A Visit To The Back 2 Festival At Catton Park
Published On Sunday 7 Aug 2022 by Sticky Beak
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I have found a way to turn time back time in the absence of a DeLorean; the ‘Back2Festival’ at Catton Hall and Park!!! The Man Bird and I were kindly invited along to this James Dean events-organised festival celebrating the 1980s and 1990s, undoubtedly the era of some brilliant tunes.
Thanks to clear signs and slick team members, we soon found ourselves pulling into a space in the appropriate car park and followed the other eager festival goers to the entrance where, yet again, the organisation ensured a swift, secure entry to the site proper. An area filled with fairground rides was the first thing we walked through and I made His Nibs promise me a go on the Waltzers later! Any festival regulars will know that the ‘facilities’ are of utmost importance and the Back2Festivals organisers had got a whole bank of them; whilst we were passing I ‘squeezed a drop’, just to be sure, y’know!!
It’s no secret that I’m a total glutton, so it’s pretty much a given that food is always in my thoughts; imagine my happiness, then, when all around me were stalls serving all manner of temptations. As well as pizzas, burgers and chips there were brownies, blondies, sweets, fish n chips and scrummy sounding tear ‘n’ share garlic bread. Being the sociable peeps that we are, The Man and I wandered over to say hello to the traders that were setting up.
One particular stall was a nattily decorated converted horse box selling the aforementioned garlic bread, and it was one of those particularly photogenic stands that just grabbed our attention. We bought some of the bread later to keep us going, and it was so good that we actually had it twice; the marinara sauce that came in a separate pot with it was absolutely amazing as well!! When you nail such a basic thing as garlic bread and marinara sauce, it really is a thing of beauty; bursting with taste and enthusiasm yet dead easy to deal with, which is what you want from festival food, isn’t it?
When we’d finished our initial recce we bagged ourselves the ubiquitous festival item, the rain poncho. Thankfully we only needed it a handful of times throughout the whole day and night, and there was just the single heavy shower so we got off quite lightly I think. I felt sorry for Scouting For Girls because it happened to tip it down during their set; they were so good though that no-one paid the inclemency much attention! In the interest of keeping ourselves warm, The Man and I headed off for a superb Wood fired Pizza and portion of chips – worked a treat too, they did!
The Back2Festival2022 at Catton Park was a family friendly event and we sat behind a family with possibly two of the cutest, smiliest young girls you could wish to meet; the youngest one was hilarious to watch (especially when one of the later acts dropped the ‘F-Bomb’!) – her reaction was priceless. The Hostess with the most was the fantastic Dahliah Rivers; no slump in the energy here thanks to her quick wit and lightning commentary, so condragulations, Dahliah, on your efforts. His Nibs and I were enthusiastically reliving our glory days, me probably more so as I bopped along to the likes of Culture Beat (Mr Vain was number one when I returned from my travels to Chicago), Jenny Berggren of Ace of Base and Sybil – both of those ladies can belt out the tunes, that’s for sure.
Fatman Scoop did a set that was, quite frankly, blazing hot, and we all whooped and hollered along with him and his DJ. It was a close call that he made it to the festival: the team had been up until the early hours (sunrise, really) rescheduling flights for the artists. 25 of 90 flights had been cancelled, and sadly some of the booked acts couldn’t make it – can you imagine the headache trying to deal with all of that??!! Props to the festival team for making so much of it happen though!! Slick security and a dedicated first aid area further added to the professional delivery of this superb festival.
When Scoop had done his set there was a sudden outpouring of folks; we all went to use the loo and stock up on food and drink (we got some mega-delish triple choc brownies from the lovely Ruth at the Absolutely Scrumptious Cake Company – yum!!!) before the headline act of the evening, Steps (eeeeeeeek!!!!) began their set. And what a set it was; pyrotechnics, confetti cannons and multi-coloured light shows all contributed to a truly amazing performance that was chock-full of their dance floor filling hits.
Respectful of their neighbours, there was an 11pm curfew on live music but the dance tent was still going for those who were now in full-flow, so to speak. The fairground was also still open and the skyline was filled with neon lights and the outline of the rides as they span round. We’d had a great day and were still buzzing as we drove home in the jalopy; it took us quite a while to ‘come down’ enough to eventually get some kip!
Massive thanks to James Dean Events and We Are Plaster PR (Corinna in particular) for inviting us along as your guests.
Find out more about The Back 2 Festival 2023 on their web site
See a few more of our photos from the day below.
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