Today is Saturday July 14th 2007, and
I’ve decided to write about what happened just over seven years ago at
Glastonbury 2000.
Why now? I’m reviewing my life, and I think its time to be a bit more true to myself. Also, I think its time I shared more of my life with you, the reader,
just in case you are interested.
Warning :
this gets seriously weird. I’m not sure what I want you to
do with this information – I apologise if any
of this causes offense – this is not my intention. If it does, just take
it as fiction…
Boy was I pissed off by this. After
the first, wonderful extra-ordinary, powerful Glastonbury in 1999, the first
thing that happened at Glasto 2000 is that I started
to hear voices in my head. Scary stuff? Nah, John Bennett did this
to me around 1976, Stan
the Weaver did it in 1974 – a lot of people can do this. Derren
Brown does this sort of thing on the telly. The
difference between what I am describing and insanity is that I have no
intention of doing what these voices ask, if I think its wrong. Its just
voices…
The first voice in my head, who I
think was Chloé, a white witch, chief witch of
Kent I believe, said “we have something special for you”. I was
less than enthusiastic. “What is it?” I asked” – no
answer – maybe I can’t broadcast as well as I can receive…
After some time of what I considered to be nagging, and no doubt Chloé thought was a very important invitation, I
decided to go and find out what this was all about.
The other voice was a Frenchman - he
said “courage mon brave”. Wise words indeed.
First I went to Henry’s Beard
Café – where I met Jason Baxter with his Piano ”In
Transit” (and the title of his CD) – an electronic piano mounted
inside an old wooden piano case (to keep it light). We did a blues duet in C
– lots of fun – he played his Postman Pat Medley – awesome.
Then Jason went into “zombie mode”, and said something about having
to go and get change for my £10 to pay for his £8 CD, so I followed
him up to the Guarana Bar. The girl at the Guarana Bar (blond hair, eyes full
of something weird, probably drug related) was also in “zombie
mode” and Jason had to buy a two cups of Guarana, one for him and one for
me. He gave me the change (no, I can’t work it out either), and he then
said that he wanted to show me “something special”. Aha I thought, could this be what Chloé
was on about? So I followed him up to the Spacecraft Stage. As we got there I
mentioned that I needed a pee, and Jason said that I should pee against this
canvas wall, as the owner wouldn’t mind. I went along with this, even
though I knew that it was untrue (sorry, whoever you are). Nobody
“doesn’t mind” people peeing on their tent. I washed my hands
with water from the bottle in my rucksack, said a prayer to the effect that I
hoped that what I was doing was alright, and stepped into the Spacecraft Stage.
The Spacecraft Stage is a yurt-style, oval
tent, made from wooden branches and white canvas, constructed over a deep hole,
cut into the ground with tiered seats. The top row of seats could fit maybe 40
people, the next layer down perhaps 25 or 30, each tier getting smaller until
you got down to the bottom which was flat, except for an even deeper pit at one
end, with wooden posts in it (I think – I can’t be sure).
Across the end with the pit, at
ground level, was a wooden stage with a piano on it. All in all, a wonderful construction, and very cosy.
Across the front of the stage was a big wooden arch, like a kind of frame, with
the words “Corruption Cabaret” painted on it, quite neatly. Hanging
up to the left of the stage was a small wooden carving of a cherub or demon,
painted red.
There was access to the stage from
the outside, for performers to get in and out, and access to the underground
seating at the other end via a canvas door. I shuffled along the second row of
seats down, to the right hand side of the stage, until I was close to Chloé, who was sitting on the topmost row of seats.
I had a non-verbal discussion with Chloé about
whether I could sit next to her, she indicated no, so I sat to her left, on the
second row of seats, so that my head was about at the level of her shin. Later Chloé tickled the top of my head with her finger
tips – cute, but slightly strange. We watched a variety of acts on the
stage – I spoke to a lady saxophonist at one point. After a while I
played piano – the G-C-A-D piece that I do – then went back to my
seat.
Then Chloé
asked the audience if they would like to hear a fairy story. There was a
general murmuring of “yes please”, so Chloé
recited a poem, in perfect rhyming couplets, that had been dictated to her by a
fairy (of course). At the time I thought it was the most amazing poetry, but I
can’t remember a single word of it, so I suspect that it was just an
illusion of good poetry. Chloé mentioned that
the fairy was six feet tall, and very handsome. Apparently the idea that
fairies are small is incorrect.
Then two people got up on stage,
Felix on violin and Amris on 12 string guitar. Felix
at least was drinking from a bottle that Chloé
referred to as “magic brandy”, and was seriously drunk, to the
extent that he could barely walk. At the time I thought it was the most amazing
Irish jig music, but I can’t remember a single note of it, so I suspect
that it was just an illusion of good music.
By the way, I had drunk about half of
the Guarana, and then I had offered to the other people, saying that I
didn’t want to drink too much of it, as it would keep me awake. I gave it
to a girl in the audience. I wasn’t sure if it was spiked… I think
it probably was, but I’m not sure with what.
Then it got seriously weird. I
traveled into what I describe as “the underworld”. There was a deep
canyon, too deep to see the bottom. Along the sides of the canyon were rooms
carved into the rock. Each room had some kind of “entertainment”
– night clubs, cinemas, discos, sex parlours
etc. There were even little comfy homes, with TVs etc. You could find anything
you liked there, if you liked that sort of thing. I was offered eternal life
there. I saw people there who had turned into dragons and wyverns. I saw that Chloé had green scales, and wings – very
pretty colours, shimmering metallic green. Other
people had the plumage they liked, with wings etc. In this world I don’t
think Chloé was called Chloé
– I could almost hear her name. I later described it as sounding like the
sound you would get if you trod on a corpse – sorry to be so graphic
– hard to imitate.
I declined the offer of eternal life
on two grounds : one was that I didn’t like the
options on offer, the other was that it wasn’t actually eternal, just
very long, maybe a few 100,000 years and I wasn’t at all sure what would
happen after that. Also it didn’t feel at all real. Real
enough to see but not real enough to live in, like a cinema picture.
When I returned to the normal world
the Spacecraft Stage was all but empty, and as I made my way along the row of
seats to the exit I had to pass by a man on the next tier up. He looked Irish,
from maybe 100 years ago. His clothes looked hand stitched, slightly crudely
made. He had badly fitting teeth, coming out at odd angles. The material of his
clothes was quite coarsely woven, and the threads had a kind of crystalline
look to them. Also I couldn’t work out how I could see him so clearly in
the dim light – so I suspect he wasn’t real. Oh, and he was playing
the violin in the same way Felix had been earlier. As I passed in front of him
I had to stand within maybe 9 inches of him, and a foot or so below him. I
stared at his chest, probably rather rudely, trying to guess if he was
“real” or not. Best guess now, is that he was not
“real”, in the sense that he had a passport, driving license and a
mortgage. But “real” enough to play the violin,
sort of.
I found the exit, and went round to
the back of the Spacecraft Stage, I think I wanted to
find someone to complain to. Dawn was breaking. I found a campfire with maybe 8
or 10 of what Jason had referred to as the “Dublin Druids” and I
later referred to as the “F*cking Dublin
Druids” – I was very cross. I chatted to them – they were
mostly dressed in Victorian-looking clothes, ornate waistcoats, almost Eastern
European Gypsy style. I’d had enough, so I headed off to my tent. A guy
called Ian followed me down the path, I think to check
if I was alright. We chatted – he said he was involved in vegetable
recycling – I was not in the mood to talk. We parted company and I got
back to the tent at about 06:30, Monday morning.
At about 09:30 Brian woke me up, saying
that they had been worried about me when I hadn’t returned to the tent. I
was touched by their concern. As I woke up, I remembered what had happened, and
started pacing backwards and forwards in anger. With the benefit of hindsight,
I think this anger was unnecessary. I had come away from Glasto
1999 with a righteous anger about the appalling state of the world and the
people in it. This time I was just angry that I had another major life-experience
to deal with. The whole world looked “thin”. Things like the
ground, brick walls etc looked transparent. This
effect went away after about 6 months. Also I was very frightened, but I knew
that fear was a pointless reaction – there was nothing to
“do” about this. I think I really put this behind me in August
2005, at the Subud World Congress in Innsbruck, Austria. Subud is for me everything that the Spacecraft
Stage witches and Druids are not – real instead of sham.
I’ve realized why I am writing
this now : After my experiences with Stan the Weaver
back in 1974 (please see Glasto1999 for a
brief account of this) I “coped” with this new information by
pretending to be normal. I became good at looking normal, so when I married
Sonia in 1987 I had suppressed the weird side of my life. Sorry Sonia – I
didn’t come quite as advertised – you tolerated the unusual aspects
of my character, but this was always difficult for you. Now that I am single
again, I am happy to embrace who I really am, because I really love my life
– weirdness and all. Subud has
brought me a different take on life, every bit as strange as what I described
above, but infinitely more real. When I say that I am beginning to see that
human life is infinite, I really mean it – we really do “choose our
own adventure”! Up or Down. Up to nobility, human kindness and love, or
Down to seedy pastimes that leave your soul empty, duped by pale imitations and
sham.
Somewhere in all of this, maybe
before, maybe after, I “met” a small ( 12
– 18 inches, 30 – 40 cm tall ) “being” whom I called
“B”. I visualize him like one of those brass engravings you get in
churches, a small picture of a knight in his chain mail and armour.
He said he was about 600 years old, and he seemed to be very wise and kind. I
believe he lives in a part of “the underworld” that I had just
visited, so maybe that was why I could chat to him, and that’s why I have
problems saying his name, so I call him “B”. He also said that he
was very troubled by the state of the world (meaning my world, possibly
his world as well), and that
“This is the end of the Age of Arrogance, and the beginning of the Age of Miracles”.
I consider “B” to be a
friend, and I take his words seriously – the arrogance of the present age
is clear, people generally are so certain that they are right that they cause
immense harm to themselves and others. It will certainly take a miracle to sort
this mess out, so I really hope that what “B” says comes true.
Having said that, I feel that this “mess” is just how its meant to be to reveal the
Truth about just who we are as human beings. Life is a miracle. The Lord’s Prayer
says it all…
Oh, before I forget, Jools Holland
was particularly good…
In 2006 I realized just how valuable Glasto 2000 had been for me. Its all about how you interpret it.
OK, I kicked up a fuss that my life
became more difficult, but I understand life better now, warts and all.
Bring it on!
