Cultured Vultures @ Bestival 2014

Bestival has come a very long way since it was founded by legendary DJ Rob Da Bank back in 2004. It’s been pulling in awards and increasing in size all this time, bigger artists have appeared but some would argue that the overall feel and vibe has remained, more or less, the same. I first went in 2012, when Stevie Wonder, The XX, Florence + the Machine, Sigur Ros and De La Soul headed up the roster. I came away decidedly impressed, the sizeable crowd was spread accommodatingly over a huge, gorgeous site with plenty of diverse, interesting stages and other curiosities. I didn’t expect to return quite so soon and, in fact, I did so almost on a whim, but boy am I glad I did.

Unfortunately due to previous commitments I had to miss Thursday night, but I have it on frustrating authority that it was great, with Klangkarussel being a particular highlight. I rolled out on Friday morning, embarking on a six hour voyage of trains, buses and one ferry. Bestival is easily the hardest-to-reach festival I’ve ever attended (being that I’ve yet to go to any outside of the UK) and it isn’t much fun lugging an inordinate amount of camping gear and alcohol between so many different articles of transportation (including the infuriating M.C. Escher sketch that is the northern line) but I powered through. Everything certainly seemed worth it when the Isle of Wight finally drifted into view. By the time I reached my friends at the campsite I was fit to collapse, but I had no time for such frivolities as personal health, I’d left the real world far behind. Ultimately our first stop was actually pretty atmospheric, we ambled into the gorgeous Ambient Forest (a nature walk for the rest of the year) and went into the amphitheater to see Kate Tempest perform a poetry set; part of Scroobius Pip’s ‘Satin Lizard Lounge’ program. It was stunning, Tempest has already proven herself as a capable MC with her storming album Everybody Down, which Big Dada put out earlier this year, but she’s a poet first and it showed, as she pulsed through a series of old and new material.

After that we headed over to the main stage (detouring to run around the woods some more like hyperactive imps) to see Disclosure. I’d previously not been particularly familiar with Disclosure beyond the most recent album and one or two other tracks, but their live set was astonishing. The lighting display was a blinding, retro flurry of neon and AV magic, and the energy of the music didn’t leave a single member of the massive crowd wanting. It was the perfect way to kick things into high gear, the night was young and so were we. After that radio 1 DJ Toddla T hit the stage and threw out a massive hip-hop set which was a perfect way to lay the table for the next act: Outkast. Now you have to understand something: I probably wouldn’t be the colossal hip-hop head that I am now if it weren’t for Outkast – I remember hearing Ms. Jackson on MTV for the first time when I was around 10 and never looking back. Even if they’d played a bad set I’d probably have come away happy. They didn’t play a bad set though, they played a breathless, mind-melting, 90-minute-powerhouse that left no stone unturned. ATLiens, Rosa Parks, B.O.B., Ms. Jackson, Skew it on the Bar-B, Ghetto Music, Hey Ya, Elevators (Me & You), they played everything with all the energy you’d have expected from them in their heyday, never mind 20 years later. I came away from it overwhelmed with boyish glee and I was far from alone.

During the rest of the night dance music took precedent. Unfortunately, between stages I’d managed to somehow leave my friends behind and, without an active phone between them, closing back up was a herculean task. So, I ended up staying with some other people I’d met during Outkast. No biggie, making new friends at festivals is practically a rite of passage. I caught Congo Natty flanked by Tenor Fly, Nanci & Phoebe and Congo Dubz tearing up the Reggae Roots stage, found a new artist to investigate in electronica-innovator Jimmy Edgar, imbibed about as much house as I could tolerate without getting motion-sick at the utterly incredible Port stage (literally a huge boat), and caught the closing 30 minutes of Caribou. When I finally closed up with the others it was back at the campsite. The interesting thing about Bestival is that everything kind of stops just past 4am, after that you make your own fun, which for us involved just winding down at our tents until an overwhelming need to be horizontal took over.

Saturday was the allocated dress-up day, the theme being desert-island disco, so the whole site was a swarm of elaborate, bizarre costumes. In the daytime (when we all finally emerged and regrouped) we spent a while just wandering the site, seeing a peculiar circus performance and the costume parade in the process. The first musical order of business was Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip’s show in the Big Top, the last one they would ever do. Although short, it was appropriately emotionally charged and the 10,000+ crowd ate it up voraciously. After that we caught Kate Tempest’s music set and trundled back off to get costumed. I won’t detail what I actually wore (those who have me on Facebook will find out anyway), but suffice to say I looked ridiculous. The highlights of the evening (besides yet more woodland gallivanting) were London Grammar, Bonobo, and a whole series of DJ sets in the wondrous Club DaDa tent that afforded us the opportunity to act real rude and totally removed.

It took us all a long time to recharge on Sunday; a timely run of performances by Kitty, Daisy and Lewis, Bizarre Ride II The Pharcyde, and later Clean Bandit provided optimum music to chill to. Busta Rhymes was also meant to play in the afternoon but alas he never showed up. Unfortunately, we also missed Major Lazer due to a surprisingly early time-slot that coincided with our need to return to camp and reinvigorate. Acts you’d expect to appear late in the evening coming on much earlier was a common theme, My Nu Leng and Ed Solo both suffered the same fate. Once we were back up to full steam (or near as dammit) we went to see Chic and Nile Rogers round out the main stage. It was insanely good fun, with the band firing out every number 1 Rogers has ever written (and believe me it’s a long list). Once they went off stage an incredible fireworks display (coupled with what is now the world’s largest disco ball) lit up the sky. Buoyed by all the excitement we scurried off to check out some of the smaller stages around the site, before drinking in as much of Craig Charles’ (yes, that Craig Charles) funk DJ set as he could get through before he was switched off due to overcrowding. Annoying, but he still managed to play the majority of his set, and I was infinitely amused by the scores of people yelling ‘3,2,1 ACTIVATE’ and ‘IN THE PIT’ in his general direction.

The late evening brought an enjoyable set from Paloma Faith, following which we headed back into Club DaDa to sweat away the rest of the night and generally revel in the fact that we could dance even at this late stage, with what must have been 24 hours’ worth of cumulative dancing already at our backs. One almost-sleep, slow pack, and broken homeward voyage later that was all she wrote.

Speaking as someone who tends to prefer smaller festivals, Bestival is fantastic. Despite the steady increase in size it’s managed to retain an overwhelmingly good crowd, it’s kept the music varied and it’s avoided going supernova like The Big Chill did. Thought it’s not without flaws, the most prominent being the misjudgement of placement and timing with certain acts, which this year lead to cases of disproportionate overcrowding and under-crowding in equal measure, it’s never lost its identity, never become just another huge, interchangeable weekend of music, debauchery and chaos. It’s one of the best festivals the UK has to offer.