All Together Now 2019

MJohnston wrote: »

Oh who cares? They're far more likely to be killed when I'm driving them to creche in the car in the morning. If you find yourself crippled with anxiety about exceptionally unlikely events, that's your problem.

A 19 year old died this weekend at a festival from taking drugs - should people that age be banned too?

Who cares? Clearly not you. Good luck to you so.

MJohnston wrote: »

Nah, you've made your choice and you have absolutely no right to dictate what others should do. If you don't think your kids would enjoy a festival, grand, but that's your choice alone.

As for EP, well that's a disaster zone of a festival these days so I wouldn't bring my son there ever, but then I wouldn't bring myself to it either.

MJ, I must respectfully disagree re EP. Organisationally streets ahead of ATN. Could not have kids in traffic queues for several hours nor toilets remaining uncleaned and uninformed stewards giving wrong directions. EP has its faults but it still remains kid-friendly.

Otherwise am in utter agreement with you. ATN and EP are billed as family festivals so it’s not as though people aren’t aware of the demographics. And many posting here seem more concerned that their drunkenness or drug inebriation are somewhat spoiled by under tens.

Don't bring your kids to the next fest lads. I might clean them right out ossified on ten tins of shyte canadian hooch. Got it? Sound.

Seathrun66 wrote: »

MJ, I must respectfully disagree re EP. Organisationally streets ahead of ATN. Could not have kids in traffic queues for several hours nor toilets remaining uncleaned and uninformed stewards giving wrong directions. EP has its fault but it still remains kid-friendly.

Otherwise am in utter agreement with you. ATN and EP are billed as family festivals so it’s not as though people aren’t aware of the demographics.

I'm sure EP is still kid-friendly from an organisational perspective, but they sell about 5 family campervan tickets, so we'll never bother going. Trekking through the refugee camp that is general camping from the general campervan site back in 2016 was when we declared we were done with EP. Talk about not bringing kids to festivals, but here was an entire campsite filled with unaccompanied kids.

But like Body and Soul is an annual tradition for us now - absolutely sound crowd who have little worries about seeing kids there (its part of the DNA of that festival in fact).

MJohnston wrote: »

I'm sure EP is still kid-friendly from an organisational perspective, but they sell about 5 family campervan tickets, so we'll never bother going. Trekking through the refugee camp that is general camping from the general campervan site back in 2016 was when we declared we were done with EP. Talk about not bringing kids to festivals, but here was an entire campsite filled with unaccompanied kids.

But like Body and Soul is an annual tradition for us now - absolutely sound crowd who have little worries about seeing kids there (its part of the DNA of that festival in fact).

EP miles easier for us with kids. Layout of the site lends itself to this. Queueing 20-30 mins for something as basic as chips for our two was a mare.

Eod100 wrote: »

Yeah saw people with a pull along cot for a baby and toddler. Just didn't seem the right place for a small child. I think last year was probably grand size wise for kids but this year far too big. Saw a few kids wondering around on their own and was looking around for their parents. Surely very easy for kid to get lost with so many people around if you're not keeping an eye on them. Bit daft.

Youve clearly never been to Glastonbury.

Wooderson wrote: »

EP miles easier for us with kids. Layout of the site lends itself to this. Queueing 20-30 mins for something as basic as chips for our two was a mare.

Sure, I mean EP is designed to attract families - ATN was designed to attract money.

A weekend with a lot of ups and downs, don't know how to feel about it all really, I still had a good weekend but the traffic on Friday took the full day away and sapped everyones energy and then the rain on Sunday made conditions difficult to enjoy.

Pros
Crowd - The crowd were great at the festival I thought, nice mix of older and younger but all enjoying themselves and most seemed very respectful and friendly. Never saw any dodgy heads floating around or didn't see too many people over do it on drink/drugs.
Music - for the majority of the acts I did see, they were all in top form and impressed me more than I expected. Hot Chip, Orbital, Kiasmos, Tourist, The Wailers, Moodyman, The National, George Fitzgerald all really enjoyable gigs.
Both Sides Now Campsite - Lovely place to camp with plenty of space and fairly good carry on most of the weekend. Place was pretty clean when we were leaving and plenty of sound people bumped into over the weekend.
Site layout - I liked where the bandstand was and the fact that the Something Kind of Wonderful/Road to Nowhere tents were moved, there was more of a natural loop around the festival compared to last year where most places led to dead ends. Some cons about the site too though.

Cons
Traffic - won't go into detail but its hard to believe how they got this so wrong. Mates of ours were in the car for 9 hours (for what is a 1.5 hour journey), mood seriously impacted when everyone arrived Friday night. Luckily I went for the red route thanks to advice in the whatsapp and only got caught for 4 hours :pac:
Congestion - They sold too many tickets this year. From the traffic, queues for food, all tents being packed out, main campsite being absolutely packed, toilets always busy, the place struggled to cope with that many people.
Scheduling - Agree that there felt like large periods where there was nothing really on or many options at least. It feels like it is still lacking depth in the lineup despite the lineup itself being very good.
Food - I only ate twice all weekend and both were fine, but like last year didnt think there were great food options around and not enough food stalls either.
Site layout - despite some good points, moving all of the stages closer together with an extra 8,000 people there made the site feel squashed and everywhere very busy. Not using the area in front of the house as much was a shame.

General comments
I will probably still go back next year and give them the benefit of the doubt but if it was to be another year like this it would be hard to go back again the following year. They really need to work hard on this and plan how to manage the crowd as most of the main issues simply came down to not being able to deal with the amount of people that were there.

Arcadia looks great but I don't think I like it. Both years now it has just felt full of people going through the motions and DJs banging out really generic techno. Hammer and Josh Wink were good enough but I find it a hard stage to stay at for any length of time, maybe I am alone in this. Also having the Road to Nowhere and All My Friends stage so nearby, all three have some sound bleed going on and all three seemed to be playing very similar music at the same time (esp on Sunday night) which seemed a bit pointless. I get people want to hear dance music come 3am, myself included, but a bit of variety would be nice. Very few of the stages felt like they were good craic, just people who were out of it and moving for the sake of it.

Saw about 7 or 8 gardaí around a fella on the ground outside the Road to Nowhere tent on Sunday night during Tourist, the guy did not look very responsive when I saw him and started to fear the worst. Someone told me that they did see him move eventually so hopefully he was okay - did anyone hear anything or see what happened?

Weepsie wrote: »

The kids are normally the best behaved people at festivals. They're not the problem, it's self entitled twat adults who don't want to feel any sort of guilt/shame when having another bump of coke, a pill or their 12th can. Now, unless they're being dragged around Arcadia at 2 am, I don't see the problem bringing them.

It was billed as a family friendly festival from the outset. Deal with it and cop on yourself.

I think being billed as is definitely different than reality. What was specifically for kids over the whole weekend? Know there was a library stall over by the house but bar that wasn't aware of any. I think a fair few people off their face on drink and drugs is unfortunately a reality of Irish festivals. Not for me and these people talking ****e while gigs are on, bashing onto you etc is far from ideal. Can't say I saw any hassle from kids but think there is a trade off for parents od brining a kid under 10 say who may not even remember or enjoy it versus enjoying the festival they would if their kids weren't there. And obviously that's a decision for the parents alone.

Wooderson wrote: »

Youve clearly never been to Glastonbury.

Well I was specifically saying seemed far too big for kids tbf. And i think most people specific bought into ATN for the size and space of last year. If they want to upscale fair enough but festival will naturally lose something. Same way EP has. No I haven't, don't think I'd enjoy a festival with population of a decent sized town tbh. But I don't really see what that specifically has to do with my individual experience of ATN.

Wooderson wrote: »

Thinking ATN was too big a fest to bring kids is laughable when compared to the vastness of Glastonbury, where 1000's of kids are welcomed with open arms annually.

Is that not the difference though? Lot of basic issues meant that adults didn't feel like they were welcomed with open arms clearly. So how could kids be? Obviously can tie it into overall organisational issues but I think it needs to do more than bill itself as a family festival to actually be one on the ground. I'm not anti kids at festivals and presumably that's evident from my posts just think basic infrastructure needs to be there. that's a criticism for the festival not for parents, as it's not their fault it didn't live up to that.

Wooderson wrote: »

Those mushies must have done the trick chief.


Quick refresher -



https://www.alltogethernow.ie/kids-together

Ara insult away. Drugs aren't my thing but infer away on an open forum. I get people might be emotionally involved if they brought kids but the passive aggressive comments aren't exactly conducive to a decent discussion. Will leave it there.

Eod100 wrote: »

Ara insult away. Drugs aren't my thing but infer away on an open forum. I get people might be emotionally involved if they brought kids but the passive aggressive comments aren't exactly conducive to a decent discussion. Will leave it there.

You didnt hear about the Kids Together field?

Eod100 wrote: »

So you're disagreeing to agree? Right so. Do me a favour and take down your last post. I try to treat people decently here, minimum id expect back is the same

The original post did not refer to resources, thus the disagreement. I agreed with your post on resources.

So did GB&Q play the new record in sequence at the start or did I miss a track?