Rebellion Festival Day Three

The third day started and long days and lack of sleep were starting to take their toll on me. There were no must-see bands on my list today, so it was all about discovering new stuff. I got talking to a bunch of Lancashire lads outside the venue who were drinking Skol (I had no idea they still made that) and I joined in with the early drinking by dumping a quarter bottle of vodka in my McDonald’s Coke. Notes were compared on bands we’d seen and bands that were still to come.

The Fuckwits were the first band on at 12:20, so the decision by management to open the doors at 12:15 was far from genius. They must have been playing to a more or less empty room for the first few minutes, which is a shame because they were pretty good. I only caught their last two songs and then it was time for a quick change of venue.

Next up were the fantastically-named Barnyard Masturbator. They had someone dressed in a pig suit dancing in front of the stage and there were two girls in the band (girls in punk bands is what real Girl Power is, not the sodding Spice Girls). They played proper hardcore with 30 second songs full of powerful riffage. They had no CDs left when I talked to them afterwards, but the bass player promised to email me some tracks later on.

Dirtbox Disco followed them (some of the bands deserve an award for the hilarity of their names). The singer had a painted-red face and wore a onesie and one of the guitarists wore a balaclava, a leather jacket and his underpants. Mental. Songs about drinking and wanting to be a girl made the half hour fly past. The Bez-esque mentalist from Thursday was also observed in the moshpit, which is impressive as he must be around 50.

F UK were next and failed to impress and then it was Yorkshire’s Geoffrey Oicott. Their name suggested cricket and the band all wore whites, there were stumps on the stage and the singer wielded a bat for most of the set. They encouraged streaking (claiming that it’s the best part of any sporting event) and a couple of fellas obliged, racing across the stage before being apprehended by security.

Bits and pieces of other bands too average to even name check here were heard before I went to see the recommended 999 (I overheard someone say that someone had told someone they knew about them). After two songs I decided I’d heard enough (someone shouldn’t have told someone that someone knew that they were good in the first place). At this point I took a mid-afternoon break.

Always set your alarm when you have a mid-afternoon break to avoid sleeping for two and a half hours like some idiot did. Ahem.

The evening flew by with performances by Reazione (Italian and crazy), Neck (Irish and crazy), The Vibrators (not really that crazy) and Vice Squad (also not crazy). The last band I saw were Resistance 77 who played classic old school-style Oi! I was going to buy a CD, but the sea of people surrounding their merch table and my tiredness meant this plan was quickly aborted.

One more day to go.