Rebellion Festival Day IV

The last day finally arrived. It’s getting to the stage where you expect to see Punxsutawney Phil on this blog (incredibly current film reference). As it was the last day I decided to try and see as many bands as physically possible and to prepare for this, I took a trip to the Pleasure Beach and rode a few vomit-inducing, pant-soiling rides and screamed obscenities really loudly.

The afternoon saw performances from Septic Psychos (song about baldness, bald singer in comedy toupee), Human Project (poor), Goldblade (over-hyped), The Talks (forgettable), The Kirkz (hardcore mentalists), Pink Hearse (all-girl band, really good), Foreign Legion (decent), Sonic Boom Six (urban-ish, shit) and Gimpfist (great name, probably best band of the afternoon), along with some strange, folky stuff on the Bizarre Bazaar Stage.

The problem with the evening was always going to be the fact that Rancid and Agnostic Front were on at the same time on different stages. I decided that Agnostic Front were the best choice and that I would just stay at the Arena Stage all evening so as not to risk being locked out if the venue’s capacity was reached.

MxPx were first up for the evening with a nice dose of pop punk to get everyone in a good mood (although perhaps not the incredibly drunk skinhead who was asleep in the corner next to where I was standing).

Jaya The Cat from Holland (or originally Boston, Massachusetts if Wikipedia is to be believed) certainly took the shine off my good mood with a mixture of punk, ska and reggae. Anyone who knows me knows my feelings about reggae. It’s shit. Really shit. Nothing more to say about it really.

At this point word filtered through that the Empress Ballroom (where Rancid would be playing) was full and a lot of people in Rancid t-shirts with solemn faces were milling around trying hard not to cry (I did see one girl in tears, but suspect that alcohol played a starring role there). Canadian psychobilly/horror punk outfit The Creepshow did little to lift anyone’s spirits.

And so to the main attraction, Agnostic Front. I’d looked forward to this all weekend and they didn’t disappoint. Opening with Victim In Pain (check it out on YouTube, if you dare!), they rattled through 40 minutes of classic New York hardcore before rounding off with a cover of The Ramones’ Blitzkrieg Bop. Vocalist Roger was also unimpressed that they were playing at the same time as Rancid, but oddly failed to mention that Altered Images were playing at 11:30 too.

Seeing as this is the end of four days of marathon band-watching and four days of blogging (sometimes whilst very tired, sometimes whilst a bit drunk), I suppose there should be a kind of Jerry Springer-style final thought or something.

I’ve seen more tattoos, spiky hair, Doctor Marten boots, Fred Perry shirts, Harrington jackets, band t-shirts, Union Flags, camouflage jackets, leather, tartan trousers, piercings, hair dye, hairspray, anarchy symbols, safety pins, studs, patches and Levi’s jeans than I ever thought possible. I learned that music in a large ballroom only really works if it’s played on a Wurlitzer. I learned that John Lydon is a bit of a tit. Perhaps most importantly, I learned that there are plenty of ethnic minority punks.

Punks have had a lot of negative press over the years, but it’s all bollocks really. I spoke to tons of people during the four days and they were all really friendly and I never saw a single fight or disagreement. Even the police were having a laugh and joke with some people who were drinking in the street (they should really have been arresting them, but nobody was actually causing any trouble, so they turned an extremely blind eye). And what about the guy in the electric wheelchair with muscular dystrophy who had brought his carer with him? She turned out not to be his carer, but his wife.