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Like volume. To put it politely the sound quality at the main stage was variable. To tack blunt adjectives to the edges of that, it varied from audible to dreadful. Friday was the nadir. A line-up which promised much simply evaporated, the atmosphere destroyed by the sad and oft repeated sight of people turning up at the main hillock, standing for a bit, then disaffectedly drifting away.
A stage at the top of a slope? Not a good idea. There's a reason why most venues and most festivals angle things the other way. It's because if you do it that way round, if you put yer performers at the bottom and yer punters at the top, then they can achieve two key goals: watching the bands and, and you'll laugh, hearing the bands.
Despite that, day 1 started, if not promisingly, then certainly not hopelessly. Little did we know that 65 Days Of Static would be as aurally pleasurable as things got on the main stage today, as Friendly Fires, Florence and The Machine and MGMT all had trouble.
Before the mighty fell, a quick visit to the Big Top to see Maps proved two key things: first, it wasn't our ears that weren't working, and second, it seemed ironically difficult for most people to find their way to see a band called Maps.
The Jim Beam Stage played host to many a folk performance over the course of the weekend, but first up were Marina And The Diamonds. Marina hit the high notes in theatrical Kate Bush style, while a cover of Late Of The Pier's Space In The Woods resulted in plenty of jerky head bobbing.
Of the main stage bands reduced to mime artists, Florence suffered least. Friendly Fires have been playing the same set for too long; Ed McFarlane's hips no longer thrust like the lunges of a sexual tyrannosaurus fronting the finest indie-disco band of the year, and have instead begun to look like the tired motions of a man who really just wants to sit down and take the weight off his loafers.
But Ms Welch, resplendent in a gold and green number that made her look like Ireland's leggiest leprechaun, managed to make Rabbit Heart and You've Got The Love hang tantalisingly in the air, potentially anthemic, at least for the people stood in the front couple of rows.
Somehow, someway, someone remembered to turn the PA on for Soulwax who, after the previous wind-swept disasters, took a bow to the tune of Part Of The Weekend Never Dies. The brothers Dewaele charged a huge crowd, throwing in Justice and Daft Punk covers for one of the sets of the day.
They were were immeasurably better than MGMT. As was the insect circus, the kazoo band and the random fella who started drunkenly and tunelessly singing Sex On Fire at three o'clock in the morning in the middle of the campsite. A bored performance by a inaudible band, which achieved the almost impossible by turning two of the weekends' guaranteed, gilt-edged anthems (Kids and Time To Pretend) into non-events.
So it was left to Massive Attack to regain some honour for a main stage which had promised so much and delivered so little - like a mythomaniac postman. Which they did. But only just. The early signs didn't bode well as they focused on new material and failed to capture attention. They were certainly not aided by another muddy audio mix. But somewhere around Futureproof, and with large sections of the crowd beginning to disperse, it recovered.
A thunderous Safe From Harm, the evermore prescient paranoia of Inertia Creeps, and a climactic Unfinished Sympathy made a performance that, whilst not perfect, certainly looked good in comparison.
The day partially saved, all that was left was to explore the late night entertainment - now with the added promise that we might be able to hear it.
We could. By 3am the Bollywood tent was dripping sweat from its low ceiling amid a fog of blood red smoke. Justin Robertson had just finished a deep acid house set before an almighty voodoo howl went off, startling dance floor stragglers from their daze. It was time for Fake Blood; cue bone crunching fidget house to end Day 1 in sleazy fashion.
 Bestival 2009:
Day 1 |
Day 2 |
Day 3
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