I only bought a ticket for Reading Festival to see The Libertines.
This is a well known and accepted fact among my friends and I’m not ashamed of it.
Once a veteran attendee to the Richmond Avenue site, I called it a day in 2007 after having a shit time that year. Over the years – coincidentally as they increased the capacity - Reading Festival started getting rowdier, more violent; festival goers were losing respect for each other, setting strangers’ tents on fire and generally the atmosphere wasn’t one I wanted to be in anymore. I discovered the delights of Glastonbury in 2009 and swore I would never bother with the teen dream Kerrang-flavoured rampage that was Reading Festival ever again.
Back in the good old days... when tickets were £135!
Until that fateful day of course, when The Libertines announced their reformation. I had been waiting six years to hear that news! I dreamt of a time when I’d go to a Pete Doherty solo gig and Carl would appear and we’d all have an old-fashioned knees up to our own personal visions of the Arcadian dream. No more dreaming now because all of my beloved likely lads (John! Pete! Carl! Gary! All on one stage!) have been ball-and-chain contracted into a million-pound deal to play Reading Festival.
It's all about the foliage. Guess the band and we'll be friends for life.
The night that tickets went on sale, I tried for hours to get them. I hadn’t even had a sniff of entering my card details when they sold out. One of my friends found me in Morrisons Car Park that night, looking like my dog had just died.
The next day, tickets miraculously were available again. We tried, and failed again.
The day after that, I found myself shut in the toilet cubicle at work, whispering my card details out to one of my friends who was frantically typing them into the computer.
Supposedly, you’ve guessed the next bit.
The 'Reading drums'. Equally loved and detested.
If you ever meet me in real life, you should ask me how much I really sacrificed in order to go to Reading Festival this year (My sudden decision to pack up and move to London was not as spontaneous as you might think). The truth is, I just couldn’t miss the opportunity to catch The Libertines live. August Bank Holiday weekend will be a monumental one in the history of British music and nothing in my life was important enough not to sacrifice for it.
After all, I heard that if you have lost your faith in love and music then the end won’t be long?
Part II a.k.a not the blogging equivalent of an Albion wank tissue, soon, I promise.
All the pictures featured here are from my own personal bank of festival photos 2004-07!
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