Victorious Festival 2014, Portsmouth Review
Victorious Festival
Southsea, Portsmouth
23-24 August 2014
Reviewed by Zoe Wild
I was very excited to hear that I’d been picked to review the Victorious Festival in Portsmouth. I love live music and as I have 2 young children, I don’t get to indulge very often any more. My husband and I decided to ship the children out on the Saturday so that we could enjoy the care free grown up aspect for at least some of it! The festival didn’t disappoint. We entered to find an abundance of interesting eateries from gourmet burgers to a cocktail garden. As we passed the Crochet WW1 tank we could hear the first act warming up getting ready to play to the crowd which was already quite impressive, so we headed over to Castle Stage for our first bar queue and to check out what was going on. Luckily, the bar we found was a cash bar although the queues were huge and it took a while to get to the front, the staff were friendly under pressure. Away we went with our drinks towards a tent playing some really great dance music and here we settled awhile on a hay bale. The atmosphere was easy and companionable and the sun was shining bright, everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves around us. As the afternoon drew on we decided to check out the silent disco tent. As we entered we were each handed a set of headphones and led in to the big top. Our ears were assaulted with a fantastic 80’s and 90’s pop/rock playlist and as you can imagine the dancing and singing (as close as it gets anyway), commenced. The dj’s spoke to us all through the headphones and got as many people as possible involved in singing chorus’ and Mexican waves. They really added to the party spirit. As we made our way to the front of the tent the new wave of listeners joined the back with another playlist on another headphone channel.
We decided to go find another drink and stumbled upon the real ale tent. Unfortunately this was one of the tents in which you had to join an infinite queue to purchase tokens to then join another long queue to then buy your drink so we gave this a miss and had a wander around the market section. There were lots of things to look at including vintage and antique stalls to homemade soap sellers and massage stalls. All this was amongst the small fair that had been set up for the occasion. With a mission in mind for dinner and then maybe a visit to the cocktail garden we bypassed the acoustic stage and went on exploring. Delicious burrito in hand we joined the queue for our cocktail (a fruit cider mojito) and found a rare free bench to enjoy them. After, we headed over to the seaside stage to see what was going on passing a few extra enticing music tents on the way. Our evening carried on in much the same way until it was too cold and time to start the long trek via public transport home.
We found everyone friendly and helpful and most of the facilities were as clean and as tidy as you’d expect. With the enlisted help of a group of young kids and teenagers the common stayed uncluttered by paper pint cups, which they were collecting up and cashing in.
Day two was a little more stressful as you can imagine it would be with a 4 year old in tow! We decided to use the park and ride for the first time ever and as we were unsure how to do this we ended up at the wrong parking site. Unfortunately although there were signs saying to use the lakeside park and ride. It was very basic and having never used the p&r before we assumed that this meant there were 2 buses running, one marked ‘lakeside.’ this wasn’t the case however and we had to pile back into the car and drive back up the motorway to another site. At which there were only coin payment machines and we had to hunt for the change to make up the fair. Once achieved and seated on the bus we began our journey skipping through all of the heavy traffic and within 15 minutes we arrived at the festival. My very excited 4 year old boy was overwhelmed by the initial choice of sugar rush items from flavoured slushies to marshmallow ropes. We took him into the sand pit to build a few castles and then we moved on to the acoustic stage where he was happy to sit and listen to a very talented group of young ladies playing indie covers. From there we went through the funfair and markets and spent most of our afternoon in the kids arena. There was so much for him to do from bouncy castles to salt dough modelling. He especially liked the paperboy making and proceeded to puppeteer his creation for the rest of the day. We went in search of dinner over by the Castle Stage and sat listening to the music for a while before making our way home.
I found the whole event a very enjoyable experience with lots of activities and side shows happening all through, to cater for everyone’s tastes. The facilities were basic but mostly clean. If you choose to go next year be prepared for long queues in places and although the ticket price was very reasonable the prices to eat and drink were very expensive and we did manage to part with more money than we’d expected. The activities for kids were great but I did find that this meant we missed most of the bands on Sunday. All of the stages were easy to navigate and all of the bands we saw on each stage were entertaining in their own style.
Congratulation to Portsmouth city council and their events team for providing such a great festival. Indeed it was victorious!
Rating: 4.5/5
For more information or to book early bird tickets for 29-30 August 2015 visit www.victoriousfestival.co.uk.
