Different festivals attract different tribes, but there are some people so annoying that they go beyond musical genre and geographical location. Here’s our trusty guide to the kind of twats that can be found at almost every type of festival this summer.
The Insta-Blagger
Everyone knows a girl who is inexplicably ‘big on Instagram’, never pays for anything and pretends to forget your name every time she meets you. A festival provides the perfect amphitheatre for this girl’s hobbies, which – other than blagging – are namely amateur dramatic boyfriend stealing, international travel and recreational hard drug taking.
The first rule about the blagger is that they’re always rich enough to afford everything they blag. They appear at the festival as if from nowhere, since it’s impossible to imagine them on any form of transport (although they may have got an Uber half-way across the country). Once at the festival, they prove groupidom is alive and well, instantly making their way backstage with some anonymous bassist who they’ll desert once on the other side. From then on out it’s all ‘festi-chic’ and Instagram pictures of them doing the peace sign with Nick Grimshaw. Unfollow.
The New-Age Spiritualist
Ranging from ‘boho mum’ and people who look like extras from Merlin to people who look like talking rocks, new-age spiritualists seem harmless until they start getting evangelical about things like reiki and acupuncture. The best way to avoid them is to not go to Shambala. But if you do get cornered by one, try not to take anything they say too seriously. They’ll try to convince you to boycott modern medicine and campaign against capitalism but the truth is when they’re not wearing their druid gear at festivals and hawking magic mushrooms, they’re definitely working as civil servants and shopping in Tesco.
The Weekend Warrior
The people with the most boring jobs are often the ones who try the hardest to go ‘fucking mental’ in their free time. These onesie-wearing marketing execs are trapped in a time warp. All they want is to go back to being a carefree geography student at Bristol, downing Jägerbombs with reckless abandon. Now their fun has been contracted into weekend benders and 2C-B fuelled festival blowouts. Best identified as adults with glowsticks, hi vis and whistles, they’re relentlessly friendly and will inevitably try to drag you into conversation. Stand still, try to act as dull as possible, and they will soon grow bored of you and leave to hear some Summer Bangers on the main stage.
The Middle Class Wanker over 30
Alright, so maybe you won’t find one of these at Download or Reading, but they’ve infiltrated just about every other festival on the summer calendar. Not satisfied with staying at home in their slip-on shoes doing posh things like barbecuing seafood, these guys are booking tickets for the increasing number of festivals that have yoga and spoken word in the line up. Whilst you can scarcely fit your four-man tent in the back of your Vauxhall Corsa, they drive their empty estate cars down an A road of ignorance to where a pre-booked yurt awaits.
It’s a known fact that by day three of a festival everyone looks like a pestilent swamp monster, but the middle class wanker over 30 walks around looking like the Boden catalogue, splashing out on trendy street food whilst you subsist off carrots, Heineken and a soggy pitta. You probably wouldn’t mind if it was just them boring their eyes into you and judging you but they have the nerve to bring their children with them, too.
The Shameless Exhibitionist
Foam fingers, comedy hats, thongs... glitter body paint instead of clothes… What’s most annoying about attention seeking at festivals is that it’s usually so premeditated – they actually went out and bought all this stuff a week before they arrived! With their Afro wigs and Indian headdresses they make flower crowns and bindis seem like tame forms of cultural appropriation. Bestival exists for a reason, and it’s so that all the people who like fancy dress can be exiled off to an island together.
The Lad On Tour (but at a festival)
Despite what the stench of Lynx, testosterone and ketamine might suggest, adolescent idiots at festivals can really range anywhere from 13 to 30 years old. And they want to ruin the fun for everyone: pissing down the side of your tent, nicking your beers and punching you in the ‘mosh pit’ (yes, they will still hit you if you’re a girl; and yes, these are the people who actually listen to Skrillex).
There are two types, depending on the kind of festival you’re at. The first wears snap backs and quilted jackets and does the gun symbol. The other is a sweaty, curtain-haired creep in slogan T-shirts that say ‘Lesbian trapped in a man’s body’. Both types of ‘lad’ come into their own on the last night of the festival, when shit gets all apocalyptic. Nothing screams ‘twat’ louder than setting fire to a gas canister, apart from giving three girls in one weekend chlamydia. Avoid.
Follow Amelia on Twitter @MillyAbraham
Picture: Sophie Davidson
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.