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Friday 4th August It was great to be back at Whitchurch once again, this was the fourth year running we have played the festival; in 1997 & 98 as World Turtle and 1999 & 2000 as Haze. Whitchurch has also seen the growth of our acoustic sets, from a solo performance by me in 97, an acoustic World Turtle duo in 98, to the fully fledged 5 piece Treebeard, last year & this. As usual we arrived in dribs & drabs throughout Friday & Saturday. I arrived around 6pm Friday to find Paul, Jane, Kai & Callum Chisnell already there, along with Tim Stenton, Andy Holleran (Three Legged Cat) and his oversized dog 'Bart'. Gordon & Richard (Treebeard roadie) arrived as I was pitching camp, as did Daniele & Elisa Castracane, Daniele's brother Nicola & his family & Francesco Ragazini & his girlfriend, all the way from Italy. Tea & beer seemed a higher priority than seeing the bands, so it wasn't until Celtus took the stage that we hit the main hall. We'd had a less than happy experience with them, when, in another life as 80s heavy metalers Mamas Boys, Haze supported them at Newcastle Mayfair. They sounchecked until the doors opened, thus allowing us no time, & then their sound engineer unplugged half the PA just before we went on. Running scared I reckon! Anyway, enough old bad blood, I really liked the idea of Celtus, traditional instruments & tunes backed by modern sequenced bass, drums & keyboards. When it worked it was really good, but too much of it drifted into Clanad territory for my liking, big 80s washes of keyboards & too many slow songs. Saturday 5th August With the arrival of Paul McMahon, Chris Jellis & Warren Jacques (Haze sound engineer) we were up to full strength, so a game of football seemed the best option to while away the hours before the Haze soundcheck in the main hall. However with the combined skills of rugby playing Andy, Chis & the demon twins Kai & Callum on one team, even with the Italian brothers & a biased referee we couldn't wrest victory from them. Suitably shagged out, we headed for the main hall to load in the Haze gear. IQ were playing last, so soundchecked first, then Cardiacs, who were delayed by the late arrival of their sound engineer, but got on with things quickly enough when he arrived. By the time it was our turn, there was just a narrow strip of stage left at the front for us to fit onto. There was only time for a 45 minute set, due to the long playing times of Cardiacs & IQ, so we picked mainly songs from 'Cellar Replay' to promote the new CD & T-shirt. The set was:- The Night/Dig The Mushrooms Survive For Whom See Her Face Edge Of Heaven Seven Stones The Vice We had to start prompt at 6.30 to fit the set in, but the bands in the smaller hall were over-running so we started playing to a near empty hall, which only filled up some 15 minutes into the set. So, not our most inspiring gig, but enjoyable all the same. We then took turns to man the merchandise desk while the rest went back to the tents to eat/drink. Cardiacs put on a truly demented performance, which kind of split the 'proggy' audience, but was highly entertaining. By the time IQ came along we were all too drunk to care, and when those of us who'd stuck it out to the bitter end headed back to the tents we found everyone else crashed out. So no repeat of last years excesses then. Sunday 6th August Another sunny day, so football was once more order of the day, and yet again, the Chisnell team took the match. We were then due into the small hall at 12 noon to set up for the Treebeard show, which surprisingly filled up pretty quickly & for me was the unexpected highlight of the weekend. Not sure exactly what we played, except it was an hour and a half of something like:- Love The One You're With Tangerine Hiring Fair Wilderness Of Eden Come Up And See Me (Make Me Smile) Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald Who Knows Where The Time Goes The Lark In The Morning Wave A Firkin Of Mead In The Universe Going to California Nothing Ever Happens Still Haven't Found Dirty Linen Human Devil Went Down To Georgia encore Comfortably Numb (Recently updates from the New Horizons review. My original list was totally wrong! We all drifted away after the Treeebeard show, Tim had already left - hence no pictures. We're already looking forward to next year's festival. See you there! Chris McMahon

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