Sunday night Reading festival nightmare - do they even care?

[itsallabittiring]

I wanted to ask about the experience people had on Sunday night in the campsites. My daughter, who is 18 and fairly streetwise, said it was absolutely terrifying as people were going round blowing tents up using aerosols. There was also a massive fight right next to them and then a stampede of people trampled over her tent. They seriously feared for their lives. Until then they had had quite a good time, although some men camping nearby had been threatening on and off so they felt a bit unsafe at times.
Security guards were next to useless apparently and a few of them were apparently clearly on drugs and were asking people for 'Ket'.
It literally sounded like the most unsafe place you could probably think of - they had to take it in turns to stay up and not sleep to try and stop themselves getting blown up. She said it felt so out of control and everyone was drugged up and didn't care.
I would seriously think twice if you think your 16- 18 year old could cope with that. I know my daughter and her friends will never, ever go back. I think it is pretty appalling how scenes like that are allowed to happen. If your teen does insist on going maybe ensure they aren't there for Sunday night which is when it all really kicks off in a nasty way.

It was universally branded as Staffordshire, which then used to end up abbreviated to Stafford as it sounded right alongside the other location of Chelmsford.

@SnotandBothered

I am very tempted to share this thread with Reading local press.

I wouldn’t bother, they mostly specialise in ‘this week’s special buys in Aldi’ and ‘best pubs in Berkshire’ type articles rather than actual journalism. Also their ‘reporters’ get free tickets to the festival.

The council really don’t care either. The festival is a huge nuisance to residents but it’s very lucrative for them (the council).

There are kids on out streets setting fire to thing routinely and making ppls lives a misery in their own homes and nothing even gets done about that as police not interested. Sadly, you are marginalised as an uptight square parent if you try and assert any type of authority over your teenagers nowadays. It’s so not the done thing to have boundaries. I’m guilty of it this time around although I did initially try and stop my DD from going to Reading. Because all of her friends’ parents were allowing them she was not listening to me and then my DH started to back her up. So little old me was powerless and outnumbered. I am even shocked by the language in the lyrics of the main acts at Reading. The lyrics MC’d by Stormzy and Post Malone are just… well I don’t know what to say. Seeing all those fresh faced teenagers ‘singing’ along in the crowd makes me 😮. Do they not understand what they mean???I’m a mum who has been about town. I’m not a snowflake. I’ve taken drugs, drank waaaay to much way too often, had many experiences, been a die hard Indie Rock fan and been to festivals. But by today’s standards…well there aren’t any standards. That’s why kids at festivals end up doing what they do. You can’t expect them to be bouncing along to drill music one moment, collectively chanting about drugs, sluts, guns, coke and violence one minute and then turn into respectful young men who will look after your daughter the next, can you? We as parents to facilitate it by turning the other way and put it down to harmless rebellion.

Google Woodstock 1999!

@ZoyaTheDestroyer

It was universally branded as Staffordshire, which then used to end up abbreviated to Stafford as it sounded right alongside the other location of Chelmsford.

People think it’s in Stafford because a lot of people travel to Stafford train station to get there.

As others have said Weston Park is in Shropshire not Staffordshire and definitely not in Stafford.

I work in the music industry so have been to Reading loads (though not in recent years due to Covid/getting old!). The Sunday night is historically the wild, trash everything, set fires everywhere, party hard night. It always used to be when the heavier rock bands played too, and all the goths appear and everyone wonders if they've been hiding in their tents the rest of the time.

It would be good for this to be widely known about wouldn’t it @Margerine78? Or would that just invite more trouble?

Yep, sounds like my experience as a 17 year old in 2007 at reading. My tent was blown up with an aerosol can with me in it and people took apart the toilet block near us. Just smashing it to pieces standing on the roof. I used the sunday night of reading festival as an example of why we need a governing state in my philosophy a level the following year. Fun times.

This festival way forward. Everyone super polite and no trouble. Its mainly dance music though different types. Great comedy and interesting talks lostvillagefestival.com/ its pretty young.

@ididitsocanyou, I think it is generally assumed, as it's the big rock festival and that kind of anarchy comes with it, whereas for people that want a safer, cleaner and calmer festival there's things like Latitude which is much more chilled. You can generally tell the more chilled ones as there's other stuff going on, it's not just the music.

I guess it's like anything, a club, a festival, a party - anything can kick off at any time depending on who goes. Glastonbury used to be really chilled out but the last few times I went (a few years back) it felt a bit rough.

It's hard as I know parents who don't know different festivals have different clientele have no way of knowing but at the same time I don't know how a festival can pre-warn that it might get raucous (as it's not something that can control, it's part and parcel of the festival so might seem weird telling people it'll get wild, and also admittedly bad PR for them).

I lived in Reading in the early 1970s and the festival was rough even then, drugs, booze and violence abounding. We went once and avoided it after that.

DP came thru Reading on Sunday early evening and commented that a lot of people were leaving the festival site - before the headliners had started their sets. We thought something then something was off. And Monday was quiet traffic-wise apparently, usually it's busy so we think a lot of people left on Sunday

That sounds like a horrible disaster waiting to happen.

Haven't read the full thread, but I had a great time at Reading festival as a late teen... the key is absolutely to camp as far out as you can though.
The chaos tends to be in the campsites nearest to the arena entrance.
You have to accept that you'll spend more time walking from tent to stage and back all weekend, but your Sunday evening will likely be totally fine.

@Phyllis321

Blimey, I went in 1992 (ancient) when Nirvana played and the only downer was the torrential rain causing tents to collapse. How sad it’s become so unpleasant.

I was there that year. Someone tried to rape my friend in the crush at the front and security laughed and mocked her, refused her access to a phone and then called her 'mental' to the welfare tent staff. Nothing has changed, you just had a better experience

God yes. Went to Reading about 15 years ago and left after the first night because wee dicks wrecked my tent playing chicken with some shopping trolleys.

The Sunday night thing has been going on for years at various festivals - the event is over so they have nothing to lose if they get ejected. I warned my DS who was at Leeds with his mates for the first time, he’s been to loads of festivals with us & he knows the atmosphere can change quickly. His large, mixed group avoided the ‘crazy’ camps, but there were still canister explosions all night and tents being destroyed. It’s a sad state of affairs. You should give feedback to Festival Republic and Reading Borough Council’s Licensing Team. Perhaps they need more of a police presence, but cost will be an issue.

To the poster who suspects Reading and Leeds get issues due to being close to 'town', I can't speak for Reading but the current Leeds site is about ten miles from the city centre and the location used before it moved to Bramham Park at least five miles away. You used to see hoardes of teens transporting their mates and booze in shopping trolleys from the supermarket to the old site as you queued to go in/past.

@EachandEveryone

This festival way forward. Everyone super polite and no trouble. Its mainly dance music though different types. Great comedy and interesting talks lostvillagefestival.com/ its pretty young.

Agree.

Yeah, Reading is pretty eye opening at that age…20 years ago we had our cool box of food and booze nicked, took Imodium for two days to avoid any need to use the portaloos after seeing them being tipped over with people in them, had our tents pissed on and pulled down, bought ‘baked goods’ from strangers going from tent to tent with special brownies they’d made, abandoned a pair of trainers that got sucked into a boggy mess of piss and mud (ie all of the ground in the campsite) on the last day. Tbh though we had an absolute blast and this is pretty much what we signed up for (our parents just didn’t realise and those that did didn’t let their kids go because they remembered what festivals were like in the 60s) The general rule of thumb is that is you want a more civilised experience you go to V fest or Latitude!

It was the same at Leeds when I went many a year ago...we ended up packing up & leaving after the last bands on the Sunday for the last few years we went.
It's terrifying & the organisers don't do anything to stop it.

Reading has always had a rep though- but to be honest I think all of the “pure music” festivals (Leeds, V etc) are always pegged as rough comparative to the traditionally “music and arts” festivals (glasto, IOW, latitude).

Tbh I used to do a lot of festivals but now I’ve got a DC I don’t think I’d even take him to Glasto these days - it’s just not quite as safe/ friendly as it used to be in the main stage areas and I don’t want to spend all weekend at glasto in the kids field. Strictly Just So and the like for us for some time I think!

This sounds like it needs one of those undercover exposé television reports.

Reading is indeed in town, it’s about a mile from the town centre, a few hundred metres from Tesco Extra and surrounded by dense housing on three sides.

@SunShinesBrightly

I didn’t say it was in Staffordshire. I said it was branded and marketed as being in Staffordshire, because it was - see the line-up poster for 2016.