Reading 96

Path: xargle.demon.co.uk!thowat
Newsgroups: uk.music.misc,uk.music.alternative
From: thowat@xargle.demon.co.uk (Tony Howat)
Subject: Reading 96
Reply-To: thowat@xargle.demon.co.uk
Date: Tue, 27 Aug 1996 16:34:14 +0100
Message-ID: <19960827.163415.00@xargle.demon.co.uk>
Organization: Dover Associates
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Julian Cope
~~~~~~~~~~~
Flourescent. Very flourescent. They got the crowd going, and got
security guards very nervous. Entertainment included the crowd's
efforts to drench the keyboards and analogues in water, some people
were surprisingly good shots.

Super Furry Animals
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A disappointingly boring performance. They played fine, but didn't
speak to the crowd and no real atmosphere was generated. There was
far more of a vibe on their tank, which pumped out dance music all
weekend and had loads of people dancing on it.

The Prodigy
~~~~~~~~~~~
Stupidly good performance.

Lionrock
~~~~~~~~
Were bollocks, but then I knew they would be. Sure, the music's
fine, but those lyrics are absolutely terrible.

Black Grape
~~~~~~~~~~~
Top performance on the main stage. Bez made a welcome return and
danced like someone who'd taken far too many drugs. He probably had.
Chris Evans was also brought on stage for "Pretty Vacant", and he
danced like a ginger twat. He was. The act included Englands Eirie
(with Keith Allen), Shake Your Money Maker, and an amusing little
thrash punk number for all those who don't get on with their father.
The lyrics went something like "Fuckdaddyfuckdaddyfuckfuckfuck!",
and lasted about 10 seconds :)

Underworld
~~~~~~~~~~
Absolutely brilliant. Huge crowd spilled out of the NME tent and
most of it was dancing. As expected, people went mad for Born Slippy,
but were also surprisingly active for the rest of the set. The band
seemed to be enjoying it too, and played a second encore (breaking
the curfew, oooh!). Certainly the best act I went to see.

Ash
~~~
They had some nice fireworks, they looked great from the dance tank.

Toilets
~~~~~~~
Heh! By the end of the festival all (round my camp site anyway) had
been pushed over, and also one was blown up, which was highly
entertaining. There was also a camp fire in the main arena, which
featured a calor gas cylinder. For some reason the fire bridgade
thought it might be a good idea to put it out.

I missed The Divine Comedy, The Stone Roses, Moby, Ruby, Moloko,
Placebo, Ursei Yatsura and a couple of other bands I wouldn't have
minded seeing due to being too drunk, clashes with other acts, or
having something more interesting to do.

Having underworld and The Stone Roses playing at the same time was
very annoying, and the first day was bobbins - a load of American
rubbish. Food etc was also extortionate, and the whole of Reading
seems to join in this rip off the punters malarkey. Still, it was
smart.

I feel this may well be the start of a very tedious thread.

--
Tony Howat