Green Man Festival – which ClashMusic.com is proud to partner (and we’ve been showing off about it for the past fortnight, with ten TOTD specials and a Top Ten article on must-see acts) – isn’t all great music, y’know. Scratch just beneath the surface – pretty though it obviously is – and there’s a wealth of sideshow delights to be found.
Green Man’s Fiona Stewart here takes us through some of the other attractions at the Brecon Beacons-held festival, which runs August 21-23 – after all, too much good music can be a bad thing. (Well, no, it can’t – Ed.)
Information in Italics taken from the official Green Man website.
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“If you look on the website under line-up you will see a lot of the other areas – these include film, comedy and literature.
“One highlight of our film programme will be on Saturday, when Kieran Evans is curating the tent…”
As well as screening his film Vashti Bunyan – From Here To Before, Kieran Evans will be curating an exciting programme of work for Saturday in the Film Tent. There’ll be a loose theme to the programme with the emphasis on ‘Journey and Discovery’, so expect to see classic music documentaries, some cutting-edge shorts, some exclusive screenings and rare ‘60s animated educational films all mixed up with work from established talents such as The Light Surgeons and films from students from the documentary Course at the University of Wales, based in Caerleon, Newport.
In amongst this there’ll be a selection of films and promos from the mighty Bella Union label, as well as a few choice films from our Fence friends from Fife. As the sun sets and the midnight hour beckons, Stephen Cracknell and his Memory Band will be helping to take it trippy by performing songs from The Wicker Man set to a cut up, re-visioning of the film. Then it’s time for serious psyche-out action as Kieran’s chums Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve select Alejandro Jodorowsky’s cult film Holy Mountain as the midnight movie.
To round things off we go back in time to 1967 and the first summer of love to tune in to the lazy, hazy sounds and trippy, psychedelic visuals of Roger Corman’s classic movie The Trip.
“Literature highlights include Joe Boyd and Robyn Hitchcock on the Saturday, and on the Sunday Jah Wobble will be with Jonnie Green, who was The Clash’s road manager…”
Jah Wobble was right at the heart of Britain’s punk-rock revolution, known and feared as John Lydon’s best mate, an east-ender who never backed away from a fight. After the Sex Pistols split, Lydon invited Wobble to form a new band with him. They were called Public Image Ltd (PiL) and they more or less invented post-punk rock, with Wobble’s utterly original bass playing at the heart of it. After Public Image, Wobble was in at the beginning of what we now call world music, and countless albums since – most recently the much acclaimed ‘Chinese Dub’ – he is still at the heart of it.
He will be reading from his forthcoming autobiography: a frank and controversial account of a life in the music business, the most authentic insider’s account of punk yet written.
“There’s also Richard Milward, appearing on the Friday. He’s the next big thing in British fiction…”
“The new laureate of teen sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll,” according to the Guardian, Milward is a 24-year-old St Martins graduate who belongs in the “anti-tradition of fence-smashing provocateurs whose aesthetics mix trash and transcendence’” (The Independent). Just don’t call him the Irvine Welsh of Middlesbrough (even though Irvine himself described Milward’s debut, Apples, as “one of the best books I’ve ever read about being young, working class and British”). He’ll be reading from Apples, and his new book Ten Storey Love Song.
“Einstein’s Garden is all about science, art and nature. It has an area for adults only, about penises, offering a scientific perspective. There’ll also be a science rapper from Glamorgan, who previously worked for NASA. And there are loads of other areas…
“Green Man funky druids are going to be on site giving you, if you fancy one, a quick blessing. Gourmet food is available on the festival site, and it’s mostly sourced locally – like Cymdu Scool’s sausage and cake stall. Their hand-made organic sausages are actually sourced from the very fields you camp in.
“We have a massage area to get the knots out of your neck in the lavender garden, and there’s piano playing in the End Up bar, which has a 24-hour drinks licence. Of course, sitting by the massive bonfire – is lit at night and put out at dawn – is a great way to meet fellow festival-goers, have a drink and reflect on the day that was. And if it’s something more energetic you’re after, there are DJs playing right through the night.
“Looking at the incredible scenery of the Brecon Beacons surrounding the festival is the final attraction: it’s among the most spectacular backdrops for a festival you’ll ever see.”
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Find the official Green Man Festival website HERE.
