So, back in the day we used to have usenet, which was a social part of the internet before we had a gui interface.

My friend Jay and I met in some alt.music subform, bonded over music and shared stories for years, he in the UK, me in the US.

I didn’t keep all our emails, but I kept more than a few. This one includes Jay’s review of  the Reading Festival in 1993.

Summer, 1993  – Jay emails me his Reading Festival review

SILLY BANNERS PRESENTS……..

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READING REVIEW FOR HEATHER
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Well I guess you wanna hear how Reading went !!!

Five of us went down in my car just for the Sunday and it was totally cool. I got some really terrible news when i got to see a program as The Posies and The Lemonheads were billed at the same time on different stages 😦 I was totally depressed by this as they are my two fave bands at the moment 😦 😦 After a lot of discussion myself and Tony decided to watch The Posies and miss out on the Lemonheads 🙂 and 😦  Isn’t that just typical Festival bad luck. Couldn’t miss The Posies first UK gig though 🙂

The Posies were due to be on at 7.00 so there were a lot of good bands to see before then.  In the afternoon, we just sat about and heard Jesus Lizard (Very dull, not my kinda thing really!), Primus (who were totally cool), The Juliana Hatfield 3 (who were good and Juliana was looking rather nice 😉 ) and Fishbone (totally funky and sounded great). During the afternoon we also took ages to put up a couple of tents !!!! What a mess!! hee hee

As soon as the band before The Posies went off (Grant Lee Buffalo) my friend and myself rushed in and got right at the front. It was quite easy to get there as hoards of people were leaving to see The Lemonheads on the main stage. The tent was definitely full though by the time The Posies came on.

Now for the review……… I was totally blown away. I don’t think I have enjoyed seeing a band play that much in a long time. The thing I really liked was how much the band seemed to enjoy playing. Ken Stringfellow was just so cool (as were the rest) and he was smiling for nearly the entire show. I was also surprised at how young Ken looked !!! How old are the band? ? As for the music….it was really flawless. The vocals and harmonies were totally excellent. I was also surprised to see Ken and Jon sharing the vocals as I was sure it was just one of them singing on their albums.

The band came on and started with “Definite Door,” which was excellent. The only old stuff they played was “Golden Blunders” and “Any Other Way” from ‘Dear 23’ and they didn’t do anything from ‘Failure’ at all 😦 I think they played everything from ‘Frosting…’ except for “20 Questions” and “Coming Right Along.” My particular faves were “Flavor of the Month” (where is the “u” in flavour!!) which was great to sing my head off to, “Love Letter Boxes” and “Lights Out” which was totally excellent and very eeries (Indiana?!!!). Another one of my friends jointed us at the front during the set and was a bit “under the influence” hee hee. I got him to shout SURRENDER at the end for a joke and I think one of them laughed…..I also enjoyed all the witty little remarks the band came out with …. very amusing!! One other funny thing that happened was that the band started one of the songs while the bassist was changing basses. They had a bit of a laugh about that and the bass player was really funny!!

Overall I absolutely lovvved the show and was so excited and singing my head off!!!!! I can’t wait to them in London on Thursday. The club they are playing at is billiant and it’s gonna be excellent 🙂 🙂 🙂 can’t wait!!! Oh yeah, if you speak to Ken soon tell him they were great and I loved the show!!!

After The Posies, I went down to the main stage and watched Dinosaur Jr. As usual they were very good and J Mascis actually spoke to the crows “WOW”!!After Dinosaur Jr finished, we all met up and went to watch Big Star in the smaller tent. When I met two of my friend who went and watched the Lemonheads they also told me they had just seen Evan Dando and Juliana Hatfield and got their autographs. I think someone didn’t like me that day! I was down the front for Big Star and they were all excellent as well Ken and Jon were absolutely brilliant as all the songs sounded like it was the original line up. It was really nice that the other two Posies were watching down the side. All the classics were played, like “September Gurls” and I had a great time all around. Alex Chilton didn’t smile much though!! Cor, I got to see the first UK dates for The Posies and Big Star in one day!

After Big Star, it was back to the tent and open a bottle of wine!!

Well, there’s the review … I hope it’s OK.