Tell someone you just got back from ‘Tales Of The Jackalope’ last weekend and they could be forgiven for shipping you off for mental examination. Indeed, Vice’s outdoor, 24 hour noon-to-noon mini-festival may be to a little too quirky though the thrills and spills will make all the embarrassment worthwhile.
With DJs keeping the party going well after dawn, ‘Tales…’ this year was fantastically headlined by Dizzee Rascal, supported by an overwhelming array of talented young indie things; Foals, The Rumble Strips and Late of the Pier but to name a few. Compared to the disastrously complicated Camden Crawl, Vice had worked their magic, organising the event with ergonomic perfection down to the very last detail of what everyone’ll do when the last PA had been switched off.
In my total wisdom, though I’ll blame the promotional shots taken at last years event, showing people simply sleeping up against each other where ever the space, I had come to the following conclusion:
“No-one takes tents or sleeping bags to Tales Of The Jackalope”
Alas, I was wrong.
Strolling empty handed through the picturesque grounds of venue Kimberley Hall, the surrounding fields were packed with hoards of tents…apparently I got the wrong end of the stick. But after Foals had drawn the live music to a close, and the DJ stages were starting to die down, to my wondrous surprise the problem of where to sleep was solved in an instant. Dotted around the grass by the stages lay piles of hay, what to do? Well bury yourself in them of course.