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V Festival

Oh what a line up, two of my favourite bands of all time are coming this year and I have just got to go. The opportunity to see both Kings of Leon and Kasabian live on the same weekend was just to good to pass up.

V festival always starts the same way, the long drive down. Luckily we learnt the back road a couple of years ago and it now only takes us about 2 and a half hours from Manchester….shhh don’t tell anyone!

This place always amazes me, 80,000 people camping in a field in the middle of nowhere is an impressive site and after years of coming here it still leaves me with the same sense of awe. Our friends have already pitched our tent to reserve us a space, so after the 45 minute walk to the campsite we sit down to a cold beer and start to plan our weekend.

The line up as always is brilliant, as all as the headliners, Editors, Faithless, The Coral, Stereophonics, Florence and the machine, The Prodigy are all performing, plus many more great acts. It’s at this point you have to start prioritising gigs, Florence and the Machine are on a the same time as Stereophonics. Can we watch half and half??

Saturday morning comes, have our obligatory wine to start the day and head off to the arena. The atmosphere never ceases to amaze me, the crowds of people, the laughter, the singing, the music, the costumes, it all comes together to making quite a spectacle.

But I have to admit, I am a little bit over the commercial nature of V. Everything on site is so expensive, by the Sunday afternoon there is rubbish everywhere, the queues for the toilets can be over an hour long and we have even had drinks stolen from our tent.

While I have always enjoyed going to V, I think it will be time for a change next year. I enjoyed Beat herder so much more, even though it does not have the big headline bands there, the atmosphere is so much more relaxed. So next year I’ll be looking to take in a few smaller less commercial festivals.