Originally Posted by Mandypants
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I love the festival as a whole and won't be cutting my nose off to spite my face simply due to one tent, which was corporate anyway. Like Nestle or Tesco, if you are that ethically principled, you can avoid it.
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Each unto their own, but if I may explain. ME decided against having heavy metal at the festival for good reasons - I went to a Monsters of Rock do at Knebworth once, what a mistaka to maka..... Having not long escaped from an estate full of little twats draped in Argos's finest, that could only manage a collection of jumbled words ending in 'innit' for a sentence, we really, really don't want to go down that road - 4 years of hell is not what we need reminding of when we are supposed to be chilling out. I'm afraid we have something of a dim view of the culture of Rap/Hip-hop as a result. The swing towards pop/celebrity rather than "alternative"/peaceful rebelliousness, and understanding, if not direct support for, the political slant of the festival is also important to us. Last year we got the distinct impression that many were only there for an extended Saturday night out and had no interest in the agenda of the festival - witness detrius left on the Monday. In fact we were left with impression Oxfam/Greenpeace etc were only present as almost a grandiose token gesture. The Leftfield missing didn't help there. (I know it's back, but now it really is only a token gesture). The only act we saw that even made a nod to environmental issues was Neil Young ("Natural Anthem").
We are lucky enough, now, to live in a small village with fields front and back, so sitting in a field, somewhat out of focus, listening to music (on an iPod admittedly) is something we can do anytime, so what is probably a novelty to many is nothing special to us. Yes, we are very lucky there.
In the past I used to trade at small events, with one national event a year. A few years back one of the "majors" decided to get involved. The first year it was fine, the major sponsored all the unglamourous bits which was great. The next year, my pitch fee was refunded with an explanation that the sponsor was demanding exclusivity. The following year, there were no traders (and there still aren't) - the sponsor pulled out and the national event really struggled - all the traders who had sponsored the non- glamourous things out of a sense of duty were no longer prepared to do so, in fact they simply were not there and marred the event, almost terminally.
I've probably not put that very well, and doubtless some will be along to argue the semantics (and syntax!) of what I have written, but the upshot is that the Playstation thing is the news that tipped balance for us.
As for the 40th party/line up, while not top of our agenda, I fear Mr. Hitler's adjutant puts it rather better than I can (about 36 seconds in)..........
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BpgYRmJOKY
Guardian Lounge No More?
