Mad for Womad…

Our now regular trip to the Womad festival was not hampered greatly by the British summer weather and we managed to dress accordingly and shelter when necessary as the rains came and went. The site was prey good again though the organisers suffered problems with the toilets, and we mourned the lack of the Pieminister food stall and the small Little Italy Tent.

Again we saw and amazing selection of artists that most of us knew nothing of. There seemed to be a jazz influence to this year’s line-up culminating in the foremost Acid Jazz performer – Roy Ayers.

Some of the acts we saw included:
Caravan Palace downloaded their album)
Rachel Unthank and The Winterset (on my wish list)
Sarah Savoy & The Francadians (would love to get something of theirs)
17 Hippies (on my wish list)
Victor Deme (on my wish list)
Hindi Zahra
Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
Mec Yek
Solomon Burke
Roy Ayers
Youssou N’Dour
Spiro
Nneke
Ethiopiques
Los Desterrados

Long days (and nights) of prolonged drinking and festival atmosphere did produce some amusing incidents, like putting an order in for tea & toast in the middle of the night under the name of ‘fudgy-foo-foo’ and having another late night cuppa in a chi tent as kids inhaled ‘laughing-gas’ from balloons and a single mum smoked a joint as her baby slept in a pram nearby.

It was such an education for us innocents abroad in everyway.