[ some elements of this article originally published 26/06/2014 ]
GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL
25th-27th June 1993
Looking at the poster, I wonder if I spent so little time around the main stage that I really didn't see many acts there. I saw much more at the NME stage, which pretty much sums up my true indie-kid credentials. That said, I did take the opportunity to catch a few things I might not have seen otherwise. It was another scorcher, by the way. Think my sunburn was even worse than the previous year...
Belly
Of course I was always going to find time for Tanya Donnelly. I hadn't seen her since 1989 when she was still in Throwing Muses and supporting R.E.M. in London. Her new band were excellent, as you'd expect.
The Ukrainians
One of the strangest projects the Wedding Present ever did was the whole Ukrainian Peel Sessions thing. Even stranger is that it was actually pretty good. After being fired from the Weddoes, Pete Solowka formed the Ukrainians and my only live encounter with the band was in the Acoustic Tent at Glastonbury. They were good. Very good, in fact, romping through energetic versions of traditional Ukrainian folk songs, original material and a Smiths cover or two thrown in for good measure. Great fun.
Adorable
To this day I rate Adorable's single Homeboy as one of the best singles of the 90s. A bold claim for sure, but I think Adorable should have been bigger than they were. Live they were excellent. I recall their set flew by.
The Sea
This was another band who came through the free festval circuit alongside bands like Back To The Planet, Ozric Tentacles, Chumbawamba etc, so it was little surprise to see them on the Glastonbury bill early in the day. They were dead good, and I'm sure I saw them at least once after this, but for the life of me I cannot remember where or when.
The Velvet Underground
An opportunity to see one of the most influential bands of all time reunited? Duly taken. Sadly, to say it was rather underwhelming would be an understatement. Perhaps if just one member of the band looked remotely interested it would have lightened the mood but for whatever reason, Lou, John, Stirling and Mo all appeared to want to be somewhere else. Mind, the reunion tour as a whole wasn’t exactly raved about by the press, and it all fell apart once Reed and Cale locked horns, not for the first time.
The Kinks
If feeling let down by the Velvets wasn’t bad enough, finding myself cringing at the Kinks made me want to crawl back into my tent and cry for the rest of the weekend. I don’t know exactly what I was expecting, but Ray Davies is a hero of mine and I think I anticipated some otherworldly kind of performance from him. What I got was a middle-aged man who seemed like he was trying to emulate Freddie Mercury – and failing dismally. I almost succeeded in forgetting this show entirely, but sadly I can still recall some of the worst bits.
Rolf Harris
I’m not going to deny ever seeing Rolf Harris, or absolutely loving his performance. At the time, Rolf was regarded as an entertainment legend. Most of us at Glastonbury that year grew up with Rolf on our TVs. We all knew what a wobbleboard was, we’d probably all owned a Stylophone at some point, and everyone could do a Rolf impersonation that usually included the phrase “Can you tell what it is yet?” Because of this, Rolf went down an absolute storm at Glastonbury, much to his own surprise. I interviewed him the following year for the North Devon Journal in which he told me he had never been more anxious than the moments before that Glasto appearance and felt genuinely overwhelmed by the reaction he received. I felt I was in the company of greatness and found him charming, eloquent and accommodating. Of course, if we even remotely suspected then what we know now, things might have been a little different.
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