Live Review: Harvest Festival, Parramatta Park, 13/11/2011

The threat of rain has passed and the sun is shining as I join the growing smug of hipsters heading across Sydney's West towards Parramatta Park and the inaugural Harvest Festival.

Entering the site through the arts area means a short tour of the spoken word, comedy and cat suit performance art stages before arriving at the Windmill stage and New Yorkers The Walkmen.

I am not all that familiar with The Walkmen and their choice to start the day with a low key ballad confused me. This pattern continued and I found their set to be nice enough but hard to get excited about.

Harvest Festival promoters had promised a more civilised festival experience - fewer crowds, shorter lines, better food and no under 18s. I sat in the field listening to PVT, pint of cider in one hand plate of Churrasco in the other, and believed they had succeeded.

TV On The Radio open with Halfway Home but the show doesn't feel like it really starts until the band play Caffeinated Consciousness. The crowd has woken up and will continue singing, dancing, cheering along for the remainder of the set. New songs Will Do and Repetition fit perfectly next to older favourites like Red Dress, Young Liars and Staring at the Sun. A TV On The Radio performance has a lot going on and if there can be any complaint it is that Tunde Adebimpe's vocals are sometimes lost in the wall of noise. There are certainly no complaints as everyone in the crowd loses their shit to set closer Wolf Like Me.

Watching Bright Eyes I am surprised how many of the songs I recognise. They are familiar but not fantastic, after spotting a nurse handing out free sunnyboys I move on.

The sun is still high in the sky when Mogwai take the stage. The daylight only seems to highlight the raw power of the band. Pity the other acts across the site as on song after pummelling song the Scottish prog rock group seem to get louder and louder.

In 2008 I missed seeing The National at Glastonbury due to a savage case of food poisoning. In January of this year I came down with whooping cough just days before their Enmore Theatre show. So after two previous attempts and three weeks of self imposed isolation (just in case) I finally get to see The National. The band starts with a stomping version of Anyone's Ghost before the brilliant Mistaken For Strangers gets everyone moving. Front man Berninger's lyrics are complex and full of double meaning but this thinking man's band still know how to have fun. The soaring Bloodbuzz Ohio very nearly carried the audience away. Fake Empire and Mr November had the whole hill dancing. The show ends with Berninger stranded in the crowd shouting the words to Terrible Love. It may have taken three attempts but The National were worth the wait.

45 minutes after their scheduled start time the Flaming Lips appear on stage. Wayne Coyne arrives inside a giant zorb and the rest of the band are birthed from the va-jay- jay of a large orange woman. But just because they are on stage it does not mean the Flaming Lips are ready to play any songs. First streamer cannons, then Wayne Coyne has to walk his zorb over the heads of the audience, then balloons then more streamers. Another ten minutes later the band start to play She Don't Use Jelly, cue more streamer cannons, more balloons and a big sing along. More streamers, balloons and The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song follows before I give up. The Flaming Lips live show has always had a great reputation but for me I would prefer less gimmicks and a few more songs.

Harvest festival had been great so far but the day was always going to be about Portishead. The earlier delays have pushed back the start of Portishead's show. Rather than dull the mood this delay builds on the already high pre-show expectations.

The Bristol group starts with Silence, the teasingly long intro has the band jamming for a good few minutes before we get the first taste of Beth Gibbons' perfect delicate vocals. Mysterons follows and it is one of the few times you hear the band use the samples and scratching of their early 90s material.

Beth Gibbons is a reluctant star - when she is not singing she hides in the darkness. The reticent singer is more than made up for by the video show. Not content with just projecting the on stage action onto the screens, Portishead use stage attached CCTV cameras, mirrors, VHS tapes and analog video processing tools to augment the live images with pulses, shadows and crazy animations.

Wondering Star is Portishead's most beautiful and fragile song. The whole audience falls silent as the band's minimal beat carefully supports the perfect delicate vocals. In contrast Machine Gun is the most assaulting live track I have heard all year. The crushing beat physically turns my stomach, the guitars buzz and synth drone induces paranoia while the laser eyed Tony Abbott projections add a layer of fear - just brilliant.

The guitar riff on tonight's version of Glory Box is superb, highlighting that this the band's defining song should be celebrated as more than dinner party background music.

The main set ends and the band leave the stage with a chaotic version of Threads, before returning for an encore of Roads and We Carry On. A brilliant end to a brilliant set on a brilliant day, more next year please.

Countdown to Glastonbury: Top Tips

So Bawley’s Hummer is going to Glastonbury. And I’m not. But rather than just sulk about this state of affairs, and because we at Bawley like lists, I thought I’d do something productive, and share my years of experience in the trenches to bring you my top ten top tips for a tip top time on Worthy Farm.

I’m Nick, by the way. I’m new here.

1. Ignore the weather forecast.

It will be wrong. That’s pretty much your one Glastonbury certainty. There is such a thing as a hot, dry Glastonbury (I’ve been to one!) But if it rains (and it probably will) you will need wellies. And it’s much better to bring them with you before you go, because as soon as the site starts getting muddy, the queues at the welly shops become reminiscent of Communist Russia. And even when it’s hot during the day, the site gets really bloody cold at night, and not even the pear cider will keep you warm. So, basically, pack for every possible weather condition.

But if anyone’s asking, I reckon it’s going to be a scorcher this year.

2. Get to the Stone Circle.

Preferably for sunrise or sunset. Help yourself to a flaming torch, sit back, take in the spectacular view over the whole site, and enjoy the atmosphere of the Best. Campfire. Ever.

3. Bring your own booze.

One of the brilliant ways that Glastonbury differs from pretty much any festival on the planet is that it’s a total alcohol free-for-all. You can bring as much booze as you want with you, and you can take it anywhere on the site, which means that you’re not limited to queueing up for overpriced poor quality lager served to you in a flimsy paper cup. The only (legal) thing you’re not allowed to bring on site, though, is glass, because the site’s a working farm most of the year, and broken glass hurts the cows’ feet. So you just need to decant any wine or spirits into something plastic before you get there. My tip, drinks wise, is a few nice boxes of red wine – easy to carry, no glass, and you don’t need to keep it cold.

4. Be prepared for the toilets.

Widely acknowledged as The Worst Thing About Glastonbury but really not that bad. You’ve basically got four types: urinals (for girls too! The She-Pee apparently works well. I don’t fully understand it, but it involves a cardboard funnel); then there’s Portaloos; long drops and a few proper flushing toilets up near the farmhouse and in the Green Fields. The urinals are fine, as are the long drops and flushing toilets, but avoid the Portaloos at all costs. And don’t forget the bogroll.

5. Try the pear cider.

It’s the true taste of Glastonbury! It’s almost impossible to get hold of anywhere else, so the Pear Cider from the Brothers Bar is a treat. Drink enough of it, and it starts doing strange and wonderful things to your head, and can make The Pigeon Detectives sound like Pink Floyd. And that’s a good thing.

6. Think about tent placement.

It’s a big site. Really big. And there are lots of fields to camp in. Some fields are near the stages, some aren’t, some a quiet, some are noisy. Some are flat, some are hilly. Most people have a theory about which are the best fields to camp in, but I don’t think it matters too much, just as long as you observe the following rules:

a) Be close to the toilets but not TOO close (you want easy access, but you really don’t want to be able to smell them.

b) Steer clear of the main paths because it’s amazing how loud people can be when they’re drunk and walking past your tent at 3 in the morning.

c) Stick to higher ground. Remember the floods?

d) Try to put your tent somewhere memorable, or make it distinctive (flags are good for this). You’ll be amazed how many tents look EXACTLY LIKE yours in the dark.

7. Get lost.

It’s a cliche, but the best things about Glastonbury are the bits far away from the main music stages. The circus, the healing fields, the ti pi fields, the smaller music stages and the like are all amazing, as are the people you’ll see there, and that’s what really makes Glasto the best festival on the planet. Make sure you take plenty of time to wander round the whole site. You really can have a great time without seeing any bands at all.

8. Beware the ATM queue.

There are a lot of opportunities to spend money at Glastonbury. There are fields filled with novelty t-shirts, drug paraphernalia and hand-crafted hippy shit. Unfortunately there are somewhat fewer opportunities on site for getting your hands on your cash. There’s a bank on site with five ATMs that don’t charge fees, and a few others around the site that’ll charge you a couple of quid, but, for a hundred and fifty thousand people, it’s not quite enough. So bring cash with you, but obviously keep it safe (tent robberies and pick pocketing is actually much rarer than you think at Glasto, but it does happen) and if you have to get cash, try to do it early in the morning or late at night when the queues are much much smaller and you’re not missing bands. However, if that band is Hard Fi, you’ll probably have more fun queuing for a cash machine and celebrating the irony.

9. Go and see a band you’ve never heard of.

They might just become your new favourite. I discovered Bright Eyes that way, and I first encountered a little-known band called The Killers about halfway down the bill on one of the smallest stages. They won’t amount to anything, I thought to myself.

10. See a headliner on the Pyramid stage.

Having said that it’s best to explore and make sure you get around the smaller stages and all the non-musical stuff Glastonbury has to offer, and despite the fact that non of the headliners this year are what might be described as ‘unmissable’; there’s something about the Pyramid that brings out the very best in bands and audiences, so make sure you see at least part of one of the headline sets. Famously, Radiohead rose to the indie-rock superleague after their performance in 1997, and their performance in 2003 was simply one of the greatest things I've ever seen.

My tip this year would be Jay-Z. With all the controversy surrounding his appearance this year, and with the rumoured guest appearances and what will certainly be a spectacular light show, I think he’ll be pretty awesome.

11. Ignore all of the above.

It’s Glastonbury, innit! It’ not about rules, man. It’s about the vibe. Man.