Glastonbury 2023

*Long post warning*

I'm not going to bore people with the ins and outs of getting there and the costs etc. If people want to know they can send me a PM. I arrived on site Wednesday around 2pm, was through the gates and had my tent up by around 4:30pm. We camped in Darble I think, near gate D. It was fine. As the years go by I'm less concerned about camping spots. It's so huge that no matter where you camp you're miles from somewhere. I was the last of my group of 10 to arrive so once I was setup we headed off for a wander to see what was new / different etc. They've cut back the music on Wednesday post covid so we ended up on the hill watching the fireworks which is always a good start. I had an early night after being wrecked from travelling and I knew it would be last bit of decent sleep until Monday night.

Thursday had more stuff on, loads of the late night dance areas open up and there's music until 3am. My target was the new Levels stage in Silver Hayes for the run of DJs. Palms Trax b2b Jobs Jobse was my first gig / set of the weekend it was awesome, huge crowd there and perfect groovy sunset vibes from the two lads. After them came one of my finds of this years festival, a live electronic music duo called Paranoid London. 2 guys with drum machines and synthesisers and a vocalist. Imagine some funky acid techno with a guy throwing down some Rick James style vocals on top of it. Absolutely bonkers but it works so well, they tore the roof off the place (if it had a roof). They did a second set on a different stage on Saturday morning from 4:30am until 6 which I was also at. Also caught Eats Everything over at The Park and then back to Levels for VTSS who was also excellent, more techno but different to Paranoid London, less groovy and more banging. They improved Silver Hayes massively this year, it used to feel like an afterthought but now it's somewhere you aim for the new Levels stage is like a smaller version of Tomorrowlands main stage, really epic.

Friday started off with Ben Howard on Other Stage who was a bit dull but he was followed by The Hives who are anything but dull. They had proper mosh pits going up the front and the whole place jumping. Really great energy from them, putting much younger bands to shame. I also ended up watching Carly Rae Jepson on the same stage because I was hanging around with my group since there was nothing on that I wanted to see. It was a high quality performance of music that doesn't interest me at all. I was expecting backing tracks etc, but she had a live band and is a good vocalist. It wasn't boring. Then it was back over to Pyramid for The Foo Fighters. Another band I don't love but Dave is a lovely guy and the atmosphere in the field was great. It's very safe middle of the road dad rock. Not that exciting but it was good to see them back on the horse after what they've been through. Dave pops up everywhere now though. He's the new Chris Martin of Glastonbury. I had wanted to see Xavier Rudd who was playing in The Avalon tent at 8pm but I didn't make it because I went back to Silver Hayes to catch a fellow Galway man known as Kettama doing a b2b set with Ewan McVicar which I wasn't really feeling so left after not too long. Then it was time for a trip back to the tent to stock up on various supplies / whisky for the night ahead. My headliner on Friday was Arctic Monkeys but they were boring as fcuk. Alex has rearranged all the songs which makes them sound totally different. People around me were trying to sing along to Snap out of it but the way he sings it now is totally different so nobody could and it just totally killed the atmosphere stone dead. The new tunes are dull as dishwater live also, not festival music at all and id consider myself an Arctic Monkeys fan. So I ditched AM (and my group) in order to head to Four Tet on IICON in the Block9 area. IICON is one of my favourite stages at the festival now. It was incredible when it first appeared and they improve it bit by bit every year. Stunning 3D projected visuals and gorgeous flowing bouncy house / techno from Kieran. He's one of my favourite artists, plays multiple sets at glasto every year and I get to as many as I can. I think after this I linked up with my group and we wandered off towards the south east corner as Paranoid London had another set at 4:30am on a new stage called Now/here which I was keen to be at and it was awesome even though it was broad daylight. The music was done when they wrapped up and all stages closed but I had still had energy and the remains of a blunt left over so I made my way to the stone circle for a smoke with all the other people who weren't ready for bed. It's a 45ish minute walk from there to my tent so got to bed at around 8am after picking up some breakfast on the way. The people serving me breakfast had a good giggle at me, not sure why.

Saturday was a hot one. I have one of the Quechua Fresh n Black tents and I couldn't do a festival without one now. As hot as it was I managed to sleep until about 10am in darkness which was good enough. There's a place near West Holts I discovered a few years ago that does breakfast smoothies with oats, honey, yoghurt and loads of fruit. One of these with a dash or two of whisky in it is the perfect Glastonbury breakfast and it sorted me right out. Then it was off to Rick Astley on Pyramid. I had never taken this guy seriously before, we all know the meme, rickrolling etc but this guy is a consummate performer and a great vocalist, you can tell he feeds a lot off the crowd and I thought he absolutely nailed this slot. Packed field singing Never Gonna Give You Up was one of my unexpected highlights of this year. We were all very sweaty after dancing in the baking sun of the pyramid field for an hour or so so once Rick wrapped it up we went off to find a bit of shade for a sit down. We decided to head towards Woodsies stage (formerly John Peel) because theres a wooded area there and I wanted to catch The Murder Capital playing in the tent. Some technical glitch meant they were very late starting but when they got going they were excellent, the front man is brilliant and the music is proper post punk, loud and energetic, no fcuks given. We hung around this stage for a while because we'd heard Rick Astley and Blossoms were doing an hour of Smiths covers which had us intrigued after he'd already smashed it on the Pyramid. I'm glad we did, because after Elton this was my gig of the weekend. You can tell he's a massive Smiths fan and he absolutely nailed it. I'll never forget the sound of thousands of voices echoing around that tent singing There Is Light That Never Goes Out, one of the best gigs I was ever at, amazing. Next up was Lizzo on Pyramid as a few of my friends wanted to see her. I know who she is obviously, wouldn't have gone out of my way to see her but she was enjoyable, the crowd were loving it. Our Headliner that night was Lana Del Ray which turned into a bit of a car crash. She was half hour late due to being backstage getting her hair done, according to herself. Then she seemed to think that she could play the full set as normal which obviously wasn't going to happen and predictably, they pulled the plug on her. I did have some sympathy as her entire set seemed very heavily choreographed with the props etc and each song was meant to follow into the other, so she couldn't just drop 3 or 4 songs from the middle because it wouldn't have worked. This didn't matter much to me because I was planning on heading back to Silver Hayes for Helena Hauff followed by Daniel Avery on The Lonely Hearts stage. This was an awesome 3 hours of music. Helena played an incredible electro / techno set all on vinyls but you'd swear she had a tonne of gear up there with the sounds she was able to create out of two turntables and a mixer, a true master. Avery was as good as always. Started very ambient then a bit bouncier and then it descended into proper heaving techno. He finished up at 3am and I headed for south east corner because Skream was doing a set at 4:30am that I wanted to be at, don't remember it very well tbh, too much whisky that night.

Slow start to Sunday. My feet and legs were sore by now, after several days of so much walking and dancing. The first bit of music I made it to was Cat Stevens on Pyramid. Thankfully it was cloudy today so not as hot as Saturday and I could just lie down on the grass and listen to this legend playing a good few classics that I actually recognised which surprised me. He finished at quarter past 4 and then I abandoned my group once more so I could leg it to the Park Stage to watch Viagra Boys. Best mosh pit I was ever in, people crowd surfing all over the place including the frontman. If you don't know these guys you need to look them up, the lead singer is a sight to behold on stage. After that I wandered towards West Holts because I wanted to see a bit of Barrington Levy who I really liked the sound of but I missed most of his set. He finished not long after I arrived then it was back to the tents to stock up once more before the grand finale. I'm not an Elton fan, I never listen to him, but this gig was special. The party atmosphere in the field was unmatched. I enjoyed Paul McCartney last year but this was better. It was proper party from start to finish. There was a bunch of scousers beside us who we didn't know, but by the end of the night our groups had become best friends, sharing drinks / smokes / food etc. We bailed out of there before Rocket Man ended because we didn't want to be stuck there for hours and needed bathrooms badly. My target after Elton was Daphni (of Caribou fame) doing a DJ set on Levels in Sliver Hayes at 1:00am, this varied from very groovy and danceable to a bit weird and stop startish but overall I enjoyed it. He wrapped up at around 3am and I made my way to The Unfairground in the south east corner. This is a sort of a nightmare carnival themed area with various venues including one called Bez's Flying Bus where Phil Hartnoll of Leftfield was doing a DJ set until 5am. This was amazing fun, this guy is older than my dad and he absolutely killed it, I can't even describe what he was playing, I think I heard a weird Michael Jackson remix at one point. Music runs until 6am on Monday morning at various stages in the south east corner but once Phil was done I headed for bed as I had to be up at 9am to make it to Bristol airport in time for my flight. When I got home on Monday evening I slept from 7 pm until 1pm the next day. It wrecks me more and more each year but boy is it worth it. It's always such an incredible experience with memories that last forever, I had some top class food as well, special mention to Taste of Tibet. Ate there 3 times and they were selling a cook book which I bought for my mother. That was my Glastonbury 2023, for me I think it was one of the more memorable ones, but maybe I think that every year. That's probably full of typos and missing words (I'm dyslexic) but I'm not proof reading it so good luck.

They are kings.