Sinister: A festival of sorts/strange days + weird mornings under canvas

[paul 'spoonbearder' sallis]

Highlights + lowlights of an intents weekender:

I'm still tired + I think I've permanently damaged my
back sleeping on a slope of 45-degrees on "the
thinnest most crappy rollmat in the world"TM.
- does anyone know of any good massage parlours?
-- Actually, for that matter, does anyone know of any
seriously dodgy + illreputed ones ;]

It was ace meeting the miniSini kids though, hello
everyone <paul waves enthusiastically like a loon, but
continues doing so for just a wee bit too long>,
despite a shaky start involving the shocking absence
of an easily-identifiable inflatable play-thing on my
behalf and a couple of shy preliminary fly-by's of the
people I was supposed to meet.

Hey Lixi, did Cedric (or was it Alfonse???) the
squeaky-legged grasshoppa' make it home in one piece?
- Sorry I tried to kidnap him, but can you really
blame me what with all those deranged words of wisdom
+ drunken wonder scrawled all over him, and besides by
the end of the evening I was quite attached to the
little fella' (literally).


It was a magical time where expert timing + random
luck strolled hand-in-hand for 3-days down the
corridors of the moment, ie: I somehow managed to meet
everyone I'd arranged to meet and see all the bands I
really wanted to see - An unprecedented event and no
mistake.

I bumped into my good friend Andy completely by
accident on the Friday night just before Badly Drawn
Boy came on. You should have seen him, he looked
impressively gnarly + spent (like: "Grizzly Adams -
the early years") - which I reckon is because he
misses his girlfriend Karen (who's a tattoo artist in
South Carolina this summer) so much that nothing else
is important to him right now, rather than anything to
do with the fact that most people looked haggard +
spaced-out by that point in the whole festy-thang.
- Apparently the poor little pet had been handed some
cake earlier in the day and his ailing tastebuds were
far too slow off-the-mark to inform him that it was of
the 'space' variety packed with plenty of 'groovy
space-rocks', and he'd spent the rest of the day
wandering around in a bit of a wide-eyed stupor <ha
ha> - I shouldn't laugh I know but then again I was
pretty badly off my own gourd by this point so it
struck me as hilarious at the time. 

I'm sorry I lost you Sinister kids on Friday night, I
wanted to make sure Andy was alright, but then he
disappeared across the field to grab some food, never
came back, and I didn't see him again - which was a
bummer cos I then couldn't find any of you in Elliott
Smith's big gay lurve tent.
- Although Mr Carsmile did find me the next night, but
I think I just kept blathering on about the 101
reasons why Burt Bachrach simply had to be playing the
next day no-matter what the vicious rumours said -
sorry about that Steve, it won't happen again honest,
you just caught me at an emotional moment.

I was just such a staunch disbeliever when I
discovered that Burt "I'll Never Fall In Love Again"
Bacharach wasn't playing, it just wasn't fair
<hummmph!> - so I threw a massive strop + sulked like
it was going out of fashion or something, for like...
oh minutes + minutes.
- the rumours were flying I can tell you, I heard many
tales of woe including: he broke his collar-bone
somehow, his arm had just fallen off (as they tend to
do!), both his arms had fallen off, his arms + legs
had fallen off meaning that he'd get arrested
in-a-second if he tried to sing along + tinkle on the
old Joanna at the same time, it was a lawnmower
accident of sorts, a crash involving trains and boats
and planes, a wayward frisbee removed a section of his
nose, and also that he'd just gone and died for no
apparent reason what-so-ever!!!
-- its was incredible, the gossip-mongers were loving
it (hey ian, aren't one or two of these your
creations???). I still don't know what did happen to
him but the collarbone thing was the only feasible +
repeated story I heard - although I tend to favour
something involving a bottle of scrumpy and a
ferret... but maybe that's just me.

So a no show from Mr Bacharach was a considerably
menacing cloud over an otherwise immaculate vista...
That is until David "he's a metro-gnome" Bowie stepped
confidently into the fray and rocked like a chicken to
save the day. 
- He was great, no really he was, and hearing him
belt-out rebel-rebel was one of the most perfect
moments in my life thus far - sadly I didn't get a
chance to tell him he's a beautiful person (everyone
else was making far too much noise for him to pick out
my little voice) but its ok cos' from his heroic
performance + stance you could tell that he knew it
and he knew that we knew it too.

After Mr Bowie the best thing I saw was definitely The
Flaming Lips... WOW what a f*cking amazing show - I
saw them twice last year and they played pretty much
the same stuff, but 'that' stageshow they've put
together is a truly wondrous thing that left me
feeling awe-struck, tingly, and even a wee bit sick
inside - but even the slight icky sick feeling was
good cos' it made me feel more alive, a fleeting
sickness of the heart not the body.

Who else was any good then... St Etienne were tops
creating smiles + shiny magic, Badly Drawn Boy was a
funny bearded man who even played the odd crackin'
song just to break-up his comedy repertoire, Elliott
Smith + Hank Williams III (yes a Hank Williams cover
band!!!) both crooned their way around my
heartstrings, Nearly Dan (yes a Steely Dan tribute
band!!!) played 70's music in a great 80's stylee
which made me laugh for about an hour, Yo La Tengo
were nice'n'spicy, It's Jo & Danny played a haunting
acoustic set of beauty + orchids, Spearmint + Ooberman
were absolute stars + kings of everything cheesy,
jangily, + indie, Black Box Recorder were frightening
but in a good way (and it took me about 3 songs to
realise that the female lead was actually wearing some
kind of a skin-tight light-coloured outfit and that
she wasn't just standing there in the buff), and the
best of this lot was a fantastic all-girl funk outfit
from Bristol called Mooz who played on a tiny wee
bandstand in the market area and managed to groove
everyone out with a selection of excellent choons
(they were so happy as well, it was probably their
first big'ish gig, and the smiles + energy they
extolled was contagious sweeping through the throng
like wildfire through a briarpatch).

Who were pants then... I can't actually think of much
that I really didn't like, I was dead lucky with my
choices, although Dark Star + Feeder were dull as
dishwater, and Rae and Christian (or was it Doves???)
made me throw-up just outside the New Bands tent - it
was definitely the music, honest guv', I mean what
else could it be? - well that's my story and I'm
sticking to it ;P

Other top/pop moments:
- Reading all the comments emblazoned on a certain
inflatable grasshopper after he did an impromptu
whirlwind tour of the beer tent - especially the one
that went "I'm only writing this because the girl who
handed me this thing is really scary"
- Seeing the brief horrified look on Mr Carsmiles face
after I offered him a giant Parma Violet in the New
Band tent which he must have thought was a horse
tranquilliser, or superfun-mauve-happypill, or
something. (sorry Steve, but your face was a picture;)
- Discovering that I'm not a Glastonbury rain-God
placed on this barren sphere to bring dampness +
trenchfoot to poor unsuspecting revellers of any
denomination (well, for some reason I still think I AM
the Glasto monsoon deity, I just had an off weekend
that's all, but at least I now know I'm not the only
one - thanks Cress ;)
- Finally managing to leave the bloomin' place on
Monday after taking 5 + 1/2 hours to traverse a small
shadeless field in cramped shambling queue's awaiting
an ever elusive bus to the train station.


All in all though it was a bit of a top weekend.

Ouch, how long + boring is this?

fly away,
paul.

ps: Cress, if you got this far, check out the
following URL for Hobotalk info: 
 http://the-raft.com/hobotalk/

hugs + raspberry slushpuppies.

-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
 Work like you don't need the money.
 Love like you've never been hurt.
 Dance like nobody's watching.
-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*

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