Festivals and alcohol had always seemed synonymous to me. But a downward spiral prompted me to attempt one sober. It was a revelation, albeit not an easy one
Twenty years ago this August, I went to my first music festival. My best friend’s mum kindly – bravely – drove us two 15-year-olds from Cornwall to Reading and supervised from a distance while we queued at the signing tent to meet Goldie Lookin’ Chain, Razorlight and the Hives, joined in the euphoric yells of “bollocks!” that swept across the campsite and eschewed the homemade food she had brought to rejoice in eating kebab-van burgers as flat and flavourful as CDs. In the photos, we look drunk – wide-eyed and giddy at the (relative) freedom, the disbelief that the pages of NME were coming to life before our eyes. But we were completely sober. Save for a couple of small local events the following summer, I think that was, until very recently, the last time I ever went to a festival without drinking. And work has taken me to a lot of festivals.
“Festival-drunk” is a particular kind of drunk. It tends to begin its steady pickling as soon as the sun is over the yardarm and last a good 12 hours or more. At its best, it’s a heavenly feeling: your most sparkling, sunkissed self, your close friends, the soundtrack to your lives writ large in front of you; the suspicion that Carly Rae Jepsen might be a child of God. The day is both endless but also laced with premature nostalgia for the present moment.
