T in the park festival 2009. Day Three

Last night ranks as my second worst festival camping experience ever. Admittedly, it wasn’t because of the T campsite, but more to do with an assortment of circumstances that culminated in me sharing my friend’s ‘tent’, which turned out to be a kid’s pink tipi. In my day they were called wendy houses. The rain came down in torrents, and I woke up in a pool of water, along with all my remaining clothes for the weekend. Brilliant.

The rain cleared up in the end, and the sun returned to the final day. Aside from going to see Lily Allen, which because, let’s face it.. You would, there was plenty on that I actually wanted to go see, and not just for the sake of watching. Big festivals always seem to distract you to the bigger names that you would never pay to see for yourself, but that you may as well check out out of curiousity. 

Pulled Apart by Horses were on the T Break stage, which meant walking bloody miles to get there, but I found myself genuinely enjoying watching a band without it feeling like work, and was conscious of singing along, incase in my enthusiasm I got thrown out of the photo-pit.  They were their usual chaotic selves; playing to an unusually busy tent, and singer Tom Hudson almost decked me in his enthusiasm jumping offstage. We had a chat later on after Danananaykroyd’s set, and they declared their love for Artrocker.com. Good taste. The Dana.. were headlining the ‘BBC Introducing’ Stage, and were genuinely brilliant. I had tried very hard to not like them – dismiss them as popular indie art-crap, but I’ve been proven totally and utterly wrong. Their set was the highlight of the festival, and if it hadn’t been for my cameras, I’d have been throwing myself into the crowd along with them for the wall of cuddles.

Blur came onstage after a long delay, due to Graham Coxon being in hospital for apparent food-poisoning. It was all a bit bizarre, but a worthy close to T in the Park. Damien looked so determined and passionate that it looked like he could have been any young artrocker band demanding answers from a world that’s gone awry, although people started leaving in droves after Song 2 had came and went.
Oh, and much to the amusement of myself and the infamous Danny North from the NME (no-one else seemed impressed), we discovered a random vegetable in the photopit during Blur. Who on earth brings an aubergine to a festival?

T in the Park’s campsite is an interesting place, and can often come under criticism for being ‘too neddy’ (chavs for you English folk). This doesn’t come about for no reason – my pink hair managed to attract a fair whack of negative attention that I wouldn’t get at other, more laid back music festivals. I realised though, that it was partly my own doing. If you give in to the atmosphere, loosen up, and have a substantial amount of whisky, then you begin to feel much safer and more secure, and don’t worry about some rogue coming round and nicking your bag whilst you (try to) sleep.

As one fellow photographer remarked, when you’re caught up in the press and the politics of a festival the size of T, it’s very easy to miss what the festival’s about, and not feel like you’ve really been a part of anything. I think the same goes for the mainstream view of the festival – the more you concentrate on the headliners and the gloss and the usual publicity surrounding it, the less enamoured you become to the smaller, more unique parts.
  

Photos by Stephen McLeod. T in the park Day Three gallery is after the jump.