Friday - So we start our bestival in tip top fashion. Friday was equal mix big names and people that I'm not cool enough to know. So once tents were laboriously pitched, we went and caught Platforms favourites Peggy Sue and the Pirates, who played a great set. Later in the day, Roy and I caught The Hat, who were excellent, Electrelane, who were excellent and The Go Team, who were, yes, excellent. The festival is great, as Roy said, "probably the closest you get to Woodstock in our modern capitalist age". This might be overstating the case a bit and there are enough pink sunglasses and grey hoodies to convince me that this isn't all about peace and love. But there's lots of different food, different stalls and the like, and Roy and I enjoyed a shisha and a coffee before enjoying an Architecture in Helsinki nightcap. Oh yes.

Saturday - So I'd say Saturday was a bit more patchy for me than Friday, but with some notable highlights. My day started by listening to the one 45-minute long song that Billy Bragg managed to perform ("I love you, I hate Margaret Thatcher" etc.) before telling the dazed hoards of how he had faith in their abilities to change the world. I then went and caught Tuung, who didn't exactly blow by mind with their offset folk-rock. The festival grew in numbers inordinately with the influx of the Monday to Friday crowd, and consequently the Beastie Boys played host to the lion's share of the 35,000 strong crowd, whilst Jack Penate endearingly choked up when he managed to fill up the 'BBC Introducing....' tent, an improvement on last year when he wasn't billed as playing at all and his crowd was essentially Platforms co-Founders Rob and Roy, along with former Platforms featured artist Adele. Roy and I then left early on Patrick Wolf, whose rather overtly camped-up set was at odds with his early gypsy-rambler with a drum sequencer work. And once again the evening was capped off with apple shisha. Like a rave, but with more appley goodness and folk legend John Martyn on the stereo. Grand.

Sunday - And so our final day at Bestival and what better breakfast than Bat for Lashes. Even though her set missed two of my favourites ('Sad Eyes' and 'I Saw A Light') it was still as eerily affective and effective as ever. Following on from them were Kitty, Daisy and Lewis, three young siblings whose band is made up of their dad on guitar and mum on double bass. Little secret for the punters here, but I think they might like the 50s. Just a bit. But they're certainly an impressive little family unit and the revellers love it. Roy and I then trudged up the hill to watch George Pringle render her spoken word poetry. We then interviewed said lady after watching a peculiar set from a suited and bespectacled American guy called Kennedy who was apparently feeling out of sorts after having taken a lot of ketamine the night before. Good to know. And yet karaoking (Nü-Verb) along to his disco-spewing iPod, he managed to win over the Bandstand with catchy lyrics such as "I know Karate, I know Jujitsu, I drive like a gangsta when I'm coming to see you." The beardy acoustic folkies who were next on looked a bit sick as the crowd begged for more and took turns at hugging him. Nothing else really caught my eye that afternoon, that is until I saw Gossip. For all their Nü-Rave hype, they are just essentially a very good scuzzy 70s derived rock band and their songs were.....well, really cool. And my last band of the night, nay festival were the powerful and generally excellent The Early Years (crap name, though), whose effects laden showgaze style was immense. The bassist from Electrelane dug it too. And yes, dear readers, once more Roy and I finished our evening with shisha, listening to Talvin Singh's Indo-Irish drum and bass and Fleetwood Mac's 'Everywhere'. Yes.