Body and soul 2023 (initial line up announced)

Did I refer to B&S sales in comparison to BTP's? Isn't it great that BTP is doing well! B&S sales are going great in relation to their capacity. Maybe not a sell out but better than last year. Which is fantastic given that they are up against another potentially brilliant festival.

And come on, you don't honestly think BTP weren't aware which weekend B&S was being planned for when they changed their date? I gave them the benefit of the doubt on that for a long time...

Are you disappointed that BTP hasn't managed to put B&S out of business or something? 😂

Glasto n B&S have been on same w/end before , 2017

Guess the Eavis clan weathered that storm ok

Not at all. It's my favourite festival and I'm going this weekend, over BTP.

It's not looking good folks: https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-41163271.html

I reckon Ballinlough will escape the worst of the weather. There'll be a lot more sun than folks are expecting.

I doubt it, there's definitely a good bit of rain due over the weekend. At this stage it's just a question of how much.

Hope everyone has a great wkend…..so annoyed over the weather but once we are there with the first can open we won’t give a fcuk!

Best of luck with the weather lads, don't miss Public Service Broadcasting! Look forward to reading the reviews Monday.

Yeah it was a pity because everyone was buzzing From Haii beforehand. Lovely sun now but it won't last.

Is the main stage now where it originally was for the first couple of years?

Nah, it was still inside the walled garden at the bottom of the small hill opposite the Bulmers stage for the first couple. Coffee/food and benches there now

Ya got pretty crazy for a bit. Lightning was right overhead. Trad don't need no amplification tho and there's a few hero's batein out tunes anywhere there's cover!

Righteo - we came home last night, so missed Fever Ray and The Blaze, unfortunately. Had been hoping to catch the blaze, but the weekend was up to the two girlies really, I was lucky to be there at all! We were allowed to move our van up to castle camping to allow my partner have less of a trek in to the main arena each day, which was nice of the team.

First festival that we have brought a kid to (she is 3), and she had a great time - it was such a joy to see her having so much fun! I'm sure the smaller crowd this year was a help. We did miss Soul Kids tho - as I said, first time bringing a smallie with me, but have worked in Soul Kids in the past and figured it would be a great place to be able to pop in and out of. Handy too for one of the parents to know they could bring the kiddies to soul kids while the other checked out some music. There were a few things on for kids here and there, but they were hard to find and times were all over the place - the various mental cloudbursts there didnt help I'm sure. Only having the single fairground ride wasn't great either (even tho it was a TENNER!) The helter skelter and chair-o-planes were always something to look forward to at B+S, for grown ups and kiddies alike!

I said the other day that the layout was odd, and that really became apparent as the weekend went on. The main stage had zero atmosphere, even for Moderat, it was a shame to see the old main stage field sitting there forgotten about...@dav09 the old stage was actually still in that field, perhaps its a little worse for wear at this stage. @bodhrandude probably knows the story there

Had some mates up in general camping so took a swing up there a couple of times. Seems as if they filled from back to front, as when you approached from the arena you had to walk passed a load of empty campsite before you got to where the bulk of people were. Only a couple of food options in the campsite itself, but they were clean, none of my mates reported and hassle or anything, place had a nice atmosphere.

Anyway...music...made it there just in time to catch the second half of PSB. Great performance, they were on the ball. Their lightshow and atmosphere was lost being on a huge stage with few people, in the daylight. Over to the Beacon then for Efa O'Neil, who was great all 3 of us danced our socks off and kicked off our weekend! Smallie and other half were wrecked after that so we headed back up to the van, after they were settled in I made it back down in time to catch the end of Huey Morgan, who was a nice surprise for me personally, love his Saturday BBC 6 show, and also for Haii (and the first of the cloudbursts), she really had the crowd pumped, and everyone was ready to let rip for Avalon Emerson who got off to a great start, but the weather had other ideas....Legged it back up to Hennesy for Avreene and stayed for a bit of Ben Bix & Little O. Was back up at the van for about half 3 I think

Saturday we had nice brekkie at the van then wandered down as things were opening up for coffee etc..Smallie had a run around with some other small people and we took it easy taking turns to go see various things.... The gong Bath thingy at the beacon was actually quite cool! Lunch with mates up at the main stage for Aoife Nessa Frances, who was a nice surprise, hadnt listened to her before but will now.....More wandering after that, seemed to need to do that a little too much this year, found there were plenty of gaps with nothing to do or go see....ran back up to camp to let the girlies have a snooze and to grab our wetgear as we wanted to see Meute, and caught a bit of them before everything stopped with the lightning storm...we passed a bit of unamplified trad at the cabin in the woods during the storm, but figured the walled garden might be a better option during a lightning storm, so headed up there to find another session in one of the food tents! When things resumed we had a dance at (I think) Bella Fiesta DJ's, before the girlies called it a day. After getting them settled I made it back for the last bit of Goldfrapp, another cloudburst and Moderat...stuck around mainstage for Weval - who were interesting enough, but there was only maybe 75-100 people there for most of it....Blessed Madonna then, who again I had been looking forward to, also a fan of her radio show, and loved her at the first ATN, but found her set this time pretty dull, it just didnt go anywhere....Gerd Janson brought more of a party, but I was wrecked at this point so...bed.

Sunday started out pretty nice, me and smallie were competing in the soul olympics until the heavens opened ant the wheelbarrow that she was in filled with about 2 inches of water in seconds!! We had hoped to catch BCUC and they did make a start, but I have never seen rain like that. The rain failed to get the better of us the whole weekend up to that point, but that one at Sunday lunchtime was INSANE, and went on for about an hour. We eventually got some cover in a shed in behind walled garden. We had wetgear, but the rain was so hard that smallie was pretty scared. The sun did eventually come back out, we caught a bit of Giles Peterson, he was moved to the Solas stage and half the crowd here seemed to be still asleep from meditation in the morning, so it wasnt the best of craic...this was the nail in the coffin for the girlies, who had put on a stellar performance at this point but more cloudbursts were forecast, and they couldnt face another so we hit the road. Thankfully we had the van packed from earlier while it was sunny.

So, overall did we have a good time? Yes, certainly did, but that was mostly down to making our own fun. In general the festival seemed to be a bit of a shadow of its former self, it was all a bit sparse, and plenty of times when there was nothing on. We were at each B+S from 2010 to 2017, and this was the first time we experienced this. Now, this is maybe just us....The "Hip-Hop" stage seems to have replaced the Upstage/Midnight Circus. Irish Hip Hop aint our thing so we just didnt go there much, while during earlier years we could always just head to Midnight Circus/Upstage for a bop. The Beacon was no replacement for these stages. It looked cool alright, but Reckless in Love, when it was actually in the woods, was a much much better party!

The "My House" stage was not there either, that was also always a fun spot. "Top of the Crops" was in the spot where My House used to be before it moved up to the midnight circus arena, but it wasnt a patch on it....weather probably played a part, but lots of times we passed there was nothing happening there.

It was a heck of a lot of money too, for what we got. ATN is not much more expensive, and has a hell of a lot more to offer, both in terms of music and the other stuff. It was nice to be back in Ballinlough for a bit of nostalgia, but it feels like it was run on a bit of a shoestring....

I'm not sure I'll ever get over Alison Spittle going on about giving lads handjobs while I was Q'ing for a burger either!