Creamfields Ireland 2002

By now, club culture has been so thoroughly assimilated by the mainstream that it seems almost absurd to think that it was once viewed by the authorities as representing the end of civilisation as we know it. What it largely means these days is a very handy way for advertisers to target the yoof market.

Down at the main stage at Creamfields, the customary between-act commercials on the video screens have now been joined by adverts during the performances, whilst in furtherance of the commercial imperative, the price has been nicely jacked up on everything from the beer to the tomato sauce sachets. In fact, forget the booster chair-lifts and the bumper cars in the fairground, by far and away the most popular attraction is the ATM cashpoint just down from the main stage. But enough griping – what’s the vibe like? Pretty damn good, to tell you the truth.

As anyone who attended Radiohead’s Big Top tour some time back will recall, the atmosphere in tents can be pretty, er, intense and in the Lust Arena, even in the early evening the mood is nothing short of riotous. Plastic beer-cups are sent flying and clothes discarded as if contaminated with some

contagious virus, as hundreds of revellers groove blissfully to the relentless techno assault rumbling from the speakers.

The space between the Lush and Lust tents serves as a makeshift chill-out area throughout the day, with many of the danced out/boozed out recuperating on the grass (if you’ll pardon the pun). In a sign of the times, the highly visible garda presence stroll through the crowd, only these days you’re far

more likely to see a police officer pose amiably for a photograph than beat down on some smart-arse E-dealer.

In many ways, the cavernous, indoor Bugged Out! arena is the perfect summation of the commodification of dance culture. The sought-after effect is that of the authentic, abandoned-warehouse rave-up, but really it feels like you’re in a museum piece. Four giant replica lightbulbs hang from the

ceiling, the video screen displays all manner of trippy visuals, banners scream “Where It’s Fuckin’ At!” and “Viva Acid House!” but it’s impossible to feel the illicit thrill of it all in such an overwhelmingly corporate environment. Indeed, you come to realise that it’s the classic pop-culture cliché – the leftfield youth movement repackaged and resold as a watered down version of the original.

With such dispiriting thoughts in mind, one can only give thanks for the arrival of headliners Underworld on the outdoor stage, who – not to put too fine a point on it – blow everyone else the fuck away. They deliver

blistering takes on the brilliant new single ‘Two Months Off’, as well as old favourites such as ‘King Of Snake’ and the perennially breath-taking ‘Born Slippy’. So that was Creamfields. Odds are that it will happen again next year, and that a lot of young people will get very drunk, dance a lot and enjoy themselves. And the bars and the merchandise stalls, of course, will really cream it.