Despite the fact that I am rather high maintenance in regards to my appearance and the conditions under which I feel comfortable, I decided that on the eve of my departure from secondary school that it was high time I lost my music festival virginity and so, the decision to attend Oxegen this year fell into place in December when I bought an early bird three day camping ticket. In apprehension and curiosity, I scoured the Internet in search of advice and opinions, only to very quickly come to the conclusion that there is no general consensus when it comes to Oxegen and opinions were and continue to be incredibly mixed and often shaped by the individual's personal experience with the festival. Now with all of it behind me, I hold fast to the cliche'd idea that Oxegen is in reality, only as good as you make it and I hope this post serves to help others who find themselves in a similar situation.
I arrived early Friday morning in the pouring rain, an inevitable annoyance that puts a dampener (pun intended) on every Irish music festival. By Friday morning, the campsites were already jam packed with dedicated festival go-ers who'd arrived a day early to pitch their tents and so, finding a spot for our lowly two man tent proved difficult. Oxegen's campsites are divided into green,blue and red sites and then subdivided into sections again, i.e R8 or B32, making it easier to navigate. That said, I feel as though more could of been done in the way of maps and signs. There were no shortage of people selling schedules yet I failed to see one map, free or otherwise in circulation. A few large laminated maps fixed to wooden planks with 'you are here' located where relevant would not of gone amiss, especially for a newbie like myself.
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After hauling our baggage around for the bulk of an hour, we finally found a small plot of land in B28 beside a security tower that became our home for three days. Camping at Oxegen is really not as revolting an experience as I was led to believe. Our tent was not ripped open, nothing was stolen and our neighbours were civil. Apart from the drunken screaming, the occasional naked man and vomit patches, it was rather tame. However, rest is a rarity and sleep even more so. The noise of the constant flux and flow of people and the dip in temperatures at night ensure that you'll have to spent your evenings doing something a bit more productive but with the fun fair and silent disco open until the wee hours so the issue in itself is nonexistent really.
As far as food went, it was vastly overpriced and fairly limited and my only major complaint was the state of the portaloo toilets on site. They contained no toilet paper, could be smelled from metres away, were impossible to use after dark because of the lack of light, lacked a functioning flush and more often than not, were covered in excretion of all sorts. How people even managed to fling their shit around the porta-potty in such an extreme and sporadic manner is honestly beyond me...
I was fairly pleased with the lineup this year and although it did contain a few heart-breaking clashes, like My Chemical Romance during Metronomy and Crystal Castles during Jimmy Eat World, it was broad and well-rounded with a good mix of genres and calibres. My major disappointment came in the form of Bink 182, one of the first acts to be announced, unfortunately pulling out fairly last minute due to a scheduling problem. I also found some of the staging decisions rather bizarre with big name bands like The Strokes being banished to smaller stages whilst new, less established musicians(and I use that term loosely...) like the Rubberbandits being granted the privilege of playing on the main stage.
I found Friday(the 8th of July) to be the most fruitful day harbouring many bands of interest to me like The Original Rude Boys, The Riptide Movement, The Naked & Famous, My Chemical Romance, Weezer and The Strokes. The real highlight of the Friday for me, however was
Metronomy who gave a humble and delicate performance in the 2fm Hotpress Academy Stage, playing bits and peices from across their discography including
'Holiday', '
Heartbreaker',
'The Look' and
'Corrinne'. They connected and made constant reference to the audience, especially bass player, Gbenga Adelekan who made the extra effort to exhilarate and elate the crowd via funky hip movements and a big welcoming smile. They play brilliantly live and are without a doubt only going to increase in popularity as they continue to play major European festivals. I really do hope to see Joseph Mount's promise to return to Ireland to play a full length gig fabricate.
Other big-name bands that played on the Friday included the Black Eyed Peas, Example and The Script, all of which I have no interest in but upon being informed all about Will.i.am's embarrassing mistake in which he was delighted to be playing in the '02 in Dublin' I wish I had of stuck around for the Black Eyed Peas. My Chemical Romance were disappointing and Weezer were shockingly impressive but the stars of Friday's main stage were
The Strokes, who happily indulged in the success of their debut album 'Is This It' by playing a setlist mainly composed of hits like
'The Modern Age',
'Hard to Explain',
'Take it or leave it' and
'Trying your luck'. They played an amazing show, causing even the stiffest of people to shimmy and shuffle. I was also pleasantly surprised at how well Julian Casablancas gruff voice translated from the records to reality. Admittedly, I was dragged to their set by a friend and I was skeptical at first but left the vodafone stage with a new found love for that band.
I felt that Saturday was a slow day in comparison to the day before. I found myself running around and missing the beginning or tail end of a few band's sets to see others on the Friday whereas I was restless and bored, waiting around for the festivities to begin on the Saturday. The earliest gig of interest to me,
Two Door Cinema Club, didn't begin until five o'clock and so the waiting and misuse of controlled substances commenced. Come five o'clock, we were all set to go. That was my second time to see TDCC and I'm happy to report that since I last seen them, they have worked on their once meager communication skills that I once found issue with. Singer Alex Trimble complimented Irish people's vigor in general to which people yelled and screamed only to be stopped by the Bangor native again saying with a smile and through laughter, 'I knew you'd like that!'. They were extremely well received.
I caught the beginning of the undeniably talented Eliza Doolittle's set but unfortunately missed out on The Vaccines due to a serious case of the munchies.
However, We caught the bulk of
Arctic Monkeys, who like The Strokes knew better than to play their newest material, belting popular tunes like
'Crying Lightning' and
'I Bet that You look Good On The Dancefloor'. Alex Turner looked at his sexiest void of his humbug hairstyle, in a gorgeous cobalt blue leather jacket.
Saturday's real highlight however were
Foo Fighters, who came on after Arctic Monkeys, fronted by Nirvana drummer and music legend Dave Grohl. They were the last act on the main stage on Saturday night and Grohl very quickly swore to play a jam-packed show with no pauses and vowed to continue performing until oxegen organizers told them to leave. They played from 11:30pm to 1:30am, with unsubdued, raw passion. Classic Foos tracks like
'My Hero',
'Long Road to Ruin',
'The Pretender',
'Times like these' and
'Best of You' were among the setlist. Although not my favorite Foo Fighters song, I think '
Wheels' really resonated with the massive crowd that had gathered by that stage. Adapted for the occasion, it was much less orchestrated and intimate than the studio version. Grohl asked the audience to sing along to which the response was incredible, so much so that throughout, he stopped singing himself and stood smiling, finally speaking, just to say 'I have the greatest fucking job on earth'. His attitude and outlook only served to further confirm the general belief that he is, indeed, the nicest guy in rock music today.
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By Sunday, I was beat. My hair was filthy, I was in desperate need of undisturbed rest and stomach wanted something more than rum and vodka to appease itself. Despite these disheartening factors, we were all determined to make the best of our last day. Unfortunately for me, two of my most anticipated acts, Jimmy Eat World and
Crystal Castles clashed and so I was forced to choose, to which I regrettably chose Crystal Castles. Ethan Kath wore his elusive hooded attire and fixed his eyes firmly on his synthesizer while Alice Glass descended from the stage, ruffling peoples hair, holding people's hands and smearing their lipstick across their faces. Neither her nor Kath spoke throughout the entirety of their set which consisted of tracks like '
Celestica' and
'Crimewave'. My disappointment lay with the crowd, who were pushy,negligent and mean. At one point throughout the set, my ear tunnel was even ripped out of my ear. It's probably a very good thing that this happened after I had stopped drinking or else some serious confrontation would of went down, no doubt. I found Crystal Castles to be of moderate yet fair quality but in hindsight I probably should of seen Jimmy Eat World instead.
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Then came the most anticipated artists of the whole weekend, Oxegen's pride and joy, headlining acts Beyonce and Coldplay. Now I am admittedly not a Beyonce fan. In fact, Kelly Rowland was always my favorite destiny's child. That said, there's simply no denying that she and her voice are incredibly beautiful and held up to expectations on the day. I just felt her performance was flat and at times quite boring, especially in the light of her recent performance at Glastonbury. Upon exchanging opinions with some girls outside the toilets, I came to realize that I was not alone in thinking that. I did however like that she incorporated a melody of old school Destiny's Child songs, like '
Survivor' and
'Say my name' into her setlist. There was no major fault with her performance, she fulfilled her duties in regards to appeasing attending fans and giving us others something funky to dance to for an hour or two while we waited for Coldplay to come on.
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Coldplay's time slot of last act on the main stage on Sunday night could not have been more strategically and aptly chosen for them. Chris Martin's delicate yet pitch-defying voice soared above the masses and over the pumping beat laid down by Will Champion on drums.
'Viva La Vida',
'Violet Hill',
'The Scientist' and
'Lost' were a few of the tracks off the setlist that mainly featured their forever rel event anthems although one or two tear-jerking euphoric tracks were squeezed in in regular intervals, creating an easily perceived pensive, almost melancholy ambiance. There was a certain feeling of togetherness and empowerment about their set. There's nothing quite as beautiful as singing the final verse of
'Fix You' with thousands of other people, united in one passion, beneath the night's sky as a final send off. To say Coldplay were 'amazing' or 'great' would be harshly dismissive. I view that hour and a half of my life as an experience in itself. One I hope to one day relive at that.
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My knowledge of festivals and how good they could possibly get or are, giving the proper organization is extremely limited as, like I said, this was the first time I attended a music festival but I felt that Oxegen was, for the most part well organized. With hundreds upon hundreds of hired men and woman over-seeing the festival, Some more fit for the job than others, I was unaffected by violence or intimidation. That said, there were countless reports of stabbings, rape and people just generally acting the cunt afterwards but I feel like that is just another unavoidable reality of life.
So, Although Oxegen was sorely overpriced, subject to bipolar weather conditions and slightly overrated, I would give it a fair 6.5/10 because when the music was good, it was very good and in the end, that's all that matters.
