What a great weekend, truly truly great. So great that i couldnt really put it all into words so im gonna keep it brief and overload on photos.

Firstly i'll get the complaints out of the way.

The programmes are too expensive, not a fan of the eco-cup, not enough loos (maybe urinals next year) and most of the tents need to be at least double the size.

The last point is the most annoying. So many people missed out on artists due to this. Especillay the comedy stage when Bill Bailey and Dylan Moran performed.

Last year it was perfect for sizing as it wasnt packed but this year they sold twice as many tickets without increasing anything. Which makes no sense to me. Although i didnt really feel it was too busy i also think that maybe they should cap it at the amount they had this year because i feel thats one of latitudes strong points. You feel more relaxed at this festival becuase you have room to breathe. Unlike ta glastonbury.

Now that ive got that out of the way heres the good points

1.Robin Inces book club. If anyone had the pleasure to see this youll know how great his book club was.
2.All the great bands. No cliche 'paint by numbers' bands here. Just good good bands. (patrick wolf, arcade fire, midlake, final fantasy)
3.Great poetry
4.Great weather. Which made a change from glastonbury
5.Great setting, loved going into the woods and being near the water.
6.Seeing Hallam Foe at 1 in the morning. What a great film
7. Dancing to the cheesiest music in the world at guilty pleasure
8.Marcus Brigstockes early edition


Im a huge glastonbury fan but to be fair i think latitude is just as good. I have a feeling this is what glastonbury was probably like 20 years ago. The setting is nicer, the tickets are cheaper, they have a supermarket with not too badly priced food, the bands were better (i felt) and due to its placement in the year it was sunnier!

I'll definitly be back next year for my third trip to Southwold.

So tonight was the nail in the coffin for me

Which coffin you might ask?

Good Question

The nail in the coffin of me ever going to an emo/hardcore gig or going to see a band because they dont play much and becuase i used to like them.

Lets start with the support band

Awful

Next Glassjaw

One thing i can say about them is Daryls voice is just incredible. I mean mind blowling incredible. No-one can get close to that guys scream.

Ok now that the one good thing is out of the way let me begin


1.Dont use mass distortion as a way of covering up lack of decent musicianship or meaning
2.The whole crowd was full of people i would happily line up and shoot. Especially people with flat cap hats. They can fuck off. I really hate them. The whole crowd was full of people that just wanted to be seen there and show off their clothes. Fuck off. You just annoy me.


The only good thing of the night was the fights


It started with a group of girls trying to be clever by smoking so the girl next to me took the cigarette from them and put it out. Absolute Genius. Then some rudeboys tried to get under the barrier to go past us but the girl and her bf wouldnt let them so one of the rudeboys flipped and started a fight with the guy. He looked like he was gonna hit the girl. It was pretty intense. I had to make sure i didnt get a bounce hit.

Then the rudeboys friends got invovled which almost turned into a brawl but then it died down.

Then there was one rudeboy left and he was annoying the guy by bouncing around in front of him doing that annoying 'hardcore' thing. After a while the guy and girl left cus she was angry but just as you though everything was cool the guy came running back and punched the remaining rudeboy in the face then ran off again. The rudeboy got hit so bad his hat actually flew off. Then the rudeboy went after the guy.
It was nuts

To be honest it was a bastard thing of that guy to do. You should never resort to violence because someone annoyed you but saying tat the rudeboy had a flat cap on so he kinda deserved it


All in all it was a lame night

Maybe im getting old

or maybe i just like folk music too much


 

So tonight was the fourth time i had seen Bright Eyes and they never fail to leave a huge grin on my face.

Lightspeed Champion supported and were ok. I was expecting them to be shit because the guy was in Testicles and ive heard a few demos but they were actually not too bad. The performance was cool and di can definitly see the influence Mike Mogis has had on him.

Then was the half an hour power struggle to keep our places at the front and make sure the tall guy and his friends didnt get back to their place in front of us when they returned from the toilet. This involved getting two chavvy girls to shuffle the poeple in front foward for us.

The thing is the crowd for this gig was so wierd, usually its much older but tonight it was quite young and all sorts of people turned up. Like the chavvy girls. I wouldnt have seen them as bright eyes fans by appearance but they knew every single word of every song. Funnily enough those girls also went to the oxford gig i went too and took the tube. So i had a giggle about that. I can be very judgemental and snobbish but things like this seem to happen a lot more so i feel im learning not to take people by appearance too much. Though saying that they were a bit nuts.


So then came bright eyes.

They mainly played songs from cassadaga but also threw in some classics that they havent played for a while

Although i prefer his acoustic stuff to the electric stuff my favourite song of the night was Gold Mine Gutted

I'm also still in love with the new version of First Day...


All in all it was a great perfromance, not my favourite bright eyes performance but still a 9/10

Im also glad hannah got to expereience bright eyes for the first time but sad that jack couldnt witness it as he went home ill/

Below are two of the dodgiest photos i could take!

 

Today i went and saw Station Parade at Finnegans in Ealing.

First up was a guy called Ross O'Reilly who did a solo acoustic set. I did my diploma with this guy and he was always good but since the last time i saw him he's got even better. His voice has certainly got stronger.

After Ross came Station Parade, who gave a great performance.

Its been a while since i've seen them play (probably the battle of the bands) so i was looking foward to hearing the new songs. They definitly know how to write catchy songs.

Im always suprised at how well they play together as a band.  They seem to be tight enough to have everything work but also be loose enough for that almost attacking sound they bring to pop/rock songs.

And as always the higlight for me was jacks drumming as it always makes me want to move.


Unfortunately i wasn't feeling to sociable that night so i didnt engage with people that much and subsequently i only took one photo, which happened to be of sean trying to catch the rain fall from the air conditioner in some beer glasses.

So basically i came back to london to go see The Who as josh had a million tickets for everyone and guest passes. It was perhaps one of the funnest gigs i've ever been too. I'm not gonna suck up to josh  by suggesting im the biggest who fan in the world but i honestly had one of the best night i've had for ages (except glastonbury of course)

We all get very drunk backstage on champagne and basically caused chaos at wembley ( to the point that james got chucked out)

It was so amazing seeing the who that close and being able to look out at the wembley crowd from the sidelines.

So much stuff happened that night that i would find it hard to put into words but believe me im still smiling now.

Below are various photos from that night



















 

This was my second Glastonbury and was the best yet regardless of the weather. So many highlights. Unless you've been i guess you cant really say in less than a thousand words just how amazing the festival is. I got to spend 5 days with good mates experiencing amazing music, amazing atmosphere, different cultures, wierdness, arts, poetry, films etc etc The list really does go on.

Ok the weather was disgusting but thats how great the festival is. If the weather was like this at reading or pretty much any other festival i would have died or just been really depressed but with glastonbury i still had the best weekend i could have asked for.

I only saw about 7 or 8 bands but thats whats so great about glastonbury!

So heres my top 10 list of things that happened this year

1.Ed's Stealing of a baguette
2.Eds 'short shorts' a.k.a "do i have the kate moss look?"
3.Patrick Wolf Camping it up on the John Peel Stage
4.The amazement that my super super super small stove worked beautifully, despite the laughs and peoples faces when i popped open my pop up tent on the first day
5.The realization that i could probably become a vegetarian considering the amount of veggie food i ate that i absolutely adored
6.Seeing an unsigned band on the introducing stage that i dont know the name of but were amazing. A great find basically
7.Dancing all night sat (especially the mexican place) til my body couldnt take anymore punishment from the hayfever/ trying to help ed out from the drug taking
8.Passing out at half 12 on the first night and being sick everyhwere. I realise this is a disgusting image but i thoroughly needed to get one of those 'messy' nights out of the way early
9.Bright Eyes and Conors superb wit " A cougar means something completely different to me, it means an older woman that goes after younger guys. Ive never met a bad cougar"
10.Seeing friends that i dont see very often and making acquaintances proper friends.


Here are some photos

Stone Circle during the day and the banksy stone cirle




Conor on a big screen




Sand Art




Cow in a tree



Who wears short shorts?

I decided that this is the official beginning of my summer
It was amazing as i've waited pretty much as long as i can remember to see this band and they didn't disapoint. I felt so ill before they came on as i was so excited and nervous about it, but that soon went as Billy came on-stage. It Honestly was the best gig of my life. I felt like crying throughout the 2 and half-3 hour set.

I had to pay 100 pounds for the ticket off ebay but it was worth every single penny.
I can't wait for the glasgow gig.