MusicTank

Thanks partly to three days of glorious sunshine, this year's Big Chill was one of the best.  The atmosphere on Thursday night was one of friendly exuberance, people dancing and meeting old friends, new friends, randoms, it didn't matter.  This served to blow away, before the festival had even begun, one of its recent criticisms - that it was verging on becoming a middle class clique-a-thon.

Great to see the added artwork around the site - from installations on each of the lakes to a great big TV monitor up in the hills, though we'd love to see the art trail returning to its former glory - what happened to the ice-sawing and tree trunk embers of yesteryear?

As ever, the event got full marks in the hygiene stakes - hot showers aplenty, toilets as good as new every morning and free valuables lock-ups open 24hrs in each of the fields.  The Big Chill should run sanitation courses for the other festivals - two sets of showers across the whole of Glastonbury just doesn't cut it...

The music was plentiful and brilliant - highlights in no particular order include Chilled by Nature with Goan musician Remo Fernandez, Kruder & Dorfmeister (with Earl Zinger and Ras Mc T-Weed) playing a 4hr set that fused on-it with chilled - sort of Ben Watt meets Cinematic Orchestra, the mighty Red Snapper, who were Friday night’s highlight (how can four people make such sublime music?), an impromptu performance by Celtic Klezmer fiddlers Sheelanagig, Tom Middleton, human beatbox Sholomo, the Birds Eye View shorts with Shri, Danny Rampling’s spacey love-in set, Coldcut's Return To Goa and Phil Hartnoll’s lush orchestral electronica (which included Orbital's Way Out - mmm!)

And then there were the 'Big Chill Moments', those self-referential instances where the crowd were having such a brilliant time that that they realised the specialness of the occasion and enjoyed it even more.  BCMs were given by amongst others Tuung - who played one of their best ever sets, Idjut Boys playing 'Love Is In The Air', Hexstatic’s Ninja Tune and Simon Bonobo playing a ten minute trumpet/gospel version of Marvin Gaye's 'Sexual Healing'.

We wished we'd heard more of the Skatalites, Norman Jay, Ojos De Brujo, Richie Havens, Mr Scruff and no doubt others...And then there were the artists who were simply on too early, such as Kate Rogers and Patrick Watson, but there are only so many hours in the day.

Best of all was the random and weird goings on, from the walking zebras to the Bubble Man wafting metre-long bubbles over the main stage crowds, making the atmosphere that bit more special.  Then there was the Bank of Subversion: you had to book an interview with the Manager (questions included 'do you own a pair of Crocs?') to, if successful, get a limited edition voucher for £2300 which you could trade, if desperate, for a cup of tea. The bank lost £1/2m on Saturday alone...

SS