The Campsite village[/caption]The most difficult thing for me not to do with these next four, possibly five posts is to make constant comparisons and contrasts between Download and Bloodstock. In the hopes of avoiding this, I will sum the two festivals using a quote from my stepson's girlfriend, Gemma. She states that the two festivals are siblings. I can see that, some of the bands I would see at Download over the weekend I had seen previously at Bloodstock. However, Gemma reckons that Download is the calmer elder sibling while Bloodstock is the angry younger one. She certainly has a point.
We left Stroud just before one in the afternoon and our journey wasn't too bad as far as traffic goes. The Disturbed and the tribute to Twisted Sister album provided the in flight entertainment. What we did realize shortly into our journey was that I had forgotten to pack a pan to cook all our wonderful gourmet meals in over the weekend. There were a few other things as well. So, we had to make an unplanned stop a few exits before the one we needed. That added forty-five minutes to our journey. Still, we managed to get Donington Park by quarter to four.
Learning our lesson from Bloodstock, we packed our gear into to small carts and followed the procession to the main gate. Once we got there, we had to wait in a large queue as all bags were searched. I was expecting this after the recent attacks here in the UK. With security not able to find drugs or explosives on us, we began the long walk to the campsite village. This seemed to be a trek and there was a second gate where some of our stuff was searched again and we exchanged our tickets for the weekend wristbands. After more walking, we finally got to the campsite village where we met our friend Joe. Only instead of heading into the campsite, after some queries with the stewards, ended up taking us back the other way to the caravan site. It turned out that Joe had some friends who let us pitch our tents by their camper van. That would prove to be a distinct advantage over the weekend.
Once all the campsite necessities were completed, including drinking a couple of cans, which I sorely needed to do, we headed back to the campsite village. Lots to do and see and there was a band playing at one of the tents when we arrived, though they finished shortly after. So, we headed for the Comedy Tent to catch the last three comedians of the night.
The first comedian was an American lady called Abdiliah, I didn't catch her last name. She was quite funny and like so many American comedians in the UK, make funny comparisons between the two countries. As normal, this put a tiny number of people off who left but for the most part, she was very funny.
Next up was a British man named Andrew O'Neil. What I remembered most about him was his ripping on Saturday's main stage headliner, Biffy Clyro and his impression of System of a Down, which he got the audience to assist him with. One side of the tent did the bass bit while the other side impersonated the lead guitar. Obviously, I can't show it here but it was pretty hilarious. All his material was very funny.
The final comedian of the night was a Canadian by the name of Greg Campbell. He talked about his trip to Russia and how the Russians, unlike Americans or Brits, don't have a word for getting people to hurry up. Americans use 'pronto' and Brits use 'stat.' He did an impression of a Russian who stated that when they want something done, they expect it to be straight away and don't need buzz words. I know it doesn't sound funny here but the way Greg Campbell told it, had me rolling on the floor.
When the comedians finished, I ventured back to the tent the band had been playing. The band had left but there were two young ladies on stage dancing with flaming batons. Unfortunately, with all the lights, I couldn't get a decent photo. However, most of the action in the late night was in the cinema tent. No films being shown but many people were gathered around the screen as the news of the General Election began to come in. Let's just say that if the election had been decided by metalheads, Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party would have been elected by a landslide. I didn't stay to long into the night knowing that I needed my beauty sleep for the day's metal which lay ahead.
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