Latitude 2010: Day 1, Part 1

“If in doubt”, said the imaginary genie in my head once (or never), “ask fellow Fly contributor Ivens!” Doubt led us thus: “Charles Ivens of the lampshade, pray how long to get to Latitude?” “Door-to-door?,” quoth the sage one. “About two hours innit.”
 
Thus, with the crystal ball essentially in my pocket, off set I to Suffolk. Five fucking hours later, “door-to-door”, Latitude was met with some serious Fly-shaped attitude. Or should have been. Any other festival that dared to stall us with such organisational ineptitude – no bus links from a train in the middle of nowheresville, fuck-all itinerary – would have had us frothing like a rabid cappuccino in a bubble bath… But there’s something about Latitude – a zen kind of calmness that frisks, finger-wags and anally searches any deep-seated grievances the moment you behold its awesome surroundings and undoubtable aura.
 
A few years back, our sagely editor wrote of this place: “It’s the new Glastonbury”. Obviously, as with anyone who seeks to convince you you’ll be paid in due course, the bullshit file is an open purse. Once we arrive, though – via a blagged lift in a VW camper van – we encounter a vibe that has hitherto been confined to the annals of festival folklore: that there is, actually, a fucking VIBE here. Nary an advert in sight, nor corporate sponsor to come fuck with our transom, the sheer beauty of Latitude’s surroundings is enough to make you temporarily forget that such things as profit margins even exist. In a world fucked on implacable greed and liberty-taking bollocks, here is a fortress that admits no profit or percentage. Of course, naysayers might point to the safe sanctuary of the line-up – and they’ve got a point: Flo and her fucking Machine AGAIN (one album: 5,000 festival appearances; Vampire Weekend: two albums of painstaking exactitude, incalculable festivals) – but there’s something about this place that transcends the music.

In such surroundings – and there are fewer beautiful locations – the music is rendered incidental. Indeed, the moment we get there, Sir Tom of Jonesness is holding court amid the trees. Upon arrival, a Welsh-speaking guard (they’re usually Scottish innit?), he sayeth: “Tom Jones is in the woods.” For a moment we shit ourselves, thinking the Welsh diva is running loose among the trees like a frustrated gyrating bear, aching for a tranquiliser. Short shrift later – in the guise of the Jones boy’s latest soul-searching renderings – and we find ourselves at the heart of a festival daring to be different. Inevitable dickhead bouncers aside – they tend to shine torches in your face, Gestapo stylee – the convivial atmosphere is contagious. How did we get here again? Who cares? The nightmare of local transport and impossibly obnoxious locals is banished once the first day is over. And with that attitude instilled in you, whatever befalls – even a pretentious poet-songwriter-madman, in the guise of Lupen Crook, who drags your correspondent away from his lady for a spontaneous snog (don’t ask) – nothing, not even the bitter taste of lovelorn lyricists’ lips, can bring you down from the vertiginous altitudes of a festival that breathes with such unfrozen alacrity.
 
We’ll run into the Ivens monster man later in the evening, and plant a wet kiss on his soothsaying lips: even his schedule foretelling bullshit holds no weight here: this place is timeless and relatively untouched. Long may it continue…
 
PS. As I write, the first spell of rain is piddling, and everyone is grinning and waving at me. My first time here, and I am in love with this place…