I would never make it as a music journalist.
Back to festival-land last night — Super Bock Super Rock — which is pretty close to where I live, so I gave in and said yes we could go, as the Arctic Monkeys were top of the bill for last night. The Arctic Monkeys are GODS in the teenage section of our house.
Lots of mummy brownie points, to be had.
Between my friend, Susana, and I, we took three girls, all three of them festival-high at the moment as this is the first year we’ve let them go to anything more festivally than when Miley Bloody Cyrus did Rock in Bloody Rio, four years ago. That’s a day I’ll never get back.
With our combined age of 86, Susana and I were pretty much the oldest people there, and the only freebies anyone threw at us were lighters. I have seven bic lighters, now. Woooo.
It was quiet all afternoon and into the night, nothing like the number of people I’ve seen there before. It was cloudy and cold. We were a bit miserable. We gossiped and ate bifanas, which cheered us up a little, but not much… we drank little beer, because HOLY CHRIST ALIVE we didn’t want to visit the loos in more than an EXTREME emergency. They were typical festival portaloos, not the luxurious functioning porcelain of Optimus last week, but stinking, overflowing, pissed on, shat on, vomited on cubicles of horror. I am investing in a she-wee TODAY, and will be handcrafting a makeshift DIY version for my next visit to portaloo hell while I wait for delivery.
The girls disappeared to the front as soon as the acts began on the main stage. The Anarchicks, followed by Azealia Banks, followed by Johnny Marr… it was like an odd time warp, stretching from 1988 to about 1991, was sucking the will to live out of me. The girls told me later that they felt sorry for Johnny Marr and cheered for him, because no one near them knew any of the songs, Smiths or otherwise (oddly one Clash one) as none of them had been born until about 1996.
The dust problem has been near as dammit fixed. With grass. Just a bit of it.
Oh, there was an almond tart. That was really lovely.
The bifana, by the way… very, very good.
We sat close to the beautifully orange (for warmth) coffee tent for most of the night. The coffee was ok.
Finally, and miraculously — for this is Portugal, punctuality is alien — The Arctic Monkeys appeared on stage at exactly 01h00, as they were billed. We had been there since 17h00. How many hours is that? Yes, that many.
Now, I don’t follow the music press… I had no idea that Alex Turner had bequiffed himself, had given up the moptop, the moddishness, the parker look, the baby Oasis, laddish look, and with his quiff wears sharp drainpipes, shiny patent leather shoes, and gorgeous suits… he has gone to live in 1959-60 and increased his appeal to older women by about 900%… and WEIRDLY, it has changed how the music SOUNDS to me. How is that even normal or possible? I used to think their music was ok, but I didn’t pay it too much attention, thinking it was laddish and a bit showoffy. Now, I think it’s still showoffy, but in an extraordinarily good way, with Alex Turner knowing how to DO HIS THING on stage, and wow the girls and the old girls, keep the boys happy too, and make the music sound more sophisticated than it ever sounded before.
Which is why I could never be a music journalist because I have almost no idea of what I’m talking about.
*I got home at four. Which is why I am now going back to bed*
Lucy Pepper
Lucy, directora da Papel, é ilustradora, mãe, bloguista e autora de uns livros culinários. É britânica e vive em Portugal desde 1999. Ela é quase portuguesificada, mas ainda escreve português com bifismos. Desculpe a.
Lucy, editor of Papel, is an illustrator, mother, blogger and cookbook author. She may be British, but she has lived in Portugal since 1999. She is almost Portuguesificated, but still writes Portuguese with some bifisms. Forgive her.
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