Perhaps the best thing about going to a music festival in the summer is the chance to see bands you weren’t sure you’d ever get a chance to see on tour.
A good example might be The Strokes. The Strokes reformed this year and brought out a new album but they haven’t announced any tour dates other than the festivals. The Libertines did something similar last year and other bands have cottoned onto the fact that they can earn a bit of cash by taking this approach.
It’s always worth keeping a keen eye out for festival line-ups so that if one of your favourite bands pops up on the list, you can get yourself a ticket as soon as possible.
One of the best things about the environment at a music festival is the general air of sociability that pervades everything. Everyone’s in it together because they are all in search of a good time and they all want to witness something a bit special.
This means it is incredibly easy to socialise with people you don’t know and to make new friends. If you’re abroad, it also sets up the possibility of a holiday romance, if you can really call it that! This is because you automatically have something in common with the other people at the festival and you have really natural topics of conversation to dwell upon.
Throw yourself into the festival atmosphere and it’s almost guaranteed that you’ll come away with new friends to share the experience with.
If you’re going to a festival and you’re planning on doing it on a budget, then you need ways of keeping your strength up even though you won’t be eating a great deal. You’ll be putting in long hours and you’ll probably be drinking a lot so keeping your blood sugar up is essential.
It’s a good idea to take chocolate with you because it will give you a burst of energy when you need it and it is a cheap source of sugar. However, you do need to make sure you get your vitamins, so try and budget for at least one meal a day where you get a bit of veg and a bit of protein.
Fruit is good festival food as well because it travels well and will last you a few days.
The festival at Benicassim in Spain is one of Europe’s favourite festivals among people from the UK and Ireland. If you’re heading to Benicassim, then there’s something you should definitely take into account before you go: it’s very, very hot.
If you’re camping then the chances are you’ll spend limited time in your tent on account of the heat. As such, you’ll be outside a lot. Be careful you aren’t overexposed to the sun and take plenty of sun cream. One application sun cream is ideal because it’ll allow you to walk around all day without the fear of getting burnt, but you should reapply later on to be on the safe side.
You can also escape the sun by heading to the Aquarama water park just over the road from the main festival site. A full day ticket costs €20.50 so you should draft this into your budget for the trip if you plan to spend a few days there enjoying the water, the rides and the opportunity to find a bit of welcome shade.
Packing for a festival abroad is a tricky prospect. Even though you can usually on better weather than at UK festivals thereby reducing the amount of clothing you need to take in your bag, you still need to be really efficient.
One problem relates to your tent. However, rather than getting your tent into your backpack, it’s worth taking the poles and pegs out and seeing if your tent is small enough without them to take as hand luggage. If you take this approach then you stand a better chance of getting all your other essentials into your bag.
The poles and pegs probably contravene rules on permitted hand luggage items so it’s best to have them in the hold anyway.
The summer festival season is very nearly upon us, but it isn’t too late to snap up a last-minute ticket if you’ve got the cash to hand. If you’re a little skint this month and you need an income boost, why not play at posh bingo and see if you can win some extra cash?
Online bingo can be surprisingly profitable if you know what you’re doing and your luck is in during a game with a particularly large cash jackpot. The posh bingo website is one of the best for promotional offers and cash prizes, as you can see by its schedule for the next few months. For example, you can enjoy:
• Collar of Money Cashback – up to £200 cashback up for grabs every week. Earn 6 per cent of any losses back!
• £500 Al Fresco Fun – playing between 12th and 30th May
• £1k Honey Trap – there’s a £1,000 jackpot to be won on Sunday 26th June
• Free £25,000 Joy Pot – playing 29th July
Striking it lucky in any one of these great games and promotions could give you the spends you need to go to any of the top UK festivals, particularly those that take place at the end of the summer as there is less chance that they will be fully sold out.
Go to ohmybingo.com for more info on posh bingo itself, as well as what existing players think of the site.
If you have missed out on getting tickets to your favourite music festival this means you either have to pay the ridiculous prices on ticket re-selling websites or face the fact that you won’t get to hear your rock heroes live this year.
This may now be all set to change thanks to a new iPhone ‘Headliners’ app by Australian designer Andrew Karpiel who wanted to find a way that festival goers could listen to their favourite bands performing at past events. You can also use the app to make a playlist from your music collection as well as giving you the chance to buy the performances on iTunes.
Now, all we need is an app where you can listen to the music live from your phone without having to be there. But, wouldn’t that just spoil all the fun?
I never thought I’d say this; but I agree with Johnny Rotten. The controversial punk legend has recently been mouthing off about music festivals and it appears as if he is no longer a fan.
The former Sex Pistols front man has explained how the music festivals have changed. He says that there has been a ‘loss of free will’ and that the events are all about the money now.
Johnny is still booked to play several festivals next year with Public Image Ltd, but he says: ‘Forty years ago, festivals were stunning and now it is just people with cash in hand, which is a little tough. It is all about headlining and half the bands are miming anyway’.
It’s true. Take a look at the crowds heading to the festivals these days compared to even ten years ago and you will see that people are now going to festivals for completely different reasons; and none of them are to do with music.
There are certain performers that are just must-sees and music festivals are the perfect opportunities to tick some of these off your list.
This year, the one to tick off your list is Mr Tom Jones. The silver haired fox will be appearing at the Celtic Connections festival which is set to take place in Glasgow and it’s going to be a one-off show so it really is a must-see.
The legend has just released his 39th album and this show is the perfect music festival to see him in action. The music festival will run from January 13th – 30th. So wrap up warm and enjoy the deep soothing tones of the legend himself.
Muddy fields, broken tents and cold baked beans. What more could you want at summer? Well, quite a lot more actually, if recent music festival sales are anything to go by.
In fact, there are predictions that music festivals could be on the way out and some are saying that even the big names could struggle in the coming years.
There was a time when going to festivals was just the done thing in the summer, but as they start to become more about the drinking and partying and less about the music, it seems that they have lost their way. People who go to music festivals now are not the people you would have seen there ten years ago. But perhaps even they will become sick of the mud and baked beans in the next few years.
