely separate entities from anything to do with Mean Fiddler. Mean Fiddler's early involvement with the festival was actually to do with the management and booking for one of the smaller stages and the Acoustic tent, again this was before Mean Fiddler turned into the giant organisation it is today on the back of it's central London events and Vince Power's shenanigans


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## Mrboots2u (May 10, 2013)

I thought you couldn't tell us .....


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

Not quite right. The super-fence was built by MF.

The problem festival was 2000 when the original fence was massively breached leading to quarter of a million people on site rather than the 100,000 licenced.

2001 was a scheduled year off, but Eavis was told in no uncertain terms that a licence would not be granted without change. It was during this year that MF was brought on board and itvwas they that managed security and logistics including the erection of the superfence.

Negotiations were not straightforward, but that was to be expected from Power who is a hard-nosed businessman.

Eavis rejected the first contract. The contract that was accepted was a 5 year one, which Eavis renewed after 5 years.

Mean Fiddler was a PLC, but Glastonbury festival wasn't. There could be no 'hostile takeover'.

As regards Benn (the other half of MF) he worked for Eavis before MF. And the Acoustic stage was run by a guy called Andy Thomas, and his company Scams Promotions, up until his death. He was the landlord of my local pub


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## Orangertange (Jul 4, 2013)

Charlie and spaz, you seem to know a lot about it either of you going to be there


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

Orangertange said:


> Charlie and spaz, you seem to know a lot about it either of you going to be there


I won't be there this time around, as I had surgery last Tuesday and the wound has got infected so I'm not exactly doing anything bar dropping my pants for the District Nurses every day.


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## coffeechap (Apr 5, 2012)

Which is nice!


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## Charliej (Feb 25, 2012)

coffeechap said:


> Which is nice!


Except its the crack of my arse thats getting the attention from them not the other side


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## Thecatlinux (Mar 10, 2014)

Charliej said:


> Except its the crack of my arse thats getting the attention from them not the other side


 I'm thinking its the nurse who has the worse end of the deal, not you


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

Orangertange said:


> Charlie and spaz, you seem to know a lot about it either of you going to be there


Nope. It'll be Camp Bestival for me this year.


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## Spazbarista (Dec 6, 2011)

Charliej said:


> I won't be there this time around, as I had surgery last Tuesday and the wound has got infected





Charliej said:


> its the crack of my arse


That's put me off my prunes and yogurt


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## Burnzy (Apr 17, 2014)

Spazbarista said:


> Nope. It'll be Camp Bestival for me this year.


Ah have fun.. Its meant to be a really good festival.


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