2000trees is a small, award winning 15,000 capacity music festival in Cotsworld Hills, England. 3 nights of a camping-only music festival with no signal across the entire site, no WiFi provided, meant a truly communal experience – I only attended the Saturday, the final day of the event, but still had the time of my life – being introduced to the punk scene on a smaller scale outside of the big heavy hitters of Glastonbury and Primavera Sound. The lineup included alternative acts like Bob Vylan, Hot Mulligan (excellent at Werchter the previous weekend) and Boston Manor; more similar at home to Download in scope; the UK’s premier rock festival. Even only on Saturday the 13th for one day I still got to see a plethora of bands, split between multiple stages with a short climb up a muddy hill in between acts. This is an example of how to pack your festival perfectly without overdoing it and ensure that there’s always plenty of things to do.
My Saturday started with a Taxi to the site in which the driver was giving me lectures about Cheltenham’s Roman Roads (I thought the Roman Empire guys were just a meme, but alas!) as we tailed people in punk shirts. 2000trees is a festival that caters to a certain type of demographic, the goths, the punks, the emos, Frank Turner and the Sleeping Souls, kings of the folk punk genre, confirmed this with a nice revival straight out of 2013, playing to a packed crowd with banger after banger promoting their new album Undefeated. Creeper brought the same crowd out as Download; but a smaller, well-organized festival put the attention on the acts to the point where I regretted not turning up on the Wednesday prior. I got there for The Cave, a smallish tent situated immediately at the entrance, for Inhuman Nature, a London-based heavy metal band, who played for 30 minutes before a quick jaunt over to the nearby Axiom stage; a fan-favorite – for Michael Cera Palin, by far the coolest band name at the festival. Their set had difficulty with audio problems but otherwise provided a real gem as an emo band hailing from Atlanta Georgia – marking the truly international state of the festival. They don’t have much music so they couldn’t have played for longer but provided plenty of entertainment – delivering their all to the crowd who turned up early.
Then it was over to Panic Shack, who turned out to be one of my favorites of the festival, and my first encounter with the main stage. Being at the bottom of a hill risked descending into a muddy abyss but the weather held until the evening when it rained during Frank Turner’s set – I’ve brought waterproofs and wellington boots to every festival that I’ve been to this summer but haven’t needed them once. It feels mad saying that given it’s the summer; but this is England, anything’s possible. Belgium the same. Back to Panic Shack though – who played at 2000 Trees two years ago; but were back now on the main stage “look at us… singing about tits” frontwoman Sarah Harvey brought an authentic brand of Welsh delirium to proceedings, their song The Ick giving ultra-specific Icks about would-be dates – he put the milk in first and shushed me at the cinema was a crowd favourite; an easy singalong to I Don’t Wanna Hold Your Baby pumped up the energy. The best part about smaller festivals is discovering new favourite bands – and Panic Shack is no exception.
After that it was back up the hill to the Axiom for Indoor Pets – the constant back and forth of the main stage-Axiom-main stage proved easily walkable and allowed me to clock around 22,000 steps. Pets hailed from Kent with a fierce indie alt rock attitude, and they delighted the crowd on the last day of the festival, most who had come from the Wednesday, heavier but still maintaining their humorous edge. Their return from hiatus after four years including the pandemic is a welcome one – and as a fan of Hi, Barbiturates and Teriyaki, it was a real delight to see them live.
Next up was Dune Rats. Again – back on the main stage. You can guess where this was going. The Australian band bragged that they brought the sun to England for the first time in 100 years, but excluding the heatwaves, it’s probably longer. Their chaotic energy brought the crowd out and gave them the opportunity to try out their costumes – I talked briefly to a guy in a full shark costume who had been wearing it for the day; there were a group riding pop-up dinosaurs, it’s a festival, anything goes here – and that’s the true delight of the UK music scene is that unlike European festivals there is actually the choice to experiment with costumes. Power Rangers were everywhere – at one point; a band member shouted out their favourite, Tommy, and Frank Turner when he came on delighted in interacting with the easy targets.
Men dressed up in banana costumes launched into hectic mosh pits, and Dune Rats kept the crowd entertained before it was back up the hill again for my favourite band of the festival: Press Club, with their fest set of the day, fellow Australian compatriots, who brought about a chaotic, Amyl and the Sniffers-esque punk energy to their set in the smallish Axiom venue. A classic in the making I made sure to get the shirt after the end of their set – the well-stocked merch table with records proved impossible to resist. Press Club debuted in 2017 and followed their single with Late Teens in 2018 and we got to see most of that across their two sets of the day. By album three they took an introspective turn, brought about the COVID-19 pandemic and proved to be a fresh new voice in punk music, with frontwoman Natalie Foster playing to the mosh superbly. Two sets were played that night and I was left wishing I’d caught the second too.
And mosh pits there were!! Every gig had them and every gig had their crowd-surfers, children as young as their early teens were being held aloft by the crowd towards the front of the set, and security had to act fast to pull them down. Festival closers Wargasm encouraged the crowd to beat the record of 7 in the Cave, and the crowd easily smashed that, like a rolling conveyor belt of human flesh. The security played along and ensured the crowd’s safety at all times – making sure that 2000 Trees will go down as one of the safest festivals I’ve ever attended. I never felt at risk in a mosh, and I left my tent unlocked for the whole evening with valuables inside and they weren’t stolen. Perhaps the only downside was the clash between headliners Wargasm and Don Broco, but thankfully, the split allowed me to catch a good portion of both sets – Don Broco optimistically sang “football’s coming home” in addition to their tremendous brand of rock from Bedford’s own, but Wargasm’s punk rock energy brought the house down and were my favourite set of the night aside from Press Club. Making a case for being known as the best band by the name Wargasm the electronic rock duo were listed as a defining part of the 2020s wave of Nu metal by Alternative Press – and Spit garnered 7 million streams on Spotify – a growing sensation. To see them perform it live was a highlight utilizing the combination of talented frontpeople Sam Matlock and Milke Way, showing why they won the “Best UK Breakthrough” Act at the Heavy Music Awards in 2021. They’ve been living up to the bill since; and this set practically ensured that I’ll see them at their next UK gig.
Living up to its reputation as a community with friendly festival goers (shoutout to Big Will and Little Will from Herefordshire who adopted me throughout the last two acts of the night); and the on point attitude of the security team fist-bumping those as they entered the site, 2000 Trees earned its reputation as one of the best rock festivals in the UK and showed Download how really, it should be done. A major plus of the festival was its discount on drinks for those who brought them back to the stalls and a wide selection of local beverage and food – the Cider stand did charge London level prices, but that’s sadly the norm nowadays – and the food on offer was fantastic. I never felt like I had to queue long.
Getting in and out of 2000 Trees was a challenging but rewarding experience – a taxi from Cheltenham Spa on the way there was marred by the struggle to pay without any signal – a rare breath of fresh air being disconnected from the online world throughout the whole weekend. And if this experience was only just one day – I can’t imagine what the whole festival must be like. Attending Wednesday-Saturday just went on my bucket list. Maybe next year?
2000 Trees will return in 2025.
Learn more about the next festival, including how to buy tickets, at the official website.
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