Guilfest 2006, Review

Another hot weekend sleeping in the tent, this time we descend upon Stoke Park, Guildford, for a weekend of relaxation and music.

This was the first time I had taken my little girl to a festival, so was quite a different experience for both of us.

We arrived on Friday evening, setting up the tent whilst listening to the Lightening Seeds on the main stage, it was a shame I missed them as they sounded like one of the best bands there.

After getting ourselves sorted out we made our way down to the main stage for The Wonderstuff, they were good although only knowing one of there songs, we then went to the acoustic tent where we saw Simon from Whitestar on stage, finishing the night off with Hayseed Dixie on the Ents24 stage, they were certainly an interesting bunch, playing songs such as the ace of spades in a country style, I would certainly recommend seeing this lot if you have the chance, then it was back to the tent to get ready for the days ahead.

Saturday comes and we made our way down around lunch time, taking the little one to the kids zone which had lots of activities for children, so theres no chance of them getting bored. We didn't really see many bands over Saturday and Sunday managing to take in Gary Numan, who was pretty good, especially the songs you knew, The Ukulele Orchestra of GB, who performs things such as Smell's Like Teen Spirit, again very unusual but very entertaining, we did also manage to catch a few new bands but unfortunately didn't catch there names. The Funky End (dance tent) was good, playing things Drum and Base through to House.

There was a couple of bands I really wanted to see but missed, Stylus, who claim to be The Stone Roses, Happy Mondays and Oasis rolled into one, and the Guillemots, who I have seen before but this was before there MTV fame and would like to see how they have come along.

Guilfest is a very good family festival with a very good atmosphere, I had very friendly neighbors, which is always a bonus, even getting a bacon sandwich of them on Saturday morning, although I didn't think the line up was strong enough, especially with all the new acts coming through at the moment and at £95 a ticket there is other smaller festivals out there which are better value for money.

I must say though that for a first festival for my little one it was perfect with not so many people about and her to get used to festival life but she will be now going on to bigger and better things.

King Monkey