The Leeds Festival Diary - 25th to 28th August 05 (3/8) By Andy Knudsen Photographs Em Alexander, Steve Clappison and Sam Saunders

(1/8), (2/8), (3/8), (4/8), (5/8), (6/8), (7/8), (8/8).

Friday 26th August 05

The alarm howls 5 o'clock. So I turn it off and close my eyes and before I know it it's howling 5.30. The plan is for Martin and Sara to meet us at Dave's parents house at 6 so we can beat the traffic and get into the campsite as easily as possible. But all that arrives at 6 is a text message from Martin saying "just leaving now".

Anyway, despite leaving a little later than planned, we arrive at the site just before 8 o'clock and it's remarkably easy to get into the guest camping area. Yeah we've got all the relevant documentation and all that but I can't quite believe it. My experience of festivals conjures up frantic memories of mud and fatigue and arsey security people. This, on the other hand, is amazing. It's almost too easy. I suspect a trap, but there doesn't appear to be one and nothing of the sort emerges all weekend. Having arrived way too early to do anything, I concur that Martin and Sara had the right idea and that we should all have had a lie in and arrived a little later. Still, I take the opportunity to catch a little sleep.

I wake up about an hour and a half later and head over to the fun bus: Turismo's van. Inside, I join Baggot, Martin and Jimbo from Freaks Union, another Hull band. Freaks Union played at the Festival last night for all those who arrived yesterday. Jimbo says that the tent was absolutely rammed and everyone was really going for it. All this talk of performing gets everyone excited and all of a sudden I really can't wait for Sunday to be here. We chew the fat and drink beer for a while as other people come and go. I have no idea why I was drinking beer at that hour, but it set the tone for the day ahead in which I found myself wrapped in a mildly stifling cloud of perpetual drunkenness.

Suddenly I see Digsy from 59 Violets. Last night he casually told me that he'd be heading over to Leeds at about 10 or so this morning. I had poured scorn on this notion, advising him that he would be certain to be caught in traffic. Lo and behold here he is just after 11 and he has his wristband! I don't have my wristband! The nerve of some people.

I head to the wristband exchange with Em (my girlfriend), Dave, Beccy (Dave's girlfriend), Martin and James Turismo. The queue's surprisingly big and very confusing but the whole process is made easier by James' delightful ringtone: it's Land Down Under by Men At Work, one of the greatest songs ever written. We huddle round his phone laughing and singing with no regard for the shame we are bringing upon ourselves. Wristbands acquired we make a tentative exit from the backstage area to the arena and hope we'll be allowed back in. We catch a fleeting glimpse of Kele from Bloc Party on the way out and it's all very exciting.

A brief reconnoitre round the arena against the flowing rapids of people coming through the proper entrance finds us at the Lee Sounds Unsigned Stage. Our intention is to check out the stage and so we catch a bit of a band called Parisman - lots of keyboards and a singing drummer. The sound is huge. We also catch up with the lovely Katy Noone, the producer for the Raw Talent radio show that had a major part in getting this stage up and running, and getting us all on it. We express our thanks and chat about how cool all this stuff is.

Continued... next page

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Photographs courtesy and Copyright © Em Alexander 2005 Em's Gallery 1, Em's Gallery 2.

Photographs courtesy and Copyright © Steve Clappison 2005 at (www.tallorders.org)

Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Adventures of Loki,	65 Days of Static,	Bam Bam Franks,
Cardboard Radio,	Ali Whitton,	Harrisons,
Circlesound,	Cardboard Cowboy ,	Lyca Sleep,
Deserves to Die.	Censored.	Sunday People.
Future Ex Wife,	Chicken Legs Weaver,	Mr Mojo.
Last Days of Vengeance.	Fifty-Nine Violets.	Mr Shiraz.
Friday People.	I Like Trains.	New Minds Eye.
Oh Farcas.	Saturday People.	Sunshine Underground.
Paris Man.	The Kiks.	The Favours.
Pilla.	Western Suburbs.	The Last People On Earth.
This Et Al.	Your Vegas.	Turismo.
Xenith Sound.		Voltage Union.

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