Fuji Rock Festival 2008

Getting there...
We left Tokyo on the 19:05 Seibu express way bus [西武高速バス - せいぶ・こうそく・ばす] which cost a meagre* 5400yen return and took us just under 3 hours to get to the Yuzawa [湯沢] bus stop. Despite printing out the map of the bus stop location (in relation to Echigo-Yuzawa station [越後湯沢駅] where the free festival site shuttle bus ran from) from both Google maps and the Seibu bus website we felt a bit lost when we got to the bus stop. The bus stop was just off the highway and not particularly near the town. On the brightside there were 3 other pairs of people looking as bemused as we were when we reached the bus stop. We hung around for a couple of minutes searching for inspiration and possibly some leadership, and then all decided to wonder off in the direction of the signs to Yuzawa town. This involved, first of all, walking down a dark set of stairs to get us safely off the motorway. The maps around the bus stop weren't too bad...and after walking a while we just had to head for the huge, brightly-lit, concrete monstrosity which is the (Echigo) Yuzawa train station. Which all in all took us about 30mins. Even before getting to the front of the station we pasted several flags proclaiming the arrival of the Fuji Rock Festival. As we walked up to the front of the station we could clearly see two tents for the festival - an information point and a first aid tent (should you have been a little overexcited on the journey to Echigo-Yuzawa) and a queue for the free shuttle bus to the festival site. The queue wasn't too bad, and just after we arrived another train load of people arrived...we didn't have to wait long for another bus to turn up...they seemed pretty frequent...I'd say, less than 5mins between buses, but it was pretty packed when we did get on, so we stood, with our luggage, for the 40min bus ride, with someone's trolley bag ramming into my legs every time we turned left sharply.

The site was very lively when we arrived, and tents were already being pitched at very strange angles on the ski-resort slopes. After walking up the hill for 2minutes I was already grumbling to Greg that I didn't want to go much further, but he miraculously managed to find a free flat piece of land close to the pavement hiding in between some tents and just behind a little area someone had saved for their friends using some packaging tape on grass - a method which works surprisingly well. I should also mention, there was a special area cordoned off just for ladies, with a member of staff standing, well sitting, guard at the entrance.

*The price of a Shinkansen [新幹線] ticket is currently set at the hefty sum of 6980yen from Tokyo, Ueno [上野] station without a seat reservation ONEWAY (7490yen with a seat reservation). Double the one way ticket for the return price.

A clearing in the woods on the way to the white stage, with a disco ball....the light was reflecting beautifully off onto the surrounding trees. A big display of candles in a fabric covered dome at the end of the Organic hippy type stage...

Festival Etiquette...
AnyHoooo, the festival. yes. Fantastic stuff, lovely atmosphere, and all my belongings felt safe. No fear of having stuff in the tent, or the tent it's self, stolen. AND you can happily reserve your little spot in front of the stage by plonking down your folding chair or your nice plastic 'leisure sheet' in the desired location, in full knowledge that people will not 1. nick it, 2. move it or 3. trample all over it. I love Japan.
We also noticed it is perfectly acceptable to sleep on the huge grass field that was the green stage, even in the rain - we saw people in a full Gortex outfit, lying on their soaked mat, with some rudimentary plastic sheeting to protect the face trying to get shut eye. How they managed to get rest through the loud music, I don't know. They either couldn't be bothered to go to the tent or they didn't have one and didn't care. Amusing none the less.

Eco Festival...
The festival was also gloriously clean (and green). The portaloos were actually more pleasant than the permanent loos close to the camp site, ok a tiny bit muddy on the floor, but plenty of toilet paper (at least there was every time that I went) and even some places where there were specific urinals for men and women only toilets. Lots of collection points for rubbish and recycling, a system run by 'A Seed Japan'. We noticed that food was dispensed in very similar paper material from all vendors, and drinks all came in paper cups. These were all recycled, as were cigarette packets, PET bottles, plastic bottle tops and cans. Just after you enter the festival site, there were volunteers handing out large plastic bags with a variety of designs on them - they looked pretty good actually and described the recycling process...or where all the items you were going to be throwing away would be going... The bags were for your rubbish (but also doubled as rain jackets for some people during the festival or something to sit on or a rain cover for bags and belongings) happened to be made from recycled PET bottles, and were handed out so that you didn't litter everywhere, even though you never seemed to be more than a stones throw from a rubbish collection point.

Walking around the festival site: (left) big inflatable stars which flashed different colours at night, and (right) a river running through the site, where some people have placed brightly painted stones with eyes on them, you can see all the Japanese in their festival chic...crocs - sandal and wellie form seemed to dominate the footwear here.

Getting from stage to stage...

The Festival was quite spread out...a couple of minutes walk from the middle of the camp site to the camp site entrance where all the washing and toilet facilities were, along with two food stalls, which included a small convenience stand...like if you needed to buy a toothbrush or a crappy rain jacket or ladies sanitation items. The entrance to the festival site was another couple of minutes walk from the entrance of the camp site... then it takes you about 20mins to walk from end to end of the festival site. But to be honest, most of the main stages; Green stage, Red Marquee and White stage were the first three stages you come across anyway.

Queues for Merchandise...
While it was true that there were longer queues for the merchandise tents than the beer tents, this was only true at the beginning of the festival for the first thursday - at the official merchandise tent near the wristband exchange point and for the friday on the first festival day. There are several reasons for this, 1. The Japanese - especially the more experienced ones - are very organised and can often be seen wheeling in cold boxes with pre-prepared drinks and snacks into the festival sites (although cans and glass bottles were not allowed for safety reasons). 2. There were an ample amount of beer tents, so no shortage of supply - nearly every stall which sold food also sold alcohol. 3. The Official T-shirts for Fuji Rock had a huge range of designs, and some very nicely done so that you could happily wear it as a fashion item as opposed to just being another rough T-shirt. 4. There were only a limited number of T-shirts and popular designs sell out quickly (the main reason for there being nearly no queues for the merchandise stalls on the last two days.

The Music...
The Music did actually play...but we didn't see them. In fact we were rather lazy and didn't see most of the things on offer from Fuji Rock past 11pm...like the DJ events in 'late night fuji' or 'Rookie-a-go-go'. Anyway, here is a quick run down of the major bands that we did see (along with some random photos):

Gossip - Despite being on at 1520 in the red marquee there was a crazy crowd who went absolutely mad for Beth Ditto.

Album recordings do not do Beth Ditto's voice justice, the woman has incredible power and tune. She did complain about being hot and stripped off to her underwear at the beginning of the show and at some point wore a towel round her head. But despite the heat she still gave a stunning performance. The atmosphere in the small stage was great, just like a small gig. They mixed in a bit of Pixies - monkey gone to heaven and even Madonna - like a virgin very smoothly during the intro to their other songs.

(Left) Hard-Fi and (Right) Asian Dub Foundation

The Zutons on White stage

A tree with eyes!!! and Benfolds in the rain.

Benfolds was great, but we did manage to get caught in a thunderous downpour which completely soaked every one...we decided to give up on that sunday and go back to the tent to dry off...