Review and advert for the Reading Festival

MELODY MAKER, September 3 1994

WOKE up. No longer in hospital. Cool.Thought I’d check out this “rock festival” stuff.

Figured that, if nothing else, I might be able to blag a few bottles of whisky from bands’ dressing-rooms with my access-all-areas “Everett True” pass. Yep! That’d annoy a few of my more “cooler” contemporaries. I can get there, they can’t! Nyah, nyah nyah-nyah nyah!

Figured I might be able to see some music from among “ver kids” which’d make me feel warm all over. Like the tres soulful AFGHAN WHIGS (see review next week), Therapy?, Soundgarden. . . Yeah, all right. I’d been looking forward to Soundgarden, too. You big wuss, Cornell. If you want to pull out cos you figure you’re more important than the RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS, why not come straight out and admit it, instead of giving us this bogus “bad voice” story? It’s not as if the Chilis are gonna kick your ass or anything. The Chills have their one trick – Parliament-era funk married to Stones-style reduced metal – outplayed after their first couple of albums, softened for mass appeal. And that’s it. Tonight, they appear near-naked, run through their standard misogynist shit, sound like Pearl Jam for a while, introduce new guitarist (Dave Navarro, ex-Jane’s Addiction), make happy the kids (who by this point in the proceedings would’ve liked Perry Como, for f***s sake, if he’d just turned the bass up loud), and leave…