Hyde Park Calling

Well I have just come back from my festival warm up - Hyde Park Calling and apart from feeling tired from all the driving I do not regret a thing. It was organised by Hard Rock Cafe and I was impressed to see a full sized restaurant at the actual festival, I only wish I had spotted it before I paid the overpriced catering vans for a substance they labelled as food. As for as other amenities went the toilets were very clean and there was fresh water available clearly marked as to where to find it.

Now on to the important bit the acts. I only went down on the Sunday as I am afraid to say the lure of Jet proved to hard for me to resist. First up on Stage were Northern Ireland's latest export The Answer. They were absolutely fine and non offensive sorry can't say more.

Next my favourite band ever Jet who were superb although, mainly played tracks from there first album, which is not a problem for me as I love everything they do. I also love the comment they made about Paris Hilton - but you would have had to be there to get it.

Chris Cornell I think was my first love musically with Soundgarden, but I am showing my age here. His performance was excellent as he did a good mix from his career covering both Audioslave and Soundgarden tracks. If you have a chance to see him in the coming weeks I highly recommend it.

Now for Aerosmith, when I first heard they were playing I thought it would be OK but not worth the money or the travel down to London (see the power of Jet), but in hindsight I was wrong. I can't believe how after all these years these guys still have it, they rock. The whole performance was amazing both visually and sound wise, it truly was a fantastic gig.

Now for the bad bits, the transport issues were badly run/policed/organised. At the end of the gig they shut many tube stations due to overcrowding - you think that they would of predicted the demand for a tube and done something about it in advance other an lots of police and one women with a microphone saying something that know one could understand.

I am a bit worried about my next bad point as it could come back on me, but the crowd, although were very friendly were not a passionate. Perhaps we do things different up north but there was hardly anyone singing along or getting lost in the music which I think was strange, everyone did however clap at the end of every song and were very gracious, but unfortunately no mosh pit.

All in all it was a great day out, I would highly recommend checking out any of the bands and the line up for next year.

This was the first festival I've ever been to but I'm so glad I picked this one over the likes of Glastonbury or Reading. It's a 'non-camping' festival, being based in the centre of London, that runs over 2 days. It's only been running a few years but already seems to have a good reputation, as it attracts some big names. I went to see Aerosmith in particular as this was there first UK gig in over 10 years (Note: this is unconfirmed, it's just what I heard).

I heard some complaints this year that Glastonbury is getting too mainstream, dominated mainly by current indie/pop acts that attend pretty much any other festival in the UK. Hyde Park Calling seems to be closer to the roots of Glastonbury, being much more along the lines of rock.

Gates opened at 2pm. After quick and efficient security and ticket checks we were inside, faced with three stages: The main stage and two tented smaller stages. Support acts were very high quality and ably supported by the crowd. I saw The Answer and Jet (both excellent) on the main stage, followed by my first experience of Joe Satriani, who totally blew me away! He was phenomenal, and really popular with the crowd. Playing in one of the tents, there was a really crammed atmosphere and the cheers at the end of each song were deafening. The atmosphere in there was electric throughout. The only spoiler was a big queue to get in being controlled by stewards on a 'one in one out' basis. Unfortunately there were a few idiots pushing too hard but it was worth the crush once we got in.

Going back to the facilities for a moment, there were plenty of food stalls (burger bars, pizzerias, oriental food, indians, candy floss etc.) to keep everyone going as well as a number of bars. Toilets were also pretty good, although there was the usual inbalance between the lengths of the women's and men's queues. I walked straight into the toilets while my fiancee had a 20 minute wait.

It rained pretty much all day, for which I was well prepared, but I was impressed by how little the ground got chewed up. That was the benefit of having a festival in a well-kept park. The big drawback with the rain was the number of umbrellas blocking everyone's view to the main stage. It didn't really seem to be in the festival spirit, and more than one person was told to get rid of theirs pretty quick. I got the impression there were a lot of people not willing to get a little bit wet for the sake of some great music. Thankfully, the rain relented just as Aerosmith appeared on stage.

My biggest gripe of the day was that they got a bit lax with the timings, so that Aerosmith appeared on stage 30 minutes late. Unfortunately, the police didn't let them stay on beyond the billed 10:30 finish time due to noise restrictions, so we felt a bit cheated out of some of the £45 ticket price. Despite that, the performance was excellent, as you would expect. They covered a wide range of their back-catalogue, and there were some memorable moments when they went off at a tangent and just jammed for 5 minutes. We were stood quite far back but could see clearly thanks to giant screens either side of the stage. The sound quality was also excellent, with every note coming through clear as a bell thanks to the main speakers adjacent to the stage backed up by 2 sets of speakers further back.

As you can tell, I had a fantastic day that was a great first festival experience. The negatives were very minor and didn't detract at all from my enjoyment. I hope that people who read this will be inspired to go to Hyde Park Calling in 2008. I'll certainly consider it.