By Paul Loader

As Bristol Rock’s resident God Botherer I was dispatched forthwith to the Cheltenham Racecourse where the annual festival for Christian Music and Arts, Greenbelt, was being held.

Now I was supposed to attend the whole weekend, however in reality I have had it with festivals. Queuing for toilets that would have failed Health & Safety requirements in Iraq and playing Russian Roulette with the festival catering (you never know which meal will kill you). Add to that some friend of humanity residing in the tent next to yours loudly pontificating on about the bleakness of the cosmos (and that his girlfriend has just dumped him) until 4:30pm in the morning has put me clean off of the whole experience.

Besides I never fully recovered from my first festival experience (Greenbelt 78) where they had dug a fifty foot pit for the toilet facilities. The stench was unbelievable, and the sight of projectiles dropping from left to right was enough to bung you up for weeks.

Anyway, some poor soul slipped on the plank that the guys had to stand onto to have a leak, and had dived head first into the murky depths. Being a Christian festival……….nobody would help him out!!! 

Anyway, bottom line, my review of the weekend is based on the one day that I actually went to the festival before returning to the relative safety on my flushable loo, warm bed and Chinese takeaway.

On my arrival, the first band on as I wandered to the main stage was Chas & Dave (yes THAT Chas & Dave) and they were having a right royal Cockney knees up. Performing all their old favourites, which if you have ever watched TV you are bound to have heard at least one of. “Snooker Loopy”, “Rabbit”, “Gertcha” and my personal favourite “Down to Margate (reliving the Only Fools & Horses special “Jolly Boys Day Out”.)

Now Chas & Dave are extremely good at what they do, I was pleasantly surprised at how competent and interesting Dave Peacock is on bass guitar, and Chas Hodges rocked away on the keyboards. They were backed up by long term drummer Mike Burt. The crowd loved it singing heartily away and having right knees up.

My only grumble is that for me personally, and I am really being a real nit picker here, that it felt a little out of place on the main stage of a festival in the sunshine. What was needed was the corner of a pub somewhere with the crowd propping up the bar, and the air reverberating to drunken roars of “Gertcha”.

Still, it was great fun! 
(Note from Kevin: you may see a few more Chas & Dave classics in the Mudheads set list in the near future...snigger)
 

The next band I caught was an American outfit called This Beautiful Republic who are of the Emo variety and seemed to me to be in the vein of Jimmy Eat World. And to be honest, they rocked! 

Mind you, I couldn’t get my eyes off of the drummer. Now we all make jokes about our drummers looking like Animal off of the Muppets, well this one genuinely did. He was a hairy blighter and his arms flew everywhere and made a thunderous noise…loved it! 

The band played solid tunes from their new album “Even Heroes Need A Parachute”, and the five piece rocked around the stage like they were loving every minute of it.

Being that this was their first ever gig in the UK, they made an extremely good impression, and seemed genuinely humbled by the positive response of the large crowd. 

They threw in one cover as they were aware that the crowd would probably not know of their own material and sang the Narls Barkley song, “Crazy”. They really rocked that up as well, and gave me a good idea for my band.

I then sat and watched Iain Archer who is a quality performer and also a secondary song writer for the band Snow Patrol (he picked up an ‘Ivor Novello’ award for his work on the album Magnetic North). 

His was a great band with which to kick off your shoes; stretch out on the grass and soak up the sun….well it would have been if it hadn’t been so flipping cold and cloudy at that point. 

As I relaxed to his extremely solid songs and the quality of his guitar playing and band I indulged in a spot of People Watching.

Greenbelt really is for everybody, whether you believe in the Christian faith or not. There were people ranging from babies to the extremely old, Emos, Rockers, Chavs and hippies with a spattering of odd balls and even normal looking people wandering around having a great time. 

I was amused by one women that looked like she had just been playing Professor McGonagall from Harry Potter, with a long black cloak and black hat, surrounded by loads of teenage girls who it would seem were dressed as fairies…strange!! 

There were lots of people there that clearly felt they were ‘cool’ as they were at a festival, but really ought to have considered a little more carefully what they considered to be the correct clothing for festivals. Thankfully, there weren’t many guys wearing socks and sandals. I think that on the whole Christians know how to blend in nowadays.

After Iain Archer I trundled off to a large marquee called the Performance Café to see a band that were once HUGE, and who I am trying to get to Bristol, a band called After the Fire. This proved to be the biggest disappointment of the day for me as I couldn’t get in. The place was rammed packed, and the sound outside the tent was dyer and so we gave in and answered to the call of the hunger pangs and went and bought the worst Burritos that we had ever tasted. 

We witnessed a range of musicians and acts throughout the day that were generally of a very high calibre and for the most part very enjoyable. The festival isn’t as big as it used to be and they are well over subscribed with performers wanting to play there and so the festival organisers have their pick of the best of the best.

The final band of the weekend on main stage was a band I have heard of for years but had never actually seen. A band from Littlehampton called Delirious? They have in the past few years played all over the globe and have supported the likes of Bon Jovi and Bryan Adams. 

And I have to say, hand on heart, they were flipping amazing. A total experience on every level, sight, sound, emotional and spiritual.

The band played great songs, they are superb musicians, they had a fantastic light show, and to top it all, knowing that people like to sing along to their songs, they projected the lyrics very cleverly though video onto a rear screen. However, they did it in such a way, that it didn’t look like a simple Powerpoint presentation, but was a video in its own right, using film and images that as well as providing the words lent image and depth to the songs themselves. 

Delirious? are a band that wears their Christian faith on their sleeves and sing about their genuine passion for God. They also sing about their heart for a world that is tearing itself apart. 

You may not have time for Christianity or for any other faith come to that, but in a world that has become so cynical and angry, it was a really refreshing experience to be part of a 15,000 crowd celebrating the love that they had for life and for God. 

To be honest, you would have to have been there to have a real idea as to what the heck I am going on about. 

At the end we joined the tired throng as we weaved our way out of the racecourse, serenaded by drums, bands, buskers, DJ’s, videos on world poverty and passed the mile long queues for the toilets. 

I learnt three things that day. Firstly Greenbelt is much more that a festival for ‘nice people’ (as described by The Sun), it’s a festival that seeks to celebrate all that is good in life and allows people to be passionate about their beliefs at a time when we are supposed to be apologising for them.  

Secondly  that it is good to remind ourselves that we all need hope, love and a purpose in life, and that rock & roll doesn’t always have to be just about the blues. 

Thirdly I learnt that you never wear Converses to a festival, my feet were freezing.

Still I got to use my own bathroom that evening, warm and snug as I hummed “Miracle Maker” by Delirious? 

Prawn Cracker anyone?