Hyde Park Calling Festival Review

Hyde Park Calling Festival Review.

As a festival Hyde Park Calling always seems to pull in some massive acts, with last years headliners The Who and Roger Waters and then this years joint headliners Crowded House, Peter Gabriel and then the mighty Aerosmith.

Most people would think that with these monumental acts that Hyde Park Calling would be a great festival; however the truth is quite different.

The venue is brilliant, the positioning, the transport systems around, the hotels in the vicinity etc, but when you get in there it's like the site has just been thrown together to make money and not to make it a good festival experience.

I will now break the festival arena down into specific areas to give a low down on each:

Standing Area

The standing area is very large and spread out, which allows a lot of room near the back, but if you want to get to the front, like with most gigs, it can get quite cramped.  The stage seems quite low so views aren't always that great.  Also the entrance is to the left of the stage (when looking directly at it), which means it is very compact over to the right and moving around to the back and to the right of the stage can be a long walk as you have to battle through the crowds.

Sound

The sound at Hyde Park concerts used to be really really bad.  They seem to have resolved this; however right at the back of the venue the sound is still quite quiet.

Food Stalls

The queue's for food at the Hyde Park Calling festival this year were very long and there didn't seem to be that many food stalls at all which didn't help.  I know someone who waited 30 minutes to get some food.

Merchandise Stalls / Market Stalls

The queue's for the merchandise stalls were also very long.  However if you went during some of the bands then it wasn't as hard to get served.  I waited at one stall for 20 minutes and no one in front of me had been served so I gave up.  Then I walked to the next stall and it only took 5 minutes to get server.  The Aerosmith merchandise had pretty much run out by 5pm and I could only get an extra large shirt as that was the only size they had left.  Thankfully I was able to shrink the shirt to fit by washing it and sticking it in the tumble dryer for an hour.

As for Market stalls there just weren't any, no stalls to go around and no random things to buy.

Programmes

£5 for 4 small doubled sided pieces of card 1 of which was just advertising.  A pure money spinner and the only way (unless you went to the website prior to the day) to know what time and where bands would be playing.

Toilets

Simple answer to this one.  Not enough.  If you are a bloke then you are ok, but if you are a female then you will have long waits.  My girlfriend spent 30 minutes waiting.

Bars

Plenty, which might have been the reason for the large queue's at the toilets.

Stages

Three stages, all within close proximity of each other which means you can stage hop quite easily.  However I heard that the second stage at this year's festival for the headliner was full and several hundred people didn't manage to get in to watch.

It didn't make sense that the second stage was right next to the entrance, so if you wanted to walk there you had to pass all the people who were entering.  The third stage was near the back of the venue, so if you were watching the main stage from the rear then you would get the sound of the third stage tent as well.

Set Times

The set times were ok, because if you wanted to you could stage hop and see the bands you wanted to and then the other stages headliners do not overlap the main stage headliner.  However for some reason, unknown to everyone at the venue, Aerosmith were only given an hour and a half to play where everywhere else across Europe they have had at least an hour and forty-five minutes, meaning the set was 3-4 songs shorter.

Leaving the Venue

It was very easy to leave the venue, but then if you were travelling by tube then you would have had a wait, especially if you used the Hyde Park Corner tube station, but this is to be expected considering the amount of people wanting to leave at the same time.

Overall Ratings (out of 10)

Standing Area 7 / 10
Sound 7 / 10
Food Stalls 3 / 10
Merchandise Stalls 4 / 10
Market Stalls 1 / 10 (there was a Hard Rock stall)
Programmes 2 / 10
Toilets 2 / 10
Bars 7 / 10
Stages 5 / 10
Set Times 6 / 10 (would have been 9 if Aerosmith had more than an hour and a half to play)
Leaving the Venue 8 / 10
Festival Experience 3 / 10
Festival Atmosphere 4 / 10 (only during Aerosmith was it any good)

Overall Festival Rating

     3 / 10

If you have any questions, comments or stories about the Hyde Park Calling Festival, Aerosmith or any other concerts then email them to me at mike.scoones@thelocalchannel.co.uk.