This was my first time at Jelly Festival and I wasn’t 100% sure what to expect from the festival. Keen to get in there and see what it was all about we headed straight into the main stage (the rest of the main area was closed off for the first night). Friday night turned out to be a bit of a warm up: We missed the first act but saw Suffolk favourites Murphy’s Lore they seemed to suit the festival perfectly, they had drawn a big crowd out of the buzzing campsite everyone was dancing along to their punchy folk jigs. We were in the countryside for the weekend and everyone was prepared to soak up the rural atmosphere.
Next up was a selection of cabaret. My previous experience of cabaret has always gone hand in hand with burlesque. But on this occasion it was quite early at a family friendly festival and half the front row were under 12, I think it was probably a good job there were no tits on show. Despite the lack of nudity, the cabaret was great fun, and good quality. Everyone was cheering the acts along which included some trapeze, juggling and fire.
The acts finished at midnight, which I thought was rather premature, and security herded us back to the campsite. By this point we had met a cluster of old friends and sat around our invisible campfire (no naked flames allowed) catching up and playing drink the beer into the early hours of the morning.
I was woken up by my nose sniffing out the bacon that was sizzling all over the campsite. I would highly recommend bringing a stove to Jelly Fest for your breakfast fix. There was a couple of stalls selling sausage and bacon baps, toast and tea/coffee inside the campsite but if the pennies are a little tight then DIY is the way to go. Luckily we were prepared, I knocked up the bacon and egg baps and cracked open the first cider of the day.
Normally I don’t start the day with cider but festivals have different rules, right? Well actually kind of wrong, Jelly fest had some pretty strict alcohol rules which to be perfectly honest I thought was ridiculous. On the first night you were only allowed 8 cans per person and on the Saturday you had to return to your car and take in 4 cans per person, per trip! I asked the security ‘so, what if you don’t have a car?!’ Answer: The security ‘look after it’. Great. The rule appears to be in place to prevent people getting too drunk too quickly as this is a family friendly festival. And actually it’s not a long walk to the car park, so it didn’t cause too much of a problem.
Once we had finished breakfast we went to explore the main arena, which we hadn’t yet seen by daylight. It was quite extensive for a small festival and easily twice the size of the last two festivals I have been to. The basic layout was a digital clock style figure of 8 with a stage in each outer corner, the main stage along the bottom edge, food stalls in the top half, shops to the left and the kids are on the right edge.
The sun really had come out to play; it was so hot I didn’t really feel like I was in England, that said Norfolk does get the best weather. Our first stop was the ice cream van followed by the Bedroom Bar stage to watch Tom Pearce’s acoustic set. A good way to ease oneself into the day.
Next up we thought we would check out the kid’s area, to be honest I’m not really a fan of children but I hadn’t seen a single one behaving badly so far and I was surprised that I didn’t meet a bad one all weekend! The kid’s area turned out to be one of the most fun parts of the festival. There was plenty of juggling kit and we found a young lad called Joe to teach us some Diablo, this boy and his mate had some pretty serious skills and they were tiny (I really don’t know how to judge a child’s age but I guess they were between 7-11). Once we reached a point of frustration where we couldn’t get any better without some serious practice we turned our hand to the face painting free-for-all: basically a load of paint and brushes that didn’t seem to be attended by anyone in particular. Everyone was helping themselves and painting each other, like a big happy family. Pretty sweet commune-esque vibes.
A couple of meters away from the juggling and face painting was an old style wooden caravan/wagon which had been converted into a touring museum of evolutionary curiosities including dissected rabbits and a collection of insects. They also had a library of animal related books and an area to learn and draw.
We suddenly remembered that we weren’t children and there was a lot else to see at Jelly despite having a great time hanging out with the kids. Unfortunately, despite there being a lot of DJ sets between bands Jelly had managed to clash 2 of the bands we really wanted to see. We chose to see both anyway, the first half of Space Whale on the Bedroom stage and the second half of Solko on the main stage. Both managed to get good crowds despite both being of a similar funk, reggae genre. We followed them with a bop in the reggae tent.
The afternoon was hotting up. We may have been the first pair dancing to Gypsy Hill but by the end of their set everyone was on their feet. The dancing had officially begun. Realizing we needed to stock up on energy we grabbed some dinner. Jelly hosted around 10 food stalls, a great selection from doughnuts and chocolate fondue to falafels, duck wraps and pies and quite a lot in-between. I chose the burrito bus. It was really tasty and a good size, never the less, I could have eaten 3.
The cider was flowing and was possibly the only thing keeping us hydrated in the scorching heat. The tipsiness had set in and we danced along to Killamonjambo and Swing Zazou to our hearts content. It seemed as though the entire festival had reached the same level. Lucy Rose came at the perfect time to cool off in a shady tent and listen to her beautiful voice. She’s already halfway there and by the crowds demands for an encore we think she’s going to get really big. We waited outside the Bedroom stage tent on the large straw beds for Errors, they were good, but not as good as when I saw them at 2000 Trees in 2010. I think its personal taste though, they played well, their music is just a lot softer than it used to be.
We grabbed a couple more drinks from the tent before heading back in for the festival Grand Finale. The families had settled down for the evening and we danced the night away to the early hours to the likes of Allister Whitehead, Alex Metric, Jakwob and the legendary Roni Size who took the roof off with his classic, Brown Paper Bag.
Final word
Jelly was a bit of a unique experience, it was a whole festival rolled into one and a half days. The site was decorated beautifully and considering your only there for a warm up night and one full day/night there was a lot to see and do. There were two smaller dance tents we never even spent any real time in, yet they seemed busy throughout the Saturday. And the reggae tent was full the entire time too. There was an excellent choice of alcohol, food, drinks and even quite a few shops. However, if I was a trader I would be cautious as I noticed a few stalls didn’t seem to be getting that many sales, for instance the chocolate fondue, it was just far too hot to want sticky hot sweet treats. The toilets were in relatively good shape until the Sunday morning and the litter levels seemed fairly under control. Jelly seems very safe and well staffed.
I would say Jelly is a great small festival and suits so many types of people because it’s not focused on one target audience or music genre. It’s perfect for people who work because you don’t feel like death going back to work on the Monday, nor do you have to take any time off work. It’s also perfect for families; it’s very safe, fairly clean and very accommodating. And It’s perfect for young people (including those young at heart) who want to party and escape from the norm.
Festival metrics
Age range: 0-75
Percentage of children: 15% or more
Percentage of children that were badly behaved: 0%
Teenagers experiencing their first festival: lots perhaps as high as 30%
Percentage of people not wearing shoes: 25%
Number of people I saw being dicks: 5
For more Jelly Fest information click here.
