Category: music

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#MYLDN (1508)

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#MYLDN (1507)

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#MYLDN (1506)

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#MYIBZA 9 (B.C)

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#MYLDN (1415)

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GLASTONBURY 2019 – Day 4 (Fri 28th June)

  • Trump with breasts swinging a plastic chicken is maybe not the best thing to see when you’re wasted..instant trauma and this was in the healing fields…
  • The slogans have spoken
  • Some people went to extreme lengths to not get split up in the crowds
  • I cannot tell you how many times I saw these scenarios around site at Glastochella
  • I didn’t have the heart to tell him he was actually at a Rosalia gig
  • The Brass Funkies at Funkingham Palace – they were superb and 1 of 3 brass bands we saw which were the highlight of our Glasto
  • The man with the bunny ears applauds the people who were dumb enough to queue up for 1hr + to get into the rabbit hole
  • Meanwhile The Bimble Inn gets rollin…
  • Superb brass band No. 2: Das Brass

We marched all over site on Friday and even though it had seemed packed uptil that point the crowds seemed to have doubled since the day before. Dealing with the mob in downtown Glasto (around the main stages) is pretty full on and not for the feint hearted. It’s a slog and you see lots of people who seem completely overwhelmed by the scale of it all and the amount of folk they have to fend through to get to their chosen destination. This is the bit they do not see on the TV.

Every time I mentioned that I was going to Glasto or that have just been to Glasto, the response is always the same…”Oh, I’ ve always wanted to go there. I would like to see it, just once”. It has become one of those bucket list things like the northern lights or Machu Picchu. IT is now something everyone wants to experience but it is definitely not for everyone. Not at all. It is an extreme event, an endurance test and ideally you need to be pretty wasted pretty much all of the time to deal with it.

Glasto used to be full of mostly munters and musos, party people who are willing to do what is necessary. These days you tend to get a lot more tourists who are there to see the spectacle rather than necessarily participate in it in this way. This has changed the feel of the festival considerably and it now feels different to how it did. Not that anyone doesn’t deserve to be there or can’t do it how they want to do it. Glasto should be anything but exclusive, everyone is welcome but it has altered the vibe.

it used to be mainly heavy duty hedonists that was attracted to Glasto which created a certain atmosphere. In the current era, pretty much everyone and their grandma now want to go to Glasto. So as a result, it sells out in half an hour so it basically boils down to who has the fastest broadband is who gets to go.

Its not about it getting more commercial because it had to move with the times and think that Emily Eavis has done a magnificent job of transforming it and making it relevant to a new generation by diversifying the acts which has successfully diversified the crowd. It needed to evolve to survive but it has also diluted the Glastonbury spirit, in my opinion and in my experience there. And I will come back to this concept of personal perspective and projection in my final Glasto post on Sat…(bonus blog day so I could cram it all in, aren’t you lucky?)

After our massive trek across site we came back to the Bimble Inn and had the best time out of anywhere we had been so decided we were going to park up in the Park (park pun intended) and have our fun without the aggro of having to get to it in the first place. This is often my policy in my home town and Glasto is actually a lot like London. Its massive and not just one place, its lots and lots of places sandwiched together and sometimes the best thing you can do is stay local and enjoy what is on offer on your doorstep…

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GLASTONBURY 2019 – Day 3 (Thurs 27th June)

By the time Thursday came along everything was in full swing, although so much had already happened I felt like I had been there a week and could barely remember anything before arriving on site..I was sure I used to have a life before Glasto, I just couldn’t quite recall what it was. The festival is so friggin enormous (the size of Sunderland apparently) and so all encompassing you forget there is anything beyond its walls…

New arrivals getting stuck in at The Bimble Inn, which was our favourite venue on site…great vibe, great bands. It is up on the hill in the ParK Area behind the big ribbon tower so people who are willing & wanting to steer away from the masses come here because they know there is a ton of fun to be had off the heavily beaten tracks of the main areas.

If you want to see your favourite band best get there early.

One crucial thing we learnt very early on and from previous years…if you see a crowd heading somewhere en masse go in the opposite direction and you can’t go far wrong. At normal festivals you would do the opposite but at Glasto there is so much cool shit to see it really doesn’t matter where you are. You do not need or want to follow the hoards. You wanna basically zig when they zag. Not everyone realises this as there are so many first timers who don’t really know where to go and you could see them marching around looking for the party not realising that they ARE the party. You make the fun wherever you are not where you were told to go. You have to be adventurous and explore. Glasto rewards the brave and the bold.

But sometimes you just can’t avoid ’em. Glasto has the same sized population as Iceland (the country not the supermarket altho apparently there was a supermarket on site selling sarnies in biodegradable packaging but we never found it) there were times when staying away from the crowd wasn’t possible. On Thursday the site was already rammed with folk there but none of the stages open till the following day so the whole site descends on block 9, unfair playground and Shangri-la, the late night venues scattered across the top end.

Block 9 – just like the apocalypse, but with mebbe less cannibalism and with mebbe more massive sound systems, amazing light shows and munted ravers…

Meet you by the guy with the big sword..

This is Icon the new stage which looked like a cross between 1984 & 2001. The movies not the years..although by the way a lot of the ravers were dressed you would have thought it was 1989 not 2019.

Meanwhile in the Rocket Lounge, vintage vibes rocked & rolled em…

Went to see our friend Gus aka Lazlo legezer in the early hours play a superb drum n bass set in the giant mouth tent (don’t know name) in the Unfair playground that had ’em spinin’ out…

ok, caption comp..the fella on the right has clearly said somit that didn’t go down too well with the girl on left. Please send your entries to babycakesromero@gmail.com and the winner will get a lifetime subscription to my blog…

On the way home we stumbled upon this gang. The girl on right was mc’ing really quite badly to a makeshift sound system in a shopping trolley pumping out D&B but we cheered her on cos that is the Glasto spirit. its all about supporting & rewarding effort…

We even managed to pop to the seaside on the way back, visiting Glastonbury on Sea: a giant seaside pier built out of steel. ‘Nuff said.

Back in the pod, the lucky folk who had bagged it were settling in for the night. Made mental note to try again next night..

You might have noticed by this point that all my pictures are mostly blurred with whacked out trippy light swirly affairs. All I can say is this is what my camera captured. The colours you see are the way it came out. The odd thing is that is mostly how it looked to me at the time. My retinas seem somehow, quite inexplicably, to be able to relay the information they are processing directly into my shutter – how that is possible I know not but am very happy my equipment and my warped sensory perception have this symbiotic connection. The ultimate fusion of man & machine. Or just a shaky hand with a long exposure. I prefer the first theory personally…

Tomorrow’s episode: Friday! When the festival actually officially begins and bands you have heard of start to play. The likes of which I fail to see as am ensconced elsewhere. People who watch Glasto on Tv can’t really comprehend that what they see is only a fraction of the festival, and in my opinion, not the best bit about it all. The greatest thing about Glasto is all the little tents, the bands and djs you have never heard of, the ones you stumble upon by accident…the ones you will never know their name but you will remember the moment forever…possibly. Ok, unlikely, but you lived it and that’s the main thing, right?

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GLASTONBURY 2019 – Day 2 (wed 26th June)

Thursday used to be the warm up day for the festival. Then the warm up day got its own warm up day and now Wednesday is a big day in its own right. At this rate people are going to start coming for their 2 week summer holiday ..but that won’t work because you would then need a 2 week holiday to recover..

Annoyingly they weren’t there. Typical Glasto meet up.

Devices at the ready…we’re goin in.

This festival go’er was lost & trying to find the location of her temporary dwellings after having pulled an all-nighter. She had taken a photo of a nearby stage the night before so she would be able to find but it wasn’t helping. There are apparently tons of tents which are found at the end of the festival which are full of unpacked bags where Gglastoheads have arrived, dumped their stuff, gone out that night, and then never managed to find their tent again for the rest of fest due to having successfully failed to secure their whereabouts before going off and getting wasted. Ouch

Cinemaggedon – an incredible collection of sooped up vintage cars n hotrods to hang in at the drive-in whilst you watch you a movie…

..or use to catch up on some kip.

Fatboy Slim turned up and performed a ‘not so secret’ silent disco set as the film rolled. Crowd went suitably nuts..

 

Incredible pod thing you could hang out in a la Park. Made mental note to return and utilise but subsequently forgot to check mental notes so never managed to actually get in…

Kicking off at the deluxe diner.

Standing up for alien rights…

..and it was great to see so many unicorns at Glasto this year, diversity really improving, although think orc numbers could still be improved..

Just in case crowd got lairy…

Drum n bass was back big time all over site this year..just like it never went away. #90stakeover2019

One day of rubbish…

 

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GLASTONBURY 2019 – Day 1 (tues 25th June)

We arrived at Worthy Farm on Tuesday afternoon and sailed in. Well, we drove in actually, we weren’t in a boat. The hoards wouldn’t arrive till tomorrow so we were able to get on site easily and get our tent pitched up on the hill overlooking the Park area next to a tree. This turned out to be the greatest move we ever made as it meant we had shade every morning till midday which was a first. When its hot at a festival you normally have to vacate your tent by 8am as it becomes nuclear by then. By getting several hours kip in each night (well, each morning) meant we were able to give our bodies ‘n’ brains some rest which allowed us (just about) to get through an insanely full-on week of revelling in the biggest musical festival on the planet…

Rule No.1 – pack light.

Dr. Zoidberg warmly greeted us into the festival..

Glasto gets poolitcal. (one bad pun surely deserves another?)

Glasto tourists wait for the big crane at Arcadia to burst out its fireballs.

Clearly every crowd was catered for at Glasto…

The Unfair playground

On the first night we went to the crew bar at Shangri-la and it was going off. On a tuesday! Everyone was already flying high and raving hard. It was kicking off more than most festival at their peak. You realise that Glasto is actually a crew party, the punters are just along for the ride…and pay for it. There are around 50,000 people working at the festival and by the time the festival starts they have been going at it for about two weeks. It is their contribution and dedication to partying which makes Glasto begin in full swing at full tilt with no run up…

This guy above was jumping up and down repeatedly into a bin so that he could crush the cans inside. We never found out quite why unless he was just being duly diligent…or had a thing about cans. Or bins.

We found out on arrival that the whole of the festival was being used as a 5g testing site. No choice. No consent. This did not feel me with joy. More of that later on in week…

We saw many casualties even on the first night. At Glasto no-one knows how to hold back. It just isn’t an option.

Eco Car

This was a sculpture of a turtle that had been caught up in a ton of plastic and other human waste items. It was designed so you could hang out inside of it but highlighted the damage we are causing to the oceans and its inhabitants, which to be honest, was a bit of a buzz kill (laughing face with tears, crying face with tears)

The view from our tent

 

To be continued….

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#MYLDNites (1313)

Some london nitelife shots this week from my b’n’w MYLDNites series, all taken in a variety of clubs around the city. Different music, different crowds, different vibes wherever you go. Musical tribes tend to segregate into their own worlds and stick fiercely to their chosen genres and fellow folk who are all into the same tunes and vibe. We congregate with our own and feel that we are doing it as it should be and other versions of the same thing don’t quite do it as well. And yet, everyone thinks that so we can’t all be right…

I like to move between worlds and see how everyone is doing it, not just one corner. The more scenes you see the more you realise they are much more similar than they would believe. What they all have in common are the 3 ds: drinking, dancing & drugs, the holy trinity of nitelife which exist in some combination in every place you go to. We tend to want to hang out in crowds who like the same tunes because that makes us feel we are not only right to like this version of music but that we belong. When you cannot connect with the sounds you are surrounded by, you feel like an outsider and that immediately alienates you from those around you.

Life is tribal in almost every way and nothing more than music.  I have just got back from Glastonbury and this festival which has every single strain of music represented shows this better than anything. Strangely the experience for everyone is largely the same but we tend to fixate on the differences even though the similarities outweigh them. I might delve into this more next week when I post up shots from Glasto as it is a great example of how what should unite us still managed to divide us.

(p.s sorry bit late today, blame Glasto)

 

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#MYLDNites (1312)

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#MYLDN (1298) SPECIAL: LUXURY KILLS

if you cant see vid please click on this link to view: https://tinyurl.com/yy59ma9h

I shot and cut the original video (link) for the 7 inch release of Luxury Kills by DA7 feat. Annie Bea using photos compiled from the Rich kids of Instagram which were then projected onto Annie and Fjokra as they performed track. It seemed like the ideal content for this anti-consumerism anthem. These digitally displayed lifestyles of excessively wealthy people had been uploaded to make people envious of their existence but just showed what a pointless and shallow pursuit conspicuous consumerism was. It was like watching the shopping channel for status symbols. Cars, planes, watches, clothes and all things bling on an endless revolving loop. It just demonstrated how repetitive and restrictive their way of life was and wanted to show it was not something to be jealous of, quite the opposite. 

When discussing ideas for the video of Jem Stone’s remix (above) I had just come off the Extinction Rebellion’s shutdown of London and realised the footage would be perfect to splice into the original video as it was the ultimate juxtaposition to the hollowness of buying shit you don’t need to impress people you don’t know. 

The lyrics of the song are about someone who can’t find any satisfaction or happiness from spending no matter how much retail therapy they indulge in. In the video she is bombarded with images of luxury (as indeed we all our every day of our lives) yet she is essentially alone and unfulfilled. 

In contrast, we have the rebellion, who are united together, a created community bound by a shared goal, acting for the collective good rather than just themselves and yet who are still having fun doing it. It showed how if we can just free ourselves of the consumerist drive of our society we can move onto another path, a more sustainable & more satisfactory path and most importantly, one that is less destructive to the environment. The damaging effects of the relentless production of unnecessary things is devastating nature everywhere. The carbon footprint of fast fashion for example is gi-normous and we must curb our consumption for the benefit of all living things on this planet, including ourselves.

The path our society is currently on is a dead end. If we continue along this route at some point the human race will stop. We must get off it and sooner rather than later. We must stop focussing our energies on how well we are doing in society and start concentrating on how well our society is doing. We must stop looking to the acquisition of things to bring us happiness which they clearly don’t. Luxury Kills, Community lives. 

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#MYLDNites (1211)

Sunday. 22:42. Loft Party, Dalston

Every shot this week was taken on a night out last week. As the Cameo track Word Up goes, “Wave your hands in the air, like you don’t care”.  Larry Blackman was singing this in the 80s and this declaration suited those times and in some ways that is exactly what has been happening ever since but things feel a little bit different now. I do care and I am concerned but I’m still waving my hands in the air. In all honesty being out and having fun these days seems somewhat at odds with what is currently going on, both in this country right now and globally for what the future holds for us. There really doesn’t feel like there is anything much to celebrate but still we carry on, pretending as if there was. We ‘party on’ to escape the horror because it feels there is nothing else to be done.  But it is starting to feel like a very surreal and conflicting experience, the euphroria of a night out squarely at odds with the current anxiety of the day to day.

The ‘real world’ never made a lot of sense to me but squeezing as much fun as you could out of life and living a hedonistic existence always did. Mainly because its when you get to experience people at their happiest and most interactive. It maybe stimulant induced but it doesn’t take away the fact that on nights out you find people come towards each other rather than edge away and (mostly) bring out the best in each other, guard down, prejudices locked away, revealing open souls who want to join as a connected collective, if only for one night.

And what unites people every single time is music. On a lot of the nights out last week I have shown you photographic snipets of, I was not really feeling in the mood when I first went out but invariably I would  hear a track and it would lift my spirits, it would bring me back from the pit of despair, it would inject me with life and positivity. One of those tracks was “From Disco to Disco” by whirlpool productions (link) which 2manydjs played at the party I was at on Monday and I was sitting there, feeling pretty wrecked and flat and wondering what the fuck I was doing there and this song came on and in moments I was up on my feet dancing, without a care in the world, uplifted and happy.

I saw the Young Fathers on Tuesday just gone at Brixton Academy and having lived through the week of nights I have shown you in these pictures I was fairly dead on the inside and heavily flatlining. Within ten minutes of their gig, I was reinvigorated and energised, raised from the dead and brought back to life. A pretty impressive achievement which they delivered on and some. Young Fathers are so explosive live, they have such commitment and passion and always give nothing but there all, you cannot help but be swept up by their tide of enthusiasm. Their energy was enough to revive mine. They destroyed my apathy, annihilated my depressed mood. And all just through the power of their music.

Music makes me feel that there is a way forward, its just not the path we are currently on. But the fact that it exists and the effect that it has gives me hope for the human race. And if we could just get the c****s out of the way we would probably be fine.

The problem is that while a lot of my generation saw what the world was really about and said ‘fuck it’, I don’t buy that bullshit, I don’t want to be a part of it, I’m going to go out and have a ton of fun instead, which was fine, but while we were doing that, other members of our gen have been steadily dismantling our society, accumulating all the wealth and power for themselves and we have let them. Our absence and failure to engage left a vacuum that they were able to exploit. Maybe it would have happened anyway, but can’t help feel disappointment that we did nothing to stop them as everything that has gone wrong has happened on our watch. And now its all pretty heavily fucked and it feels that there is literally nothing left to do except to get fucked and watch as the world burns. So guess its business as usual then…as Jim Morrison so wisely once said: “I don’t know what’s going to happen man, but I want to get my kicks before the whole shithouse goes up in flames.” Amen Jim. Actually thinking  about it, it didn’t really turn out too great for Jim so mebbe not the best person to listen to…we need a postive role model to lead the way….any suggestions?

 

 

 

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#MYLDNites (1209)

friday. 22:41. West London

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#MYLDNites special – David Byrne is Utopia

I know a singer who has the anagram WWDBD etched on a stickie on her computer to inspire her as she works and it stands for ‘What would David Byrne Do’ and last night I saw what David Byrne can do and its off the chain. His gig at the 02, part of his American Utopia tour, was one of the most relentlessly inventive and the most perfectly executed show I have probably ever seen. It was also in some ways the simplest as all you are looking at are the band members and the instruments they are holding. And nothing else. No speakers, no monitors, no cables. Nothing except for them.

It really takes a few songs to get your head around. As you watch the band and DB move all around the stage in synchronized movements as they play you have to keep reminding yourself what is so weird about what you are watching. Oh, yeah, there is no equipment on stage. At all. Its mindblowing and such a massive game changer and just one of the reasons that DB is always ahead of the game, always pushing the boundaries of what’s possible and what’s established. They talk of pioneers but he truly is and always has been. In a world where everything has been trampled on so many times he is once again in unchartered territory.

And so you think, well, why doesn’t everyone do it like this? Its so much better. And there is no drop off at all, in terms of sound quality, to beam it remotely to the stacks hidden behind the stage. Not only is there no deterioration but the sound is exceptional. The band are incredible. It is studio clarity and so good in fact that you can’t help but think some of it must be a backing track. About half way in DB actually addresses this as he has obviously been asked this many times over the tour and he confirms that everything you are listening to is being performed by the musicians on stage. He then goes about proving this by introducing each band member and the part their instrument plays and one by one they literally build the layers of the track in front of you and its  jaw dropping how they do it. I had goosepimples all over. And a dropped jaw.

Musical craftmanship, composition, arrangement, choreography, visuals..everything about this show is pitch point perfect and it just gets better and better as the show goes on. He mixes in old classics with songs from his latest album and for once, there is also no drop off with the new material, it is as good as everything he has ever done, you just don’t know it as well but I actually preferred to hear the newer tracks as were fresher to me which is virtually unheard of when you go to see an old timer live. You’re normally always waiting for the ones you know. Even the old tracks felt new as they had been vamped up and re-arranged for the show. Blind and Lazy and This must be the Place were outstanding.

And as good as the band sound, the visual aspects of the show are as equally dazzling. The simple visual concepts they use  are so simple yet so clever and so effective – they do a silent break in the middle of one of the tracks and it makes your heart leap its so cool. The entire show is nothing short of mesmerising. the band all move in sync and do dance moves whilst they are playing their instruments and you wonder how they can do it all at once and excel at everything they are doing. And DB looks and sounds as good as he ever did. Same as he always was.

David Byrne is nothing short of a musical powerhouse, a sheer genius that was born to do this and makes everyone else look sloppy and staid by comparison. But we can’t all be David Byrne. Nor do we need to be. He is doing enough for all of us. And he is still cool as fuck and clearly a beautiful human being.  Now that the other DB has left us (RIP DB1) Byrne is all we’ve got and to have seen him deliver such an incredible show will stay with me forever. I didn’t want it to end as he made me happier on a Monday night that I had probably ever been.

Here is a link to his set list on spotify if you want to have a listen:

https://open.spotify.com/user/chaninmusic/playlist/0Yv4rJcKiX11SNOMrvYiqC?si=v0LkMWeWRjWLl_MuEwZscQ

 

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Wot I did in my summer holidays (Pt 5)

Notting Hill Carnival 2018 Day 2

It got chocka on the street real quick as it seemed that most of the people who stayed away on Sunday came on the Monday to make up for it. People were dancing from midday onwards and soon the party was jumping.

The street got so full at one point they had to block off the road. They had never done this before but it was pretty rammed so maybe it wasn’t such a terrible idea. Ultimately though, it created more problems than it solved as it generated a lot of tension between the police and the crowd that couldn’t get onto the street. Normally it just naturally dissapates as those that can’t handle it just leave. This has always worked in the past and so this interference in the natural flow of carnival just served to piss a lot of people off who in return were gave grief to the constables who would not let them through…

The police seem to be interfering in general more than they had in recent years which is strange to say the least as they worked out from previous experience that the more they muscled in the more more trouble it caused so why would they revert to a policy they know doesn’t work? The Carnival is a massive massive beast. You can’t control it, you just have to let it do its thing. You have to flow with it, not against it. It is always fine if you just leave it alone, but the cynic in me thinks they don’t want to leave it alone.

They want to stop it. They would rather it didn’t exist as its just a headache for them but they know they can’t just end it just like that so maybe they think if they show its a problem they can maybe persuade the authorities not to continue with it. They could never just stop it. There would be an outcry. But they can maybe slowly snuff it out. They already make it as hard as possible for people to get in and out, with what seems like a lot of unecesssary  herding, but it feels like this is deliberate to deter as many people as possible. They are also making it harder for the sound systems to get permits and licenses and one casualty of this year was Gaza’s Rockin Blues which was not there this year, the first time in 42 years.  They appear to be pricing people out of the market and this is how they will strip it down and shrink it. It is huge. Maybe it does need to be reduxed a bit but sadly it will be money that will dictate who stays and who goes which means that a lot of people, especially the local community who are such an integral part of it, might fall by the wayside.

99.9% of the crowd who attend carnival (apparently a million and a half people) are just there to have a good time and they have definitely come to the right place as the event excels at this. There is a tiny tiny minority who might be there for anti-social reasons but it is a minuscule fraction of the people present and this element exists at all times, in every society, bar none. It cannot be entirely eradicated. We are stuck with it but we don’t have to let it rule us. Over the course of the entire day on the Monday three people kicked off on the street and attempted to start a fight of some description. But they were all shut down by the security and peer pressure every time. They were contained, the music was stopped and each one was ejected from the proceedings. The crowd booed them. No-one was interested. No-one got involved. It was very professionally dealt with and that was that. Job Done. No police were involved. It was solved without them.

What I took from this is how easy it is for just one single person to derail everything, to harmony into discord and peace into violence. It is astounding when you watch so much joy stop in an instant just because one individual has a cobb on or can’t take their booze or whatever. I was however massively heartened to see how the majority of people just have no interest in violence in any shape or form. Most of us, nearly all of us, just want to hang out and have a good time. And we don’t care who you are as long as you want the same. And we refuse to let those few who do want to stir things up dictate how our lives are run. The party is going to continue, its just going to continue without you.

All in all it was another brilliant carnival and it is just such a massive celebration of life, pumped full of joy and is just incredibly uplifting and exciting. Dancing in the street in the middle of the day on a monday..when do you ever do that? Never. Which is why carnival must always exist. We need it. Human societies have always had annual events when everyone got wasted, partied for days and then went back to their lives, only to do it all again the following year. Maybe it was for harvest, or to worship the sun god or to celebrate whatever but it has been around since the beginning and it is integral to a happy existence. Every now and then you need to blow off some steam and so you might as well do it dancing your socks off at a sound system plonked down in the middle of the street.

Lto see the full gallery please click on this link: https://babycakesromero.com/notting-hill-carnival-2018/

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Wot I did in my summer holidays (Pt 4)

Notting Hill Carnival 2018 – Day 1

I woke up at Midday (don’t judge) to see heavy duty rain pounding down on guys in flimsy waterproof(ish) jackets trying to put up the remainder of the disya jeneration sound system. On the street were a mere handful of very brave carnival attendees bracing the horrendous weather. It looked like it was going to be a washout. But ultimately you cannot crush the carnival spirit. It is more powerful than anything the skies can throw at it…

It stayed that way for hours and as a result it was probably the quietest carnival I have ever seen. The weather might have knocked out as many as quarter of a million people who stayed away as a result. You couldn’t blame em. It was grim but carnival was never for the feint-hearted. It is a magnificent experience but its a big beast and you have to be willing to get stuck in. Rain or shine. From the vibe on the street it was clear that this lot were not going to be put off by a bit of rain.

I did feel sorry for everyone who puts so much effort into putting it on and all the stall holders who are trying to make some money from the event, which is what the carnival was invented for in the first place. To give the local community an opportunity to earn some cash. After such a long hot summer it seemed a bit cruel but fuck all you can do about it. And soon enough, it didn’t matter. People were getting seriously stuck in to their daytime dance off. Normally the street is mainly used for walking along and here it was, as if my magic, transformed into a full-on street rave with a killer sound system with giant speaker stacks at either end of he road and around 2000 people jammed inbetween them all rockin out like their lives depended on it.

And just like in previous wet years the ones that didn’t shy away were the proper party people who aren’t staying away unless there is force 10 hurricane and even then they might still come along, just in heavier boots so they could still dance without getting whisked up in the air.

The  rain did eventually subside and the latter part of the afternoon was dry and all those bold enough to come in the first place were amply rewarded by another spectacular block party  from the Disya gang and Boiler Room.

The atmosphere was brilliant and nothing but good vibes all day. It was pretty full on as usual  and everyone went for it big time despite it technically being a warm up day. You always get to the end of sunday and you suddenly realise, oh shit, this is just Part 1, we gotta do all this again tomorrow! Having just got back from Lost village, this marathon race weekend was just hotting up…

Day 2 tomorrow…

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Wot I did in my summer holidays (Pt 3)

Lost Village 18

To see the full gallery please click here: https://babycakesromero.com/photography/lost-village-18/

Lost Village 2nd time around although I was only there for one night before and so was great to go back and spend a bit more time there. Like Houghton it is also a great size and very manageable although they had upped the capacity a few thousand on last year, not that you could really notice. I’d had the good sense to bring a large umbrella. The heavens erupted at The Bureau of Lost just as we arrived on the friday, a sound system hidden in the woods. We very quickly made friends as a whole gang of guys who joined us underneath to shield from the rain. We had been there literally minutes and we were being hugged and offered all manner of stuff by this lovely lot who were clearly off their head. It was a very warm welcome and summed up how friendly everyone was (induced or otherwise) throughout the weekend.

 

What I hadn’t realised about LV last time was that a lot are there for the food and there was even a pop up Dishoom, (a very trendy restaurant in London apparently) and was slightly stunned to see a very large queue of people trying to get in. I also saw joggers for the first time at a festival (see full gallery) which left me fairly slack-jawed. They have a wide variety of stuff on offer at LV including stand-up, theatre and art installations. What sadly they don’t provide (and this was my main gripe of the weekend) is any entertainment past 1am. I couldn’t actually believe it when someone told me. A festival that finishes at 1pm? Is that even a festival? All the acts finish  at this inordinately early hour and after this moment there is only one tent open, the Hay bale tent, where you can dane to a Spotify playlist. That doesn’t sound very enticing but when there is literally nothing else on, you would be amazed what you will tolerate.

It actually sounded like it was being selected from someone’s phone as some tracks were occasionally cut short as they would be at a house party with nothing but the machinations of a wasted phone user as dj. We actually went round the tent, which was full to the brim with about 2000 people, looking for someone with a phone making the decisions on what these festival revellers should be dancing to. Whoever it was went for the big hitters, and almost everything played was a banging hit from now or yesteryear. And the crowd went suitably nuts to every cheesy tune that came their way, not caring who or how they were getting them, as you can see in this short video…

LINK: https://youtu.be/XPtxrlZT6MQ

I am not blaming the organisers as they are restricted to a curfew which just seems so sad. There is, according to a steward, very little going on in this part of the country so you would think local residents would be ok with a wee bit of noise pollution for one weekend a year. Clearly not. It just bothers me in society that ‘quiet’ always wins. Its a shame as Lost Village is a really cool little festival and would definitely be up for returning…I might just now have the foresight to bring a loaded up device with a speaker to be able to listen to some tunes in the later hours rather than crowd round a poorly connected iPhone, desperately trying to squeeze out an entire track on the streaming bandwidth available in the middle of a field whilst everyone else is trying to do the same.

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Wot I did in my summer holidays (Pt 2)

Houghton Festival 2018

2nd time at Houghton and I have to say, two years in for both the festival and myself and I still have no complaints. We actually spent a lot of the car journey trying to find something that had been wrong over the weekend and the only thing anyone could muster was that a piece of lemon cake that had been consumed was a bit too ‘lemony’. You can’t really knock anything. The venue and location are stunning, the layout is very well thought out, the lighting, festival design and decorations are bang on, the people, both the crowd and the staff are all lovely, the music curation is second to none and it is a very very manageable size and just the right amount of people. And that is essentially all the ingredients of a great festival. Job done.

Even at festivals I have really enjoyed I generally still have a few gripes (see tmrrow’s post) but Houghton just keeps on delivering. Even  for a M.A.R (Middle Aged Raver) like me. In fact, the mostly younger crowd were very welcoming and friendly to us older folk which is just how I was in reverse when I was first going to raves so its nice to have that bit of karma returned to me intact.  What is the difference between a 20yr old raver and a 40yr old raver? A: 20 years.  (drum roll put-lease). Truth is it turns out that nothing changes and no-one cares. And even if they did, who cares? You should never stop doing something you enjoy for some perceived notion of what someone else is or isn’t thinking. You’ll never know anyway so it really doesn’t make a shit of a difference…unless you let it and that’s down to you and you only.

Should I have found something better to do? Maybe but I didn’t. So why fight it? I think one of the reasons why rave culture is not ageist is that all of their favourite djs, like Andy Weatherall and co. are now all in their 50s and no-one could give a monkeys. It is generally accepted that you have to be a bit old in the tooth to have had enough time to get a decent record collection so its ok for djs to be middle aged, and if you are an original raver in the same age group, that is kinda ok too. Or so it would seem…

Once again Craig Richards put together an incredible line-up of djs who were all allowed to flex their stuff as were given long sets, 3.4 hours + to be able to build their musical journey at their own pace and desire. And we were all in for the ride they wanted to take us on. They are encouraged to play what they want rather than just known crowd pleasers and as a result every sound system feels like a big house party. The other great thing is that every little sub-genre of dance music is represented in some way and what is on offer is some of the best of its kind. Whether you’re into minimal tech, breakbeats, grooves, banging beats, disco heaven, dirty house..its mostly all catered for and if you don’t dig one dj you are only moments from another. Highlight of my weekend was Coleen ‘Cosmo’ Murphy who did an absolute banging set in the little Stallions tent. David Mancuso’s protege is a force to be reckoned with and she was nothing short of spectacular.

On the saturday it chucked it down a bit and we went from stage to stage looking for a bit of rain respite, protected along the way by my trusty Samurai umbrella. Just as the heavens opened and the floodgates opened we were in  a tiny tent on the hill (i think it was on a hill) where Awkard Moments were playing. They gave a mesmeric performance which was aided by a hypnotic projected animated sequence which beamed onto the gauze in front of them. I watched and listened, utterly captivated as the rain added some meditative percussion on the tent. It was a bizarre and quite beautiful moment of serenity amidst the carnage of the weekend.

My other highlight was Horse Meat’s Disco mammoth 6hr daytime set on the Saturday afternoon . Just joyful. A perfect daytime affair with the sun shining and everyone beaming.

The other good thing about Houghton, which I noticed also last year, is they don’t really flag up who’s playing where – they want you to discover music rather than just head to the big names and the process works. We stumbled upon  a brilliant set by Jake Manders in the record shop which was called Demitri’s or Vinny’s or something like that and also heard some amazing sets by djs who we had no idea who they were. They do supply a printed schedule with all the various set times on it but the font is unfeasibly small and I think that is deliberate. Add in myopia and a bit of an eye wobble and  and we coudldn’t make out a single word. This was one downside of being a M.A.R. and desperate to find out when Coleen Murphy was on, I commandeered a young person with fresh eyes and made them read my programme out to me. Ah the joys of ageing…

I can’t think of any reason why I would not return next year and I sincerely hope I do. For me now, there is Houghton and there is everything else. And I think the reason that it attracts the right crowd is that it is ‘music first’. People are there first and foremost for the tunes and a lot of festival crowds are no longer geared that way and you can tell. It creates for a different experience but when you are all together, united in your love of music, nothing can stop you…

To see the full gallery click here: https://babycakesromero.com/photography/houghton-18/

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#MYLDN (1134)

Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london

All the shots this week were taken at the Portobello Summer festival which was on weekend before last and was a free fest and the first time it had ever been thrown. It was an amazing vibe all day, helped undoubtedly by the relentlessly good weather. It was like carnival but just for the locals and everyone trotted out from the area to hang out and have a day of listening to great music and basking in the sun. Grooverider and fabio really kicked it off on the square  and there were two more stages on Portobello Green and also in Acklam Village featuring acts such as Audio Bullys and Jazzie B and an inspirational Akala. I never found out who the guy was in this shot but he looked and sounded brilliant. They even turned Portobello rd into an outdoor cinema and filled it with deckchairs and wireless headphones. As I mentioned last week this area is starting to get its positivity and energy back a year after Grenfell which this event was actually dedicated to. The tragedy plunged the neighbourhood into misery and despair and there is still a massive fight underway to get justice for the survivors but like suffering personal grief and loss, at some point you have to go forwards and reinvest in life. You have to participate again and remind yourself that we are all just lucky to be here no matter what is going on . You exist, you’re winning. End of.