From the title of this post, and from the fact that the first thing I did was work on a dissertation draft, you probably won't get how much fun was had yesterday - unless, of course, you're a (British) child of the 90s and the early 00s. Then you'll know immediately that it's a reference to the title of a Busted song and, from there, you might just guess what I was up to...maybe! Haha.
For those of you who haven't/won't have guessed, I spent the afternoon and evening in Hyde Park at the British Summer Time festival (which could not have been more aptly named, as it turned out, but more on that later) watching McBusted (Busted and McFly combined) and the Backstreet Boys! The Backstreet Boys. Before I get effusive to the point of incoherence, though (and because I want to be able to explain things properly), I'm going to start at the beginning and work through the day - minus the dissertation, naturally, despite it taking over my morning!
So. I was in the company of my dear friend Hattie (Heather, not Harriet - she wears hats a lot) who came up to stay from Surrey. It was an exciting day for us both, because Hattie had never been to a gig, and I'd never been to a festival. Things to tick off our lists - literally, in Hat's case, because she turns thirty at the end of the month and has a list of the thirty things she wants to do before then. I think she's down to the last four now.
Anyway (because Hat will hunt me down if I talk too much about her) we were super excited, and kept giggling like schoolgirls in the car on the way there. I suppose that was allowed, really, because the day would be filled with the music we listened to while we were at school - hence the choice of title for this post. It was only when we arrived and Mama very kindly dropped us off, though, that the excitement really began - because we realised just how well thought through the access facilities for the event had been. We had arranged a spot on the wheelchair viewing platform, but we didn't expect there to be golf buggies with ramps (ramps!) to ferry us there. I'd never seen them before - mostly you can only use buggies if you can transfer out of your chair - and was really impressed! I felt like I was in South Africa staying with my cousins and that we were on safari, not in the middle of London. Thanks, Hyde Park!
Once inside the festival, we were told where to go to get wristbands (yay wristbands!) that would allow us into the accessible area, and we clocked just how many people there were. The vibe was incredible, and we were still only by the entry gate, nowhere near our allocated spot. The sky was an amazing blue, the sun was streaming down, and it all seemed rather surreal. Wristbands on, we found our way to the platform, where we also found my friend Savannah, who had managed to use her guest pass to sneak in and say hello. She was there with her best friend Gi, wife of Tom (one of the guys in McFly), and their new baby Buzz, who was chilling out somewhere in the shade with his noise-cancelling earphones on. It was lovely to catch up (Sav's currently very busy being her brilliant self and playing Glinda in the West End production of Wicked) with a backdrop of the music of The Vamps, who were new to me but great. We took what I think is my first ever selfie:
Which prompted Hat and I to try and take one of the two of us, as well:
From the above photo you'll also be able to gauge the size of the viewing platform. This was another reason to be impressed - we had thought that there would be room for maybe three or four wheelchair users, because that's usually the maximum capacity in most venues, but I'm sure there were about thirty of us (maybe even fifty!), plus our chosen companions. That was great, because it meant that we had the same vibe in our little section as there seemed to be everywhere else - people mucking around, doing silly dances, and generally having a wonderful time - and that was before the Backstreet Boys came on!
When they did, Hat and I did a quick calculation, and worked out that most of the people with whom we were sharing the platform probably weren't born when the band formed. This fact was confirmed about halfway through the hourlong set when they mentioned that they started out in 1993 - when Hat was nine and I nearly two. But, apart from making us feel old, having missed out the first time around didn't seem to impact the fourteen-year-olds at the front from enjoying themselves immensely - it would appear that nineties pop music transcends time and age. We, of course, completely revelled in the nostalgia. As Long As You Love Me and I Want it That Way played and I was right back at primary school. Their new stuff was good, obviously, but not quite the same - and we were worried for a while that they'd leave out Everybody (Backstreet's Back) in favour of publicising the new album. I'd forgotten that that's one of the oldest tricks in the book when it comes to gigs, though, to leave the best for last. So we got to witness the dance that we had both spent hours (separately) trying to learn:
Which was a good thing too because, by this point, it had already poured with rain several times - as you can see from the few pictures below - but we didn't mind. It's sort of a prerequisite of a British festival, hence my comment earlier about this one having a particularly apt name, so we felt we'd been truly inducted. It gave us the opportunity to muck around in the break between acts with the puddles that had developed on the platform, and to take the last of the photos in the group below. That's how much water there was - we could see our reflections!
One of the things I didn't expect at all about the festival experience was how quickly the time went. I had thought the five hours that we were there (from 5-10pm) would feel like an age but, after we'd taken those photos and had a catch up, there were about five minutes until McBusted were due on. And then they duly arrived, flying in on a car, in beautiful homage to their mutual inspiration, Back to the Future.
Now, my twenty-two-year-old self did have a moment of wondering whether I should be quite as excited as I was about watching this lot live. I've never been a fangirling type of person, so my enthusiasm surprised me. It was as though I was ten and twelve again - but then I realised this was precisely why I should be excited, because hearing the music of these two bands again allowed me a glimpse back into the past, as well as forward into the future. It struck me as especially apt that it was both rainy and sunny at the same time, too, because (to use that favoured device of literature students everywhere, pathetic fallacy) the jumble of weather mirrored my mixed up emotions. I wasn't sure whether to laugh or to cry, because the memories were so vivid. From the moment the first notes of Air Hostess rang out, until we heard the final chords of Year 3000, I was back at secondary school discos and dancing with my friend Vicky. Boyfriends forgotten for a bit, we would rock out in sisterly solidarity, trying our best to look 'cool' (whatever that was) with our bottle green uniforms and our attempts at dancing in our chairs. I found myself filled with giggles at the things we did, all these years later, whilst also being very sad that we wouldn't be doing them again. A lot can happen in just over a decade, it turns out - not only can bands break up and reform, but friends can pass away. That said, my overwhelming feeling was of joy, because the music gives me such a powerful and long lasting link to my dear friend - as well as a reminder that it's possible to move onward and upward without forgetting, and that she would hopefully be proud of me for doing so. Here, again, the weather matched with what I was thinking - and, indeed, with the music. About halfway through the gig, just as the bands began to play McFly's breakout hitFive Colours in Her Hair, a glorious double rainbow appeared above the stage. It was perfect, for the song and for Vicky.
It was also just what I needed to bring me back into the present, grinning and hopeful, to bop my way through the rest of the night. I sang along to every single song, the lyrics as familiar as bedtime stories, although they were brought up to date brilliantly with the use of emojis and things as subtitles - and a very cleverly incorporated clip of Tom's groom's speech in the introduction to Crashed the Wedding. Then there was the casual transition to the flying saucer, of course...! And the flames picking out the name of the joint venture, McBusted enshrined in fire. Just, you know, because that's what one does when one plays to over 50,000 people in Hyde Park, I suppose. That, and pretend to start your set all over again, before finishing on a high with that quintessential tune of the year 2000 - Year 3000 - because it would seem that it's human nature that once we reach one milestone we're already looking forward to the next.
It. Was. Ace. (The sci-fi didn't end with the concert, either, because we got to ride back in the dusk in one of those awesomely accessible golf buggies. Yeah!)
So. This has been a massively (and overly) long post about a massively (and overwhelmingly) amazing day. Apologies for rambling, but I hope you got a sense of just how great it was.
I'd like to end by saying a huge thank you - to Hattie for coming, to Sav for the catch up, and to the McBusted gang for being brilliant. Without wanting to be too OTT, you gave me the soundtrack to my teenage years, and I'll never forget that. You really were what I went to school for.
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