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Think of all the aspects of a festival then turn it on its head, replace the mud for sand, rain for sun (with one exception as you will soon read), the English language for Spanish, keep the great bands in there and you get Benicassim festival.
Benicassim has gradually grown a name for itself over the last few years, attracting tons of English punters to its glorious town every year for 9 days (4 days of which are music). In the past, the festival has attracted the likes of The Strokes as headliners and this year boasted headline sets from the Kings Of Leon, The Killers, Oasis and Franz Ferdinand amongst other great acts from around the world.

The festival ticket costs you around £160 which includes camping and 4 days of music. Benicassim lies on the Spanish coastline in-between Valencia and Barcelona, thus you can fly into either from many UK airports. Both will take you an hour or two to reach from either airport (Valencia is probably the best bet as you face a shorter and easier journey). Stepping into the unknown, we chose to fly in from Barcelona Girona airport (1 hour away from the main city centre), getting into Barcelona city centre proves easy with coaches available at the return price of 20 euro’s, there is then a train service from Barcelona Saints that takes you right into Benicassim in 2 and a half hours. A word of warning if you are exploring Barcelona pre festival- we found it to be rife with pickpockets and prostitutes trying to pickpocket so do not leave your wits in the UK. I wouldn't not go there however (this was just one part of the city!)

However, once you get into Benicassim, things couldn’t be better, with a wonderful atmosphere right from the very beginning. The campsites for the festival open on Monday, but it is well worth getting into Benicassim on the Sunday if at all possible (luckily our friends had managed to do this and save us a spot). The two campsites of choice are ‘Benicamp’, which tends to fill up quickly due to its close proximity to the beach and FIB which is where we were based. I would definitely consider FIB as  the best campsite as although Benicamp is ideal for the beach, FIB it is right near to where the music takes place (you can see and hear the stages no matter where you are based in the campsite) and there are frequent buses available when you want to opt for the beach so you have the best of both worlds.

The campsite is what you expect of a festival. Expect toilets that lead you to grow a disgust for humankind and showers that give you nothing but a drip (you will not be able to do without a shower however as the heat in Spain in July is nothing but torturous). Pre festival, you get to know your neighbours and go out in Benicassim town or enjoy the supermarkets dirt cheap Sangria (1 Euro 10) or cheap spirits such as Lidl’s beautiful ‘Wodka’ which helps you get atleast a few hours sleep in your baking hot tent.

The festival started on Thursday evening (the scheduling is strict, with nothing starting till early evening) boasting Brit-pop champions, Oasis as headliners, with other English acts including the likes of Mystery Jets. Always opting for Blur over Noel and co, with Oasis being a band I wouldn’t turn on nor off, Oasis surprised me to some extent. They opted for crowd pleasers such as Wonderwall and my personal favourite live, Morning Glory, that did exactly as promised, getting the crowd going to the extent that people climbed scaffolding and generally went a little mental. Other than that however, Liam has since described Benicassim as a ‘waste of time’ to a UK tabloid, saying that there PA problems which took place during the bands set ruined their appearance and stating that it was only worth it for the 'mental fans'. Admittedly the problems they incurred did not hinder their performance however with Oasis proving themselves to be a worthwhile watch.
If you are expecting cheap drinks inside the venue, the following amount for a litre of Heineken (sponsors of the event) may just shock you, with a litre setting you back 7 euro 50. Yes, that’s roughly around just £7.50 with today’s awful exchange rate. In order to obtain your drink, the purchase of tickets is necessarily with 1 ticket worth 2.50, you need 3 per litre. Psychology plays a part here, with you handing over money with no thought of its value. However, if you are in Camp FIB, its worthwhile popping back to your tent when there is a drought in the music line up and knocking back that warm Sangria you brought.
Post headline and major acts, the festival hosts what I can only describe as brilliant djs taking to stages throughout the festival, going on until 6.30 am.

The next day, after a few hours sleep (if that), you are free to take advantage of the beach, Water Park (next to the main stage) or shade which every little bit of is taken up by sleep deprived English fans.
By the next day I refer to Friday, the day I was most looking forward too as finally I would get to see the mighty Kings of Leon after many years of missing out on them. The line up for Friday also included the likes of Maximo Park, set to play after K.O.L and Boys Noize to take the music throughout the night once again. Thus, I was extremely excitable all day, this was up to around 5pm when a fairly strong wind took hold of town. Pre drinking at the tent proved a bad idea with the wind getting progressively worse causing sand to fly into your drink. Paul Weller started the evening and everything seemed fine (minus the video screens that had been pulled in). After playing most of his newer album, 22 Dreams, he left stage without playing any of his older collection and shudding a duet with Liam Gallagher who had stopped around to watch the ‘modfather’. The build up continued with the stage being set for headliners Kings Of Leon but as the wind got worse and worse, the time gradually wilted away and the organisers put the time back and back until they announced that Kings Of Leon would not play due to the weather conditions. To rub insult to injury a band came onto stage and started to play, but this merely caused a chorus of booing and insults being hurled at the band. The band did however come off stage after only 5 songs due to the stage being deemed ‘unsafe’, but for those who left the venue it was like Kings of Leon had thrown a hissy fit and weren’t even consoled by Maximo Park. That night however, campsites proved to be destroyed, the stage’s roof damaged, other stages were closed and to top it all off, there was a bush fire just outside the venue by the main stage.
The next day was rife with speculation about whether the festival would actually continue and most importantly if so, would Kings of Leon be rescheduled. After clearing up the mess and watching construction vans head into site, the rumours circulated that Kings of Leon would play after all. It was not until 5pm that it was confirmed that they would not in fact be playing. The festival seemed doomed with Lily Allen and Foals also pulling out of their performances due to illness. Maximo Park proved to be heroes of the festival as they took Lily Allen’s slot and nailed their performance. Franz Ferdinand also proved to be nothing short of highly entertaining headliners and 2Many DJ’s proved to be an absolute smash.
The final night of the festival saw no further cancellations with the weather back to normal. It featured amazing performances from the likes of Friendly Fires (amazing is an understatement here) and The Killers who played fan favourites from their back catalogue as well as tracks from their newest album. Elbow also proved that their songs were perfectly suited for the festival environment and White Lies proved beautiful moody indie melodies despite a less than vast crowd.
After a nothing short of brilliant week, here came the hardest part- getting out of Benicassim (this is where it is easier to fly into Valencia). All I will say is that it involved a night sleeping rough outside another towns train station, taxi drivers that don’t have a sense of direction and one general tip to all... MAKE SURE YOU SORT YOUR TRANSFERS OUT IF YOU ARE PLANNING A STINT AT BENICASSIM.

Matt Healy

(Benicassim Festival 2009)