V Festival, Chelmsford - day 2

I had a great nights rest last night. I blew out the sleeping in a tent surrounded by pissed up folk, instead I chose the first class luxury of the back of the hire van I drove here in. Nice, dry and quiet. In the morning I went to the nearest Little Chef to eat and take advantage of there WiFi to send a few more pictures through to Filmmagic. After an hour or so I headed back to Hylands Park for Day two.

I'm not too excited about the line up today as in comparison to yesterday it seems a bit Lame on first glance. Still, my first band of the day is The Goo Goo Dolls, and what a great start they are. I really like the this band and have a couple of there albums kicking around. I thought they seemed a bit early in the day but still sounded excellent, then down to the C4 Stage for Mark Ronson and as soon as we had the first three in the bag we were whisked back down to the main stage for James Morrison. James was great although I did keep hearing some other photographers moaning about how he always seems to look like he is in a world of pain when bellowing out the hits. These facial expressions are what make good pictures if you ask my opinion...

Actually this morning doesn't seemed too bad. It has a certain feel of relax around the camp. As we were about to head down to the JJB tent for McFly the press room here was echoing with comments about how the world wouldn't miss McFly. I feel completely opposite as I have shot the boys on many an occasion and have never had a bad experience so far. They have the energy and flare to make any show they perform a hit with every last person in the arena! Very few bands I photograph give me the reason to get exited with my work but these lads never seem to fail. Today at V was no exception! Stage jumps, audience participation, loud teeny-processed rock music and lots of screaming girlie's- another McFly performance if ever I've seen it!

Then it was back to the C4 stage for Mark Ronson, who admittedly I'm not too familiar with, still a good enough and definitely layed back but meant that I had to blow out KT Tunstall. I didn't quite make it back to the stage on time to be allowed into the pit so I was slightly disappointed with that.

Never mind, this did mean that I could concentrate on uploading the day so far to the picture desk to keep them happy so I soon cheered up and it also gave me the fine opertunity to munch down on another of those realy greasy pancake roll things. You know, I think they should put up secret cameras and record the expressions on the punters face when purchasing and chewing on one of these ghastly objects. At least my chin is well and truley oiled up in case I'm dragged along the floor on it at any point over the festivities.
Next on the list was The Fratellis, Mika and James. The Fratellis were as good as I've ever seen them and I've always noticed that these boys seem to have been made specifically for festivals! They sing songs that everybody knows the chorus to and if they don't, it isn't too hard to pick it up. Then Mika who was one of the highlights for me due to the great lighting, wonderful stage presence and great music. I've never shown any interest in the Mika era so far, but I was happy with the results of this set. Anyway then we headed back to the Main Stage for James. Now I'm 32 years old, so James were at the top of there game around the late eighties to early nineties which was when i was leaving school. This performance brought back some grand memories of that time.

Now it was time for Lily Allen whom always seems to be in the press for gobbing off all the time. I heard that she rattled off something at V Stafford Yesterday and upset a few folk, so I wondered if she'll say more today. She harped on about some bird from Gracia mag and a few lines about being barred from the US so I guess some people will complain about her. I will never understand why people take these comments seriously, after all Lily Allen should only be listened to when she is singing. Anyway, I was there to take her picture and I did, so enough said. You go girl...

I had a break to eat at this point, mainly to unwind after the shocking antics of Ms Allen but more to ensure I was all set for the main reason to stick around today through the rain, mud and young whipper snapper musicians: Kasabian. I quickly nipped out to the grounds of the festival and purchased a rather inedible hot dog. It wasn't hot but I'm sure that dog does come into the making process of this festival culinary delight. Hot Fido one must speculate... I feel kind of warm inside knowing that this special snack in my hands is probably the last bit of shit food I'll be buying this weekend.

So, we walk to the Main Stage for the best Brit band in my own opinion. I think Kasabian are awesome but although I say this I have never bought a ticket to a gig, which is strange. But I have photographed them a bunch of times. They came on and once again blew me away. We were out after the first three songs and rushed down to the C4 Stage for The Manic Street Preachers but I rushed back again to catch the rest of the set and it sounded amazing as usual.

So as The Killers have requested no photo's and The Basement Jacks are dj's, it would appear that this years festival is now at an end. I must say that I enjoyed yesterday more than today, even though Kasabian were here. Yesterday just seemed a better environment all round. Maybe I should hold the weather responsible for this.

Just before I do go and get a beer and relax for an hour or so, I must just remind you all that I have already posted some of my shots in The Gallery section of my site, and this can be accessed by going to my home page and selecting 'Photo Galleries' from the menu. I haven't put them all up but I have randomly selected a bundle of 'em for the benefit of you lot. So hopefully I'll be back next year for my third V, so until then, ta ta all.