Secret Garden Party 2012
- By Sam Herbert -
- Jul 27, 2012
“The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars.”
Seated on a crowded, muddy bank gazing up in child-like wonderment at the explosions of colour and noise scattering the night sky, a result of the Secret Garden Party fireworks show, I can’t help think of Jack Kerouac’s infamous quote and how relevant it is in describing the hedonistic goings on at this particular festival. It’s safe to assume that Kerouac would’ve loved SGP; the diverse mix of music, arts and theatre intermingled with the madness of life – at the end of four days of debauchery you feel as if you’ve lived a wild chapter of 'On the Road' and not even a week in a health spa would be long enough to recuperate.
Experiencing the 10th birthday of SGP - and it is an experience - is akin to diving head-first into a giant deluxe party bag; hidden in every nook and cranny is a stage, tent or hut as bizarre and fantastical as the last one for you to get lost in.
On Saturday the Colli-sillyum, a four-tiered, hay-stacked arena, was host to male and female mudwrestling competitions, to the hooting and howling of a baying crowd. At night the hay barrels shook and shuddered to the driven party rock of Fake Blood (among others), causing much foot-stomping stupidity amongst the wide-eyed night owls. Earlier raucous scenes unfolded as Oxide and Neutrino brought the Solid Sound of the Underground to Wormfood’s Valley of the Antics stage treating everyone’s adolescent-self to hit after garage hit.
It’s so easy to get lost in the madness of the festival that you constantly have to remind yourself that there are bands to see, and some good ones at that. Alabama Shakeswhipped the Great Stage crowd into a Friday evening frenzy with their brawling blues thundering out across the resplendent lake. Midday Saturday and the sun greeted Tim Minchin who tinkled the ivories and tickled the hearts with songs about Woody Allen Jesus, being ginger, and, one in particular about the Pope which had more profanities than an entire series of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares. With the fireworks show warming up the crowd better than any support band could Orbital took to the stage to deliver a rambunctious set of both old and new material proving what a terrific headline act they are.
Yet the truly magical thing about Secret Garden Party is that it’s not so much a festival about the music but one that celebrates life; the silliness of it, the brilliance of it and the madness of it. There were mud beasts, fake funerals, tattoo parlours, a man playing and driving a piano, Fagan-esque blokes offering their services in photo-booths (take that how you will), strange cults, trapeze artists, a fairground, a Nordic Jesus in a trance, flash mob dancing under a bandstand, a badger wood, boating and naked swimming in the lake, all kept under supervision by a giant fox with a monocle.
Kerouac also wrote that "happiness consists in realising it is all a great strange dream". In many ways that’s how Secret Garden Party felt and I for one will be dreaming again next year.
Video by Matt Proud - @Mafyoo
By Sam Herbert. Tweets at @herbert_sam
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