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It all hit me on Sunday. Four nights in a tent had taken their toll. It was also the hottest day sofar. For me, in many ways, Slipknot had been the grand finale; everything today was just an added bonus. It was however, a very different place to the one we had left the night before.

There were substantially more day visitors on Sunday, clearly drawn in by the AOR nature of the line-up. Ageing rockers with more patches than denim showing emerged en masse in the early morning heat. With them they brought children, lots and lots of children. I think it’s commendable that the festival was so accommodating to families and I support any event that does so. As aforementioned, however, I had been in a tent for four days and the last thing I wanted was to be placed in the middle of a scorching field with absolutely no shelter to find that it had been transmogrified into a rudimentary nursery. Yes, it was Surly Sunday for the Zombiehamster.

My grumpiness was aided with the confiscation of our whiskey. I was under no circumstances going to drink anymore warm, flat expensive beers and so we sought the pleasure of the vine. This proved suitably pleasant and reclaiming our preferred vantage point, we sipped our Sauvignon Blanc’s and watched Stone Gods, whose traditional biker metal was surely indicative of what was still to come.

Tesla were second to perform on the main stage, their best song being ‘Signs’ which was sampled by Norman Cook a few years ago ‘And the sign said, long haired freaky people need not apply’. I really enjoyed Tesla; they were great fun, although the singer did resemble the recently resurrected corpse of a Native American dipped in candle wax. His teeth were whiter than light itself. They got the crowd going really well, but I knew that there would be no circle pits today, oh no, this was the day for air guitar and power poses. Anyone who knows me will profess to the fact that I have absolutely no issues with this whatsoever.

The specially reformed Skin (Not the Skunk Anansie Singer) followed with another display of 80’s soft rock. Their last song surprised the hell out of me however; as it transpired that they were the originators of ‘Unbelievable’ which was brought to popularity by EMF in the early 90’s. Skin’s version is far superior, with the old school riffs perfectly suiting the fast pace of the song. This wasn’t turning out so bad after all.

Black Stone Cherry. Again, I had seen so many of their shirts over the weekend that I assumed they must have a considerable following. Their set transported me back to a hundred pub rock gigs that I have seen against my will and better judgement. As with several of the bands that I saw over the weekend, there was nothing wrong with what they did, but there was nothing progressive or overly exciting to it either. Their set seemed to last a lot longer than it did as well, which is not always a good thing. Still, I didn’t care, the very reason that I got out of bed on Sunday (aside from the girl on acid in the tent next to me who had just hooked up with a tattooist named Rob) was Journey, and they were due to play in a matter of minutes.

I was sceptical and a kind of unsure of what to expect from Journey as I had seen very little footage of new singer Arnel Pineda. I needn’t have been so apprehensive. In forty minutes, they powered through their greatest hits and made everyone very, very happy. ‘Anyway you want it’, ‘Wheel in the sky’ and ‘Don’t stop believing’ were now the anthems of the day. It was possibly the most perfect band to see on the last day, bedraggled and wounded from the sidelines. I have included some of the official videos for you to get a better indication of just how well they performed.

Things took a horrible turn for the worse when Dream Theater played next. I have never before in my life experienced a band that was so awful that they actually made me vomit. Well, I guess there’s a first time for everything. I just couldn’t take it, trapped in the sun with the most horrendous prog rock ever made. It was like living downstairs from Rick Wakeman and half hearing his week long noodling sessions through a pillow that you have protectively wrapped around your head to try and make it all go away. It wouldn’t end. They just kept going, playing, solos, no, couldn’t take it. Horrible, horrible band.

When I ran an indie record store for a while, we used to sell bucketloads of their cd’s. If the place still existed I think I would track down these people who ordered their albums and have a serious talk with them, before beating them around the head with cans of salmon. Why Dream Theater exist is entirely beyond me and they have now taken place I my list of bands that I never want to hear again as long as I live, where they stand proudly alongside the likes of Bob Marley, Pink Floyd and The Beatles. Oh if I never had to hear a song by any of those artists again what a wonderful world it would be.

The pain was eventually relieved and it took me a while to recover, I felt violated. They got me after Journey; I was all happy and vulnerable. Bastards.

To hell with bad prog rock though because there was some proper rock on next, in the hairy bear form of ZZ Top. ZZ Top are like walking cartoons, they are amazing. They seem like such delightful old men too, although this can make it a bit weird when they’re singing about shagging. They are fantastic blues musicians (as anyone who knows their early work will agree) and it was only in the 1980’s that they developed their pop rock formula which catapulted them into megastardom. This was a delight as their shows can be quite rare and so I made sure that I enjoyed and appreciated every moment. ‘Cheap Sunglasses’, ‘Legs’, ‘Gimmie All Your Lovin’ and ‘Sharp Dressed Man’ were just so much damn fun to hear and jump about to. Their departure signalled the end of the fun.

I had been looking forward to Whitesnake. This anticipation was diluted, spilt and evaporated by the end of the second song. Dave Coverdale is like some awful Bruce Forsythe / Butlins Redcoat hybrid, with about as much charm as haemorrhoids. Opening every track with lines such as ‘Here’s another one you’ll like’ and ‘I’ve got another little song for ya’ in his ridiculous lord of the manor voice was really starting to annoy me. The meandering solo’s lasted three or four days. The banter was endless and equally flat and forced. I began to hate Whitesnake after 20 minutes. After an hour I wanted to go home. By the time they got to ‘Is This Love?’ and ‘Here I go Again’ they rocked, but I barely cared.
It was with this, the fatigue, the heat and the entire lack of enthusiasm to see Def Leppard; I went back to my tent where I passed out, only to wake an hour later when they started lighting fires.

It was all a bit scary for a while, every few moments another tent would explode, then some campers began letting off flares which illuminated the sites nicely for the Police helicopters that circled overhead. The air was filled with smoke, the red glow showing the scurrying guards and Police as they stormed through the tents to stop the mounting fires.

It all ended peaceful and we made our escape on Monday morning, managing to rearrange our boat home. This was one of the most welcome eventualities imaginable, well for me, because I wasn’t driving. Many thanks do go to Soup however, you were a legend man and I can’t thank you enough. 25 concerts in three days was hard going, but worth every moment. Any quibbles I may have had were minor ones given the unique and memorable line-up. I saw some bands I loved, some I didn’t know I would even enjoy and a few that were just great to make fun of. I haven’t seen sun since I returned to Ireland and have no intention on leaving the house anytime soon. Well, not until the next good gig comes around, I don’t think that’ll be too far away either.

Biggest douche of the weekend goes to Marilyn Manson for wasting everybody’s time. Oh and for the most disturbing moment of the weekend, when a mother approached me during Manson and, motioning to her daughter, said:

‘You’ll have to put my daughter up on your shoulders so that she can show her tits to the camera’.

Now that was weird.

To read Day One’s Review, Click HERE

For Day Two’s Review, Click HERE

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