WOMAD, the World of Music Art and Dance celebrates ten years at Rivermead in flamboyant style.
Emerging from Reading station, it was easy to tell who had come for WOMAD and who had come for the Reading match against Newcastle United. Those in coloured polyester turned left, waved their scarves and chanted loudly in huge groups. Those in tie-dyed hemp turned right, waved their sarongs and played their drums as they set off towards the Rivermead Leisure complex by the Thames. But it wasn’t just about attire - there was a different attitude, too, and one which would prove more and more important as the weekend wore on.
Rivermead Leisure Complex is a funny place. Remember the place you used to go for swimming lessons when you were 12? It’s exactly like that; all exposed airducts and green lino. Oh, and a huge world music festival. The Rivermead staff (in matching purple polo shirts, a la the Brittas Empire) looked slightly bemused at the sight of 17,000 festival-goers with dirty feet queuing up for flushable toilets, showers and chilled Marsbars from the dispenser. I think I would have done too. A group of kids who were obviously making the most of being dragged along to WOMAD on the first weekend of the school holidays fought loudly over the driving simulators and computer games in the leisure centre lobby.
But outside, a different world. In the blazing sunshine, hundreds of silk flags fluttered gently in the breeze. These flags are characteristic of the event and time and again throughout the day I was reminded that just looking at them made you feel cooler. Other festivals’ essential accessories included wings and cowboy hats. Although WOMAD had its fair share of both, the general rule seemed to be to wear as many colours as possible, preferably in an ethnic garment. The WOMAD nomads are a rainbow people.
Or so they would have you believe.
One of the accusations that has been levelled at WOMAD festivals is that they provide an opportunity for white, middle-class suburbanites to go ethnic for the weekend. This is something that can definitely be seen at WOMAD festivals, although it’s also possible to see a broad minority of committed music enthusiasts. For the majority, however, WOMAD represents a chance to explore the world musically for the price of a weekend ticket and a couple of nights in a tent. It’s a comfortable sort of cultural exploration, and at times it can seem slightly patronising. There’s a stark contrast in operation; the audience is mostly white, British and middle class; the performers on stage are either colourful exotic foreigners or westerners with a talent for playing music from elsewhere - or fusing western influences with others. Is WOMAD another symptom of the current trend for lusting after a cultural heritage we no longer possess - or have never possessed?
The first thing that hits you about WOMAD is the relaxed atmosphere and open attitude which along with the perfect weather, contributed to an exceedingly groovy weekend in the home counties. Really, if these festival-goers were any more laid back, they’d be lying down - which probably explains why many of them were to be found reclining, counting clouds to the beat.
It’s hard to think about reviewing the many and varied acts that appeared at WOMAD over the weekend. Many people commented that they hadn’t come to see any specific artist, but that what drew them was the general atmosphere. In this way WOMAD was a lot like a huge international buffet - the audience is invited to sample a morsel, then move on. Individually, each dish served up does not make a full meal on its own, but the combination is more than satisfying. Performances were held in a number of marquees and outdoor stages, and most of the time, the audience seemed to be satisfied not to watch the performers, but to chat, read, eat, treat the music as pleasing background noise and generally lie back and think of anywhere but England.
In general, many of the musical highlights of the festival were unexpected discoveries - bands like Bloqu� from Colombia who play “psycho-tropical funk” got the audience bopping within seconds. Hardcore political rappers FunMental followed an inspiring set by the Rizwan-Muazzam Qawwali Group, and brought home another WOMAD truth: Where else could the transition between Sufi devotional chanting and politically charged hip-hop be so seamless? Opening with controversial and hard-hitting tack Rape (is a weapon of war), FunMental attacked the stage with raw energy while members of the Qawwali group could be clearly seen grooving along in the background.
Meanwhile, in the green room, home of the infamous candlelit cabaret, the De Ramos Capoeira group put on an amazing show of acrobatics, contortion and martial art, combined with insane stunts like performing backflips over four upright and nervous-looking audience members. Marcel, the athletic Brazilian responsible for these stunts joked before the performance “I am a little bit scared. If I land on my head I might get brain damage. Again”
As predicted, Afro Celt Sound System proved to be a highlight of the WOMAD weekend, along with Billy Bragg, the packed Baka Beyond workshop, Bangarra Dance Studio and Asian Dub Foundation. DJ Monkey Pilot provided the soundtrack to the uplifting and energetic Whirl-y-gig dance experience in the evenings, but most festival-goers we talked to seemed to agree that there were some inspiring discoveries to be made, too, where you’d least expect them. The Blind Boys of Alabama knew their stuff and impressed the whole audience with their skill and sheer style. During a set by Brave Old World, a Klezmer collective specialising in Jewish music from all over the world, the energised audience danced in circles in the dust at the front of the stage. There were no crush barriers underneath the stage. Maybe that’s because none of the acts merit that kind of fanaticism. Maybe that’s because it’s a much more civilised festival. But maybe because the audience need that room to dance. Incidentally, in the middle of the Klezmer set, a guy in a Manic Street Preachers jacket staggered over and beerily informed me that they should sing songs from Palestine afterwards, and not “all this Israeli shit”. Nice, tolerant attitude, there. Unsurprisingly, he was on his own, in more ways than one.
The audience is also very fluid (no, not sweaty - although we were that too). There’s much less of the “I want to see X and Z but I’ll sit through Y ‘coz I don’t want to lose this spot” than goes on at more mainstream festivals. Part of this is due to some ingenious programming of events. There are a number of performance spaces, but performances are rarely successive in one location. This means that there is a regular movement of the people. In between performances on stage, those who choose to remain in the sun, waiting for the next act were entertained with spontaneous performances by drummers, acoustic, amateur and authentic, members of the audience beating out their appreciation of the festival.
A note on drummers: they were everywhere. Perhaps as a result of so many stalls selling everything from cheap bongos to hefty djembes, WOMAD seems to be populated with a beat generation and a half. It’s only too easy to tell those who have recently purchased their congas - they seem to spend most of the day furiously tapping out variations of the same rhythm, surrounded by a group of similar newcomers to the art. Those with the natural skill and ease which comes from years of playing tend to either be on stage, or are satisfied with random private bursts of brilliance from the back of food stalls. In the official programme there’s a special note, sandwiched between “camping” and “fires”: “DRUMMING: yes, we know this is a WOMAD festival where drumming is part of the entertainment, but please do not drum on the campsite after 12 midnight�. Persistent drummers will have their drums confiscated.” Aw, they’re no fun. Mind you, I was pretty tempted to confiscate a few myself - for crimes against rhythm.
The routes between the stages are lined with hundreds of food stalls and the “global market” - a veritable bizarre bazaar of goods from around the world, as well as the more usual festival fare. Selling everything from Afghan spice-boxes to rather tasteless afro wigs and from herbal highs to hemp clothing, these stalls entertained a constant stream of sweaty punters with money to spend. As usual, there were a lot of purchases made in the heat of the moment, probably to be regretted later. Funny how sarongs on men are great in theory and WOMAD and yet just don’t go down so well on the Tube on a Monday morning. Food also played a large part in the enjoyment of WOMAD, although the standard was probably better than at other festivals - and more expensive, accordingly. Purely in the interests of research, of course, we sampled quesadillas from Mexico, organic sausages, spicy bean burgers and greek chicken - and an awful lot of icecream. Many thirsty WOMAD nomads were satiated by frozen yoghurt, sangria and buckets of wheatjuice. But damn, it was hot. Really, really hot. Anyone with the forethought to buy a job-lot of sunscreen and iced water would have cleaned up at WOMAD this year. But instead, there were an awful lot of burnt and sweaty folk boogying in the sunshine as well as, I imagine, an awful lot of uncomfortable journeys home.
Ivan, lead singer with Columbian group Bloqu� insists that music forces the mind to be open. If that’s the case, then WOMAD is the ultimate celebration of the open mind - an exhaltation of an ever-shrinking world in the heart of a very English summer. It was a world festival for sure - one made smaller by communication and participation which, of course, meant the use of the mobile phone alongside the tin whistle and bongo drum. The genre classification ‘World Music’ is problematic as it seems to encompass music produced or influenced outside our Western pop mainstream - everything from Torres Strait fertility dances to one of the highest grossing acts in Columbia. There’s no way that these acts can be lumped together in such a convenient, marketing-friendly way. Maybe it’s time to get away from limiting classifications such as ‘World Music’ and return to the idea of a world of music, arts and dance, from which WOMAD was originally conceived. And although we might lose a few suburbanite weekend xenophiles along the way, is that really any great loss?
