Blog 7

Let’s Make Glastonbury Better!

It’s amazing how ideas come to you sometimes. There I was, surrounded by mud and rain and more mud, cursing the lack of urinal at the top of the New Band Tent (call it by it’s name) Field when it suddenly struck me. All the issues I had with Glastonbury reminded me of something, see if you can spot it:

1. “Father knows best” autocratic owner increasingly getting in to bed with commercial interests that seem to have only negative impacts on the punter

2. Said punters being treated like cattle with little thought for our comfort or welfare

3. Increasing costs and declining facilities

4. Being constantly told by media/controlling interests that you’re part of the best festival in the world, when you can clearly see the cracks round the edges

5. The complete lack of feedback mechanisms for us to get our views across to those in charge

Yes, being at Glastonbury is exactly like being a football fan, and what have football fans done about this? Formed Supporters Trusts, by the hundred! … read on …

Glastonbury 2007 sez

I guess its too late to go round Mr and Mrs Suns gaff and see if little Jimmy Sun wants to come out and play? Am watching Gypsy nonsense in puppy parlour!
– Pete, Sun 20:30

Who? Doctor The Who?
– Pete, Sun 19:40

VITALiC! Fucking COME ON!
– awesomewells, Sun 19:30

Ooh my feet! Mark Pompom and then Vitalic and then potential bin death. Only the calamacho can save me now!
– Pete, Sun 18:15

We’re sitting having a lovely pint of real ale about 10ft from whisperin’ bob harris
– Carsmile, Sun 17:15

Sweary old Dame Shirley has got this party started
– triffidfarm, Sun 17:10

I have realised what glastonbury needs! A “supporters trust” so the concerns of the fans can be articulated to the management
– Carsmile, Sun 12:00
… read on …

THE FreakyTrigger TOP 25 BRANDS: 20: APPLE RECORDS

That’s Apple Records. Not Apple Computers. Or indeed Apple Martin-Paltrow. Both a blatant rip-off of Apple records logo etc.

So Apple Records. That is beatle band record label. Why is it so important, its only a record label. Well Apple was one of the very first stabs at a creative entity (the Beatles) owning the means of production and distribution. Being able to set up a stall and rake the money in directly. To ignore THE SUITS and do what the hell they wanted. Of course it was just a shame that what the hell they wanted was Mary Hopkin records and The White Album, but then such is the way with truly innovative ideas. And as a brand Apple was very easy to understand, there was that nice picture of the Granny Smith on the label. … read on …

A Disgruntled Glastonbaby writes…

“I have to stay in my house ALL DAY on Saturday waiting for the Glasto ticket after a series of mishaps etc. I knew this would happen. WHY CAN’T THEY USE ROYAL MAIL AND HAVE IT WAITING FOR ME AT THE POST OFFICE? Like everybody else does, and even they did in previous years, when it was easy for me collect a ticket and didn’t involve me wasting a day of my free time with no possibility whatsoever of me even being allowed to take the risk of it going astray in order to actually receive it because their mad policy is that they have to deliver it to me according to their bureaucracy even if the eventual outcome is that I can’t receive it at all I mean it WORKED when the Royal Mail sent it, I popped down on Saturday morning to pick it up on my way to do other things WHY WHY WHY do the Eavises insist on clever ideas that add up to complete nonsense, and even when they do make a tiny bit of sense, not a huge amount mind, but at least not eking out the pandemonium and heartache of trying to get tickets for days on end, they go and wreck it, I mean there I was at two hours before the midnight deadline taking pictures of myself for their registration service and then they go and open the doors to another fortnight’s worth of shysters and ne’er-be-on-times to turn pretty decent odds into a total farce like all the previous years in fact why is E Eavis in charge anyway, its nepotism you know, I bet they didn’t advertise that job in the local paper.”

I can’t get all the news I need from the weather report

So GlastoWeatherWatch has left us a little in the lurch this year (congratulations on your wedding though :)). OK, so there’s Glasto Festival Forecast attempting to fill the gap, but they look like they’ve jumped into bed with THE MAN, how can we have a reliable forecast from just one company, eh, eh??? … read on …

The FreakyTrigger Top 25 Brands: 21: POKEMON

Marketers at Nintendo has credited the popularity of Pokemon to its expert combination of two previous fads - the Tamagotchi and the Beanie Baby. Fair enough, but this isn’t why Pokemon has become so successful as a brand, capturing the imagination of children and adults worldwide. A great brand needs a great brand symbol, and Pokemon’s is Pikachu - in fact without Pikachu as an identification point the game would never have been a success. … read on …

Jindabrandin’

Jindabyne is second or third hand goods. No problem in basing your film on a Raymond Carver story, they are a pretty good little basis for films. But the story in question “So Much Water So Close to Home” was already one of the nine or so stories interleaved in Short Cuts. Now Short Cuts itself is patchy, but this tale (some blokes go fishing, find a body and only decide to report after their holiday is over) is one of the stronger ones in Cuts. And the big blow up of this small story to fit it into an Australian race story seems a blow up too far. We get Laura Linney’s excess of empathy contrasted by her husbands lack - but as it stumbles towards a touchingly hopeful resolution it feels like its being overstretched. It also leaves the issue of the actual bad guy of the piece, the murderer, flapping in the air. Which is unfortunate for a UK viewer, because said murderer is the dead spit of Michael Eavis. You are never sure whether to be creeped out by his upside-down facial hair, or applauding his festival.

The other cultural aside I got from Jindabyne was Streets Ice Cream. Logo below.
… read on …

REPUBLICANS VOTE FOR DIXIE CHICKS

Well, they probably will as a way to destabilise Hillary Clinton’s campaign first for Democratic Nomination and then President. Because Hillary BELIEVES IN DEMOCRACY SO MUCH she is allowing her supporters to pick her running song. Some people, after all, have pooh-poohed her initial choice of Right Here, Right Now by Jesus Jones: on the grounds that it is a Right wing song for a left wing candidate. Such reasoning seems spurious when just a IT’S JESUS JONES SONG surely would suffice, but there you go. D:Ream did not harm New Labour*. … read on …

When A Man You’ve Never Met Before Gives You Flowers

He’s probably been dumped by the girl he bought them for.

Impulse, the Just Seventeen of the deodorant world*, is advertising on the side of buses at the moment (can I find one on the web, can I heck). Three new fragrances to add to their already substantial range of cheap, whiffy smells to brighten up your sixth form common room. Now I know that fragrances often have names with little to do with the actual smells involved - long gone are the days you could just buy Rose perfume. Instead perfumes are seen as aspirational, hence the celebrity linking of late. You aren’t buying Jade Goody’s perfume to smell like Jade Goody after all (one assume the celebs don’t wear their own perfumes very often anyway). So the current range of Impulse body sprays are as follows: … read on …

FT Periodic Table: Element 3: ROBOTS

Robots. And not the so-so computer animated flick of 2005, but real actual robots, computer-brained servants made to follow our every need. The Freaky Trigger periodic table is forward looking to anticipate - in our time - more domestic servitude from our clanking friends.

Except, as that recent article predicted, robots will not be C3-PO-esque droids with cut glass British accents, acting as our own robo-butlers. … read on …