Pete Doherty of Babyshambles taking his first steps on the Other stage. Photograph: Matt Cardy/Getty
It's a peculiar man indeed who doesn't suffer a temporary collapse of the will to live at some stage during a particularly muddy Glastonbury. I am not that man. I can pinpoint exactly the moment at which I thought the much-vaunted Glastonbury spirit drained completely from me.
A renowned whiner, I thought I was doing quite well, given the rising tide of cloacal filth and the rain: keeping my spirits buoyed up, informing my friends that it wasn't as bad as it looked, always someone worse off, look at that guy with his eyeballs pointing in different directions who appears to have pissed himself if you require proof etc. But then disaster struck. It was around 7pm, shortly after my wife rang to inform me that our baby daughter had walked her first steps, during Babyshambles' set on the Other stage.
In fairness, Babyshambles were significantly improved from their performance at 2005's Glastonbury - although, it's probably worth pointing out that had Pete Doherty had merely got onstage and waved his arms about a bit, it would have been an improvement on Babyshambles' performance at 2005's Glastonbury - but there was still something unbelievably weedy and defeated-sounding about what they do: it's music that sounds like it would blow away in a strong breeze.
My breaking point was brought about not by the appearance of Kate Moss - who, at one of the innumerable junctures during which the camera cut from the band to her, actually appeared to be having a little cry - but by a harmonica. It was produced by Pete Doherty, who proceeded to blow through it in a horribly listless manner. The end result was pathetic in the extreme: a sort of terrible reedy whine. It sent me plummeting into the slough of despond: I missed my daughter's first steps in order to get covered in other people's shit with entertainment provided by a twerp who can't be bothered to play the harmonica properly? I've had enough.
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