Looking at the fields of Glastonbury and hoping for the Laba Daba festival

Last Saturday, one of the largest and most prestigious music festivals in Europe - Glastonbury - took place virtually. It could also be used as a measuring scale, to see if there is a demand for this type of festival at all.

The demand was already clear on Saturday: although the ticket with the online access code cost 23 euros, there was no shortage of those who wanted to see the legendary Glastonbury on a computer or phone screen - so much so that these viewers exceeded the festival organizers' IT capacity and many people simply could not join the stream. Including the author of this article, who with repeated apologies received access to two additional virtual streams on Sunday. Fine, there is no difference between when you watch, it's not like you have to build a tent in a meadow for this festival.

The Glastonbury Festival has been held since 1970, and last year there was a grand celebration of its 50th anniversary with the participation of such greats as Paul McCartney and Taylor Swift, but then - Covid… The organizers did not want to reschedule the festival for the second year in a row, so this time in an exclusive live broadcast from the Somerset Worthy Farm took place, allowing music fans anywhere in the world to virtually unite and share the feeling of the festival and its surroundings. "This is a unique opportunity to be virtually at a festival, for which it is usually almost impossible to buy tickets, because they are sold out at the speed of light," the organizers enticed, and it is absolutely true that tickets are sold out at the speed of light. In addition, tickets to live festivals did not cost just a couple dozen euros.

I had never had the chance to be present in Glastonbury (to be truthful, I also had no such wish), so the virtual festival was a great opportunity to see its legendary venue and also listen to good music. It must be said at once that the imagination is a strange thing: hearing the phrase "Glastonbury Festival," I had so far imagined something like Rock Am Ring, which mostly takes place in an area covered with concrete. However, in stark contrast to the image I had in mind, Glastonbury is more reminiscent of Hurricane or our own Laba Daba festival - large rural areas, unspoilt nature, some hangar or scrapyard, etc.

When joining the Glastonbury Festival, I had to realize absolutely unexpectedly - yes, there really is the effect of being there! The camera operators did their job so masterfully that at moments the room practically smelled of leaves and meadows (well, alright, the real cause was the peeled cucumber next to the computer…) and revived long-forgotten images from what was once experienced at foreign festivals. I wonder what feelings, seeing this, took over the music lovers who had been to Glastonbury previously? Probably sadness. Even after the first sounds and scenes, it became clear that watching events of this scale also requires equipment of the appropriate scale, namely, a home theater with a large TV screen and decibel-loving speakers, but - what can you do, you have to work with what you have…

The rock band Wolf Alice, which was also at the Positivus Festival in 2016, was the first to perform, and it will soon become topical with the latest studio album "Blue Weekend" (it will be released on June 4). Ellie Rowsell, the vocalist/guitarist in a long, white dress and heavy black boots, together with the band members was really able to captivate the listeners, and it was finally very clear what had influenced our own Purple Negative with Elīza Daine in the lead. Wolf Alice compensated for the lack of audience by making music for each other, during the song breaks they playfully poked fun at each other, and the performance ended with a great banger - everything that is needed in a rock music concert. Michael Kiwanuka was announced as the second performer, about whom information of interest to Latvian listeners has just arrived - his concert here has been moved once again, this time to June 10, 2022, still at the same venue - Sigulda castle ruins. According to what we observed and heard on Saturday, it will be worth it, and this musician will be able to show us his third studio album "Kiwanuka". Next up was the singer George Ezra, the punk-rockers Idles (they really blew us away!) and the all-female band Haim, but I hope the fans of these musicians' will forgive us because preparations for the evening's headliners - Chris Martin's band Coldplay - were already underway.

Although I am far from being a Coldplay fan, it must be admitted that even in such an unusual format, this first-class rock band was able to prove its high professionalism and quality. The Coldplay performance was accompanied by such a show, a blast of light and sound, and it was all filmed in such a way that you might just think it was a live performance in a large stadium in front of an audience of thousands. Encouraged by Martin's joking remark, guitarist/keyboardist Jonny Buckland added a pre-recorded public ovation, further strengthening the mood of a big festival. Hit after a hit after a hit - I had already forgotten that Coldplay has so many!

There was another interesting musician besides Coldplay (following Damon Albarn and Jorja Smith after them) - although the performance of this "guest" would take place after 1 am on Saturday, probably no Glastonbury festival guests wanted to go to sleep until they found out what lies under the "as yet unnamed special guest." It turned out to be worth the wait: the special guests of the live show were The Smile, which brought together Radiohead leader Thom Yorke and guitarist Johnny Greenwood, as well as drummer Tom Skinner from the British jazz band Sons Of Kemet. This was the debut performance of the new formation, and without going into the nuances, just jot down the name of this project in your "must hear" list - of course, Yorke is Yorke, and The Smile performs interesting and intellectual guitar music.

In conclusion, is it worth holding such a festival? From the consumer's point of view, yes, but remember that, as the head of the Positivus Festival Ģirts Majors said before, in this case, there is someone who has to pay for it all, and this "someone" is not the listeners who paid 23 euros... Here in Latvia, this "someone" will not appear. After this virtual walk around Glastonbury, I wanted to check again what is (not) happening in Latvia on the festival front: Positivus Festival and Summer Sound still say neither yes nor no, neither black nor white, neither will happen nor will not happen, although it is clear that only an official announcement is currently expected from the management of both festivals that the events will be postponed to 2022.

In turn, the aforementioned festival Laba Daba is even more interesting - fake organizers have appeared, who are already prepared to sell tickets to this event, writing in small letters in the corner that it will be an online event. Finally, the officials of the Laba Daba responded, announcing on May 17: "We have noticed that some pages of Facebook are behaving dishonestly, and some of you have fallen for it - the events organized by the pages in the pictures have nothing to do with music and art festival Laba Daba! Laba Daba is not planning online concerts at the moment."

This post was published on the festival's Facebook account, but in the meantime, the official website still shows only that the event will take place on August 6-8 - no wonder one commenter had aptly mentioned - "if nothing new is published, then all the Laba Daba fakes publish news instead.”

It must be said that the current silence of the big festivals really is confusing and encourages various devious individuals to take action. However, Laba Daba (and also the contemporary ethnic music and ancient crafts festival Zobens un Lemess, which has already been announced to take place on Bauska Castle Hill on August 20-21) seems the most likely of the big music events that could take place this summer. And to happen in person.

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