Glastonbury - Day 1

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It's day one!

Well it's more day 6 really. Left Dublin on Ryanair's 3:30pm to Bristol last Saturday. Made an unplanned stopover with an ex in the city before kicking back with a beer as the World Naked Bike Ride rolled slowly past our bay windows Sunday afternoon.

Frankie, the former frontman to Frankie Goes to Holyhead, picked us up in his "just-seven-miles-on-the-clock" Golf GTI after lunch and we cruised through the rolling Somerset hills, past Glastonbury Tor and were pitching our tents by sunset.

This is my forth time as the festival. First in 2002, then the last three running. I'm one of a gang of 24, half Irish and half other. We are working together on an underground piano bar. It's a big hole in the ground, shaped like the hull of a boat (see pic). With tiered seating for about 200. The heavy work is done by JCB, with spades then finely-tuning the soft Glastonbury mud. It's got a stage with resident piano, where passing bands, anything from folk, alt-country, punky theatrical outfits and others line up and fill the bill. It opens as the main stages close and is one of the few venues which run all night, every night. It's going to be a long weekend.

Outside our hole is perhaps the greatest festival on earth. Around 200,000 tickets for the festival were sold within four hours of going on sale last October. There will be close to 700 acts on 80 stages spread across 900 acres from the dance tents, to the Green Fields, to family camping to cabaret camp.

Those expected to create the most fuss are Friday's headliner U2 - the world's biggest band taking to a most-carefully scrutinised stage. Coldplay, Beyonce, Primal Scream, The Streets are among others looking to dig deep and impress the festival's revellers, along with viewers and listeners elsewhere - at this widely-watched event.

The weather has been mixed. We've had rain, breeze and sun. The rain changes everything. The mud is deep. Short walks take time and the mood gets stuck. But today the sun is shining. It's energy is showing. Spirit's are high as the light flickers through the thick canopy of leaves into our makeshift kitchen.

A hundred drums in varying keys fill the nearby Sacred Circle. An orchestra of ghetto blasters belt out a rich spectrum of bass. First big act of the weekend and first lady of UK garage, Ms Dynamite is tuning up on the WOW! stage.

Time maybe for a ramble.

John Bela Reilly