Festivals - Part 18

Reading and Leeds Festivals

England's Reading and Leeds Festivals are two rock festivals that are joined.  Both festivals are held on the three-day August bank holiday.  Reading (pronounced redding) is in the south of England and Leeds is in the north, nowhere near each other, but the two festivals feature the same musicians, only on different days.  For example, musicians playing at Reading on Friday play at Leeds on Saturday.

The Reading festival, the older of the two, is the world's oldest pop music festival that is still going on.  It started as a jazz festival in a different city in 1961.  The festival moved to Reading in 1971, and by then it had become a pop and rock festival.

Attendees can camp on the festival grounds.  Above, at the 1973 Reading festival, I'm not quite sure what's going on, but it looks like it involves a stick and a guy's ass.

Some unashamed attendees at the 1975 Reading Festival rise about the crowd.

A naked roadie for the band Wildhearts hands a guitar fo lead vocalist Ginger at the 2004 Reading Festival.

In 1999 the festival added Leeds as a second site.  The 2006 Leeds Festival was notable because Chas Palmer-Williams, singer for the band Lightyear, performed the band's entire set naked.

Lightyear trumpet player Neil Draycott played naked, too.

Draycott also sings.  The band Lightyear had the reputation for playing naked, and they delivered at Leeds.

This 2011 photo came from an article on the Reading and Leeds festivals but did not say which festival the photo was from.  It looks like England's rainy climate produces lots of mud at rock festivals, just like other festivals that we have seen.  Although this guy has a fierce expression, I think he's having fun in the mud.  Grrrr!