I Big Dayed Out
Yesterday after a bit of a sleep in, I packed my bag with food and (illegal) water and was picked up by jbaby77 and looneymoth to head out to the rock mecca of Claremont Showgrounds. Parking was tough and as we waited in the car queue, we watched 4 boys take a leak on the side of the road. 12 pm and already they were drunk.
Eventually we found suitable parking and trekked in only to find that EVEN THOUGH the website detailed that SEALED BOTTLES of water would be permitted, they were making everyone empty their water on the way in. There is something highly obscene and offensive to watch litres of fresh water be tipped out onto the floor in a city struggling to cope with drinking water demands. When I asked about the website I was told by security that "the website lied". I am very unimpressed. And I wandered in feeling the clear disdain and contempt of the organisers for today's youth (by the time I left, I shared it). Our bags were searched (but not remotely thoroughly - I also saw smuggled in alcohol during the day) and our ID checked and then we were tagged and allowed in.
We headed straight over to Lisa Mitchell and I hung out and grooved whilst the others merched up and got food before coming back to join me for "Coin Laundry." Mitchell asked people not to throw coins onto the stage - ah, Lisa? Next time don't tweet about how cool that was the first time it happened to you, it starts trends among fans.
After this act we decided to try and get water. We got caught in a pedestrian traffic jam on the road from the Green Stage to the food area. When we got to the water stations, we found you could either use a water fountain or they had barrels of water to refill bottles but only if your bottle was one of the 200mL BDO bottles. I deemed both to be low in hygiene standards and both had loooong queues. I paid $4 for a bottle of water half the size that I brought in. And then we sunscreened up and headed back to the Green Stage. We caught a bit of Kiss Chasey who sounded pretty damn fine, I thought.
At this point, J headed off to meet another friend who had just arrived and looneymoth and I headed off to the Boiler Room for Itche and Scratche and Girl Talk. There was hardly anyone at the Boiler Room when we arrived and we had the best time dancing in front of the stage to Itche and Scratche. There was a nice breeze and they went OFF. It started to fill up though and there were some obnoxious people - you know the people who light up cigarettes to smoke in the mosh pit - hello, WTF? That was starting to give me an asthma attack. Also I had one of those irritating little boys - you know the kind, the ones who wear white singlets, slip on shoes and very manicured hair and suntan and are exceedingly impressed with themselves? And dance in very large spaces that don't exist? Eventually this was just pissing me off because a) he had tons of space just over there, where I was not and b) he kept bumping into me and elbowing me in the breast. Now. I get that in closed spaces, people bump into each other and it doesn't mean anything other than an accident. The first few times I just ignored it. And then it kinda started to shit me off. So I asked him to move over but he made a song and dance about not. Then when he did it again, I asked him to stop touching my boobs. He apologised and gave me a fist bump and a hand shake and asked if we could be friends. I nodded and went back to grooving, thinking perhaps I'd overreacted. The second time I pointed it out that he did it again. The third time I said: "dude, these are not yours to touch, stop touching my boobs!"
To which he said: "I'm sorry! I"m sorry! I said I was sorry!"
Me: Dude, stop touching them!
Him: I said I was sorry! Can we be friends"
offer of the fist bump again
Me: No.
Him: But I said I was sorry!
Me: No, it's not my job to make you feel better after I asked you three times to stop. Just STOP TOUCHING THEM!
At this point, I realised I'd probably stopped having fun. About five people around me started to light up cigarettes, including this knob, and I started to feel the encroachment of the crowd. I started to panic and thought that Girl Talk would be worse [1] and I motioned to looneymoth that I wanted to leave. She followed me out. Geez I tell you. The number of people who don't move out of the way so you can get out of a mosh pit and look at you like you're really annoying. Only one guy near the outer part reached his hand out to help me out of the crowd. ONE nice guy in all those people. It's depressing. Thanks Nice Guy! You rock!
We ended up though right on the barrier but to the far edge of the stage for Girl Talk and I think that was an AWESOME spot. We could see everything and dance sort of comfortably. I had bought my ticket for Girl Talk and he went off!!! He started with about 50 people from the crowd on stage dancing behind him. He was totally nuts - getting up on the table to dance and sing out at the crowd. He had a couple of people with blowers and contraptions on the end to shoot out unravelled rolls of toilet paper to the crowd. And the crowd went nuts.
Somewhere about the time that the toilet paper shooter gal in the leather pants was up on the stage dancing along to the lyrics "Get out of the way bitch, bitch get out of the way" over and over and over, I kinda went to another place. I started to watch the crowd and it all turned kind of ugly for me. There were these shallow, superficial kids up on stage who couldn't dance but kinda looked pretty, sorta motioning to the crowd along with the lyrics. There was this crowd of people who needed security to lean into the mosh pit and haul people out of trouble. Two kinds of people get hauled out - tiny little girls with thongs and barely any clothes on and very drunk/fucked guys who are sometimes bleeding. Some of the guys are out of control and need security to contain them and march them out of the area. It just all seemed so ... meaningless. And I love Girl Talk but at the same time, he mashes up songs with other songs - and I think what he does is really clever, but then I know all the music that he's mashing up. I dunno. There was just something about the way the little blonde thing was dancing to John Lennon that made me think that she never ever really understood the music that she listened to.
I was grumpy by this stage and sort of over the whole thing.
Girl Talk was AWESOME though! I thoroughly enjoyed him playing live.
After this though there were 4 hours before any band I was remotely interested in - I would have loved to have stayed for Powerfinger but I was hot, grumpy, dehydrated and over being felt up and stepped on. I loved and left my Muse fan friends and the exceedingly lovely maelkann came and picked me up. And won the Awesomely Best Boyfriend Eva award. I did walk out the exit in the wrong direction and have to do a circuit of the grounds which involved being spoken to by a man sitting in a kilt, without underwear on. And letting him take my wristband so that he would stop talking to me And I didn't have to look at ... it.
First thing in the car, maelkann asks me if I'd like to go get a drink, cause he'd been reading my tweets. We headed off to a shop and I selected three different kinds of drinks! Then he took me out to dinner before dropping me home. Did I mention Awesomely Best Boyfriend Eva?
I still had a bit of sunstroke and dehydration and after I picked Benji up (who had nearly outworn his welcome at my parents'), I showered and watched some of Damages before going to sleep. I'm sore and could do with some more sleep but I kinda don't regret leaving the festival when I did.
[1] I once had a very bad experience in a mosh pit at a Green Day concert. I was winded by a guy jumping up and down next to me and I started to go under the crowd as I couldn't breathe. And people just carried on jumping on top of me. It's left me feeling very unsafe in tight crowds ever since. I start to panic.
Eventually we found suitable parking and trekked in only to find that EVEN THOUGH the website detailed that SEALED BOTTLES of water would be permitted, they were making everyone empty their water on the way in. There is something highly obscene and offensive to watch litres of fresh water be tipped out onto the floor in a city struggling to cope with drinking water demands. When I asked about the website I was told by security that "the website lied". I am very unimpressed. And I wandered in feeling the clear disdain and contempt of the organisers for today's youth (by the time I left, I shared it). Our bags were searched (but not remotely thoroughly - I also saw smuggled in alcohol during the day) and our ID checked and then we were tagged and allowed in.
We headed straight over to Lisa Mitchell and I hung out and grooved whilst the others merched up and got food before coming back to join me for "Coin Laundry." Mitchell asked people not to throw coins onto the stage - ah, Lisa? Next time don't tweet about how cool that was the first time it happened to you, it starts trends among fans.
After this act we decided to try and get water. We got caught in a pedestrian traffic jam on the road from the Green Stage to the food area. When we got to the water stations, we found you could either use a water fountain or they had barrels of water to refill bottles but only if your bottle was one of the 200mL BDO bottles. I deemed both to be low in hygiene standards and both had loooong queues. I paid $4 for a bottle of water half the size that I brought in. And then we sunscreened up and headed back to the Green Stage. We caught a bit of Kiss Chasey who sounded pretty damn fine, I thought.
At this point, J headed off to meet another friend who had just arrived and looneymoth and I headed off to the Boiler Room for Itche and Scratche and Girl Talk. There was hardly anyone at the Boiler Room when we arrived and we had the best time dancing in front of the stage to Itche and Scratche. There was a nice breeze and they went OFF. It started to fill up though and there were some obnoxious people - you know the people who light up cigarettes to smoke in the mosh pit - hello, WTF? That was starting to give me an asthma attack. Also I had one of those irritating little boys - you know the kind, the ones who wear white singlets, slip on shoes and very manicured hair and suntan and are exceedingly impressed with themselves? And dance in very large spaces that don't exist? Eventually this was just pissing me off because a) he had tons of space just over there, where I was not and b) he kept bumping into me and elbowing me in the breast. Now. I get that in closed spaces, people bump into each other and it doesn't mean anything other than an accident. The first few times I just ignored it. And then it kinda started to shit me off. So I asked him to move over but he made a song and dance about not. Then when he did it again, I asked him to stop touching my boobs. He apologised and gave me a fist bump and a hand shake and asked if we could be friends. I nodded and went back to grooving, thinking perhaps I'd overreacted. The second time I pointed it out that he did it again. The third time I said: "dude, these are not yours to touch, stop touching my boobs!"
To which he said: "I'm sorry! I"m sorry! I said I was sorry!"
Me: Dude, stop touching them!
Him: I said I was sorry! Can we be friends"
offer of the fist bump again
Me: No.
Him: But I said I was sorry!
Me: No, it's not my job to make you feel better after I asked you three times to stop. Just STOP TOUCHING THEM!
At this point, I realised I'd probably stopped having fun. About five people around me started to light up cigarettes, including this knob, and I started to feel the encroachment of the crowd. I started to panic and thought that Girl Talk would be worse [1] and I motioned to looneymoth that I wanted to leave. She followed me out. Geez I tell you. The number of people who don't move out of the way so you can get out of a mosh pit and look at you like you're really annoying. Only one guy near the outer part reached his hand out to help me out of the crowd. ONE nice guy in all those people. It's depressing. Thanks Nice Guy! You rock!
We ended up though right on the barrier but to the far edge of the stage for Girl Talk and I think that was an AWESOME spot. We could see everything and dance sort of comfortably. I had bought my ticket for Girl Talk and he went off!!! He started with about 50 people from the crowd on stage dancing behind him. He was totally nuts - getting up on the table to dance and sing out at the crowd. He had a couple of people with blowers and contraptions on the end to shoot out unravelled rolls of toilet paper to the crowd. And the crowd went nuts.
Somewhere about the time that the toilet paper shooter gal in the leather pants was up on the stage dancing along to the lyrics "Get out of the way bitch, bitch get out of the way" over and over and over, I kinda went to another place. I started to watch the crowd and it all turned kind of ugly for me. There were these shallow, superficial kids up on stage who couldn't dance but kinda looked pretty, sorta motioning to the crowd along with the lyrics. There was this crowd of people who needed security to lean into the mosh pit and haul people out of trouble. Two kinds of people get hauled out - tiny little girls with thongs and barely any clothes on and very drunk/fucked guys who are sometimes bleeding. Some of the guys are out of control and need security to contain them and march them out of the area. It just all seemed so ... meaningless. And I love Girl Talk but at the same time, he mashes up songs with other songs - and I think what he does is really clever, but then I know all the music that he's mashing up. I dunno. There was just something about the way the little blonde thing was dancing to John Lennon that made me think that she never ever really understood the music that she listened to.
I was grumpy by this stage and sort of over the whole thing.
Girl Talk was AWESOME though! I thoroughly enjoyed him playing live.
After this though there were 4 hours before any band I was remotely interested in - I would have loved to have stayed for Powerfinger but I was hot, grumpy, dehydrated and over being felt up and stepped on. I loved and left my Muse fan friends and the exceedingly lovely maelkann came and picked me up. And won the Awesomely Best Boyfriend Eva award. I did walk out the exit in the wrong direction and have to do a circuit of the grounds which involved being spoken to by a man sitting in a kilt, without underwear on. And letting him take my wristband so that he would stop talking to me And I didn't have to look at ... it.
First thing in the car, maelkann asks me if I'd like to go get a drink, cause he'd been reading my tweets. We headed off to a shop and I selected three different kinds of drinks! Then he took me out to dinner before dropping me home. Did I mention Awesomely Best Boyfriend Eva?
I still had a bit of sunstroke and dehydration and after I picked Benji up (who had nearly outworn his welcome at my parents'), I showered and watched some of Damages before going to sleep. I'm sore and could do with some more sleep but I kinda don't regret leaving the festival when I did.
[1] I once had a very bad experience in a mosh pit at a Green Day concert. I was winded by a guy jumping up and down next to me and I started to go under the crowd as I couldn't breathe. And people just carried on jumping on top of me. It's left me feeling very unsafe in tight crowds ever since. I start to panic.