Due to a lack of available web access at the event, I wrote this review starting several days afterwards, and for a period of about 2 weeks, hence some of the details might by now be a little hazy....

Anyway, I arrived on THURSDAY afternoon, after a bit of a traffic delay, and set up my tent in fairly reasonable weather. However, within a few minutes of me finishing, heavy rain set in, and lasted for a good couple of hours. Luckily the tent coped very well, with no leaks. I did manage to get out of the tent for a while to go behind the scenes for a special gig from Bison, a kind of crazy band who were all wearing orange karate gis...

On FRIDAY, Kate Nash opened the event proper, with her well know songs. It was a nice gentle way to start the day, and I really enjoyed her. After this, I wandered around to soak up the atmosphere, and came across the small bandstand, where Rodney Branigan was playing two guitars at the same time (one hand each). I'd never seen anything quite like this, so I stayed for about 15 minutes, listening. I then caught some of Vampire Weekend, who seemed fairly good. After this was The Feeling, and they played interesting covers of both Video Killed the Radio Star and Take On Me. It was at this point that I met up with some of my mates.

Following this, the TingTings were on in the John Peel tent, and this seemed to have the most crowd enthusiasm, starting with a big traffic bottleneck. The pathways in to the field were also very slippery and deep with mud by this point, which made progress even slower. They played their songs like Shut Up and That's Not My Name. After a bit of a sit down, I saw We Are Scientists, who were pretty good. Later on were the Fratellis, another band of the moment. Towards the end of the day, I chilled out for a bit more. I was quite near the back of the Park Stage for Dizzee Rascal, who I couldn't really take seriously, but seemingly everybody around me could..

On SATURDAY, the first person on the Pyramid was Shakin Stevens, and he had good reception for an oldie. Several people had made special painted signs, and one of them was even a green door that opened up. However, this person must have been disappointed, as Shaky did not play the song! He played some hits like This Ole House, but much of the set was taken up by obscure new material.

After this, I headed over to the John Peel stage for Emmy The Great, who I'd seen before and really liked. She performed well, I enjoyed it a lot. Around midday were some locals in the form of the Wurzels, who played all their hits, including Combine Harvester, and even managed a cover of Don't Look Back In Anger... My mates wanted to see British Sea Power, so I headed over for them next, and they seemed ok.

The Wombats are another one of those bands that seem to get talked about, so I was curious and went over for a listen. They sounded original, but did not really excell. After this came Elbow, the last of my big-name bands for the day.

In the evening, I went over to the Avalon fields- where I saw some guys in the semi-open-air pub, playing standard indie-rock stuff. Wandering along a little further, there was a punk band with a banjo and a fiddle(!), playing songs called "Greenwashed" and "Iranians", and they weren't bad, if a little angsty.

Due to a scheduling problem with Alabama 3, they were replaced by a Spanish singalong band wearing red and getting everybody involved. I just sat down in the middle of the tent, and relaxed for a bit.

As I had already seen the Proclaimers, I then moved on to the small SensationSeekers Stage, to see Los Alamos, who had a sax and were fairly energetic. These were followed by the Highliners, who played I Fought The Law and Monkeyman, as well as the theme from the Benny Hill show. Not too bad, but again, a little angsty. Finally, I ended up in the circus tent to see jugglers and some people that could only be described as human catherine wheels. After this, it was a case of seeing which of the food outlets was playing the best tunes, and hanging out near them.

On SUNDAY, there was pretty much nothing on until about 4 pm, so I took the opportunity to explore all of the green hippy stuff. Near the stone circle and the renamed Shangri-La, you could learn to be more creative (ie practice as a stonecarver, a glassblower, a silversmith, etc). This took up a good few hours (especially with regular breaks for a Brothers cider).

Neil Diamond had one of the biggest crowds of the festival, and played Daydream Believer and others. Not too bad, although of course he was showing his age. Katie Melua came onstage in the intimate Avalon tent, and played a brilliant version of My Aphradisiaic Is You. This was followed by Slow Train, and later in the set were Crazy and 9 Million Bicycles, in what was the best set of the weekend.

At this stage the ground was fairly dry, and the sun was busy burning people. Over on one of the bigger stages were the Zutons, with a guest in the form of Mark Ronson. They played all their hits, and were very enjoyable. By this stage, a very long queue had developed for... the mobile recharge tent. This was probably the longest of any line at the event, and it's a bit sad that all of that power would be wasted on recording tinny unwatchable videos of the back of somebody's head. Interestingly, with everything being green, there were both solar panels and a wind turbine on the roof of this tent, presumably in order to claim sustainability. However, according to the digital screen,the combined output from the solar panels and the windmills did not even cover 20% of the electricity requirements for charging a few phones... The rest being made up by batteries or a diesel generator.

At the end of the night, I watched the first 7 or 8 songs by the Verve, who bizarrely started with the Muslim mantra, before playing Sonnet and a few other songs. The picked up an electric 12-string guitar for Time And Space, but even this couldn't save them from being average, so I walked round to the Other Stage for Groove Armada. A few minutes after I arrived, they played the song from the Renault TV advert, and had everybody dancing around energetically.

Overall, it was the most dissappointing lineup for many years, with no real headliners, several bands playing twice (and a couple playing no less than four different times!), and also a few gaps in the schedule (listed as "special guests" or "TBA"). It was probably the worst Glastonbury I'd been to - although it's not as if I didn't have a good time (I did have a great time) - it's just that expectations are always high, and other Glastos have been better.

Even aside from the ticket (and £12 booking fee), the prices have definitely gone up in the last few years. Glasto always used to set itself apart from other UK festivals like Leeds, Chelmsford and Reading, by having stallholders who didn't take liberties. I'd not been to Glasto for several years, and things have changed a lot. This time around, it was £11 for a burger and a pint (complete with soft cardboard cup that squishes when you hold it tightly). I thought this was very excesive, and doesn't compare well to the €2 for a beer that you can get overseas.

Unfortunately, there were also a few unavoidable clashes (including Raconteurs, Editors, KT Tunstal, Scouting for Girls, Pigeon Detectives, Crowded House and Sinead O'Conner). Unfortunately, I found out once the festival was over that the Bluetones had also played in a smaller field. One more thing I found out about while reading the programme afterwards was the Igloo tent, which was a projection area with surround sound...

Anyway, all in all, a good event, with an enjoyable lineup, the usual great party atmosphere, and fantastic midnight ramblings with half naked people with paint all over them.