With intense sun beating down on Reading's collectively adolescent head and insipid lager being downed at an appropriately impressive rate, what better than the no-brainer primal rock assault of Limp Bizkit to ready the kids for the evening's entertainment?
After all, we may be prone to lament their lack of cerebral activity from the comfort of our sofas but the effects of pissy beer and intense sun have no sympathy for a hypocrite.
So out strut Fred Durst - complete with red baseball hat seemingly welded to his head - and crew, Wes sporting blood-red body paint and a head painted entirely white. Launching into the only new track they will preview today, Limp Bizkit make it clear that theirs is a sound spawned of contemporary America. Referencing not only their obvious rock influences but also the white boy rap drawl of early Beastie Boys ('Hey Ladies') and the hip hop posture of the Wu-Tang Clan. It's enough for us to guess where they're heading with the new album.
'Break Stuff', the one track that truly sums up the essential energy of Limp Bizkit's confused and indignant rage, sees Fred jump into the crowd shouting, "It's hot as f**k out here!" Festival officials hearts leap in unison as, cleary pumped by the crowd's reaction, he thrusts a unsuspecting bystander to the floor in his rush back to the stage. This was, after all, the track said to spark last year's Woodstock riots.
On 'Re-arrange' Durst's voice seems more at home singing than the obvious struggle that he's having hitting the necessary aggressive growls. Like Eminem, a natural soulmate, he has a depressingly nihilistic line in home-spun insights: "Say f**k you. Say f**k me…" But, what's this? A touching moment of emotion addressed to the 'Reeeeding' crowd: "I f**kin' love you!"
The band reel off a string of pastiches - Korn, Rage Against The Machine, Metallica - then fire up a metallic take on the House Of Pain's 'Jump'. Needless to say, the original will provoke an altogether more communal response when Norman Jay drops it at Notting Hill Carnival on Monday.
'Nookie' is greeted by an explosion of pyrotechnics and the crowd are drenched with sparkling confetti. All that's left is a triumphant rendition of the break-through chart single, 'Take A Look Around', and then it's over to, err, The Bluetones...
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