Witnness the phantom

Foo Fighter Dave Grohl was spied sitting on the top step of the Grandstand smoking a fag and admiring the chaos in the field beyond… Gwen Stefani made a brief appearance flanked by swarms of over bearing body guards. Methinks she could’ve done better by swatting an oncomer with the spike of her 8” stillettoes… Gomez were wandering in and out of the smallest (and nicest) pub in Ireland, ‘The Witnness Inn’ backstage, making the most of the free Guinness… Tom from The Electric Soft Parade spun a drunken tale of irregular Spanish verbs on legs… Damien Rice rocked the VIP area with a blistering performance in the TV Tent… Howlin’ Pelle got the corwd screaming “The Hives, The Hives, The Hives” instead of “Olé, Olé, Olé”. Cheeky bastard… The Frames performed a cracking cover of Pixies anthem ‘Debaser’ after which a dementedly euphoric Glen Hansard jumped from the stage headfirst into the mud before declaring “ARE YOU FESTIVAL FIT?”… The Bluetones described the aftermath of getting caught in traffic and arriving too late to play as feeling “like spare pricks at a wedding”… Rumours of surprise appearances by Daft Punk, David Bowie or Queens Of The Stone Age abounded but unfortunately proved to be unfounded… Sets by Gemma Hayes, Hundred Reasons and Creative Controle all came a cropper during the afternoon’s confusion… Not to be undone, Creative Controle played their set anyway despite the fact that no-one was allowed in the Dance Tent to see them… Sandra Bernhardt preached the merits of love to the audience before backtracking with a brusque “sober up arseholes”. Worse was to come when she started to sing… Rumours abounded that the giant Jenga in the Treatment area got a bit tense, with the Phantom FM team beating off the Melaton boys… The Cooper Temple Clause got fruity on the bed in the interview tent backstage, pouring Guinness everywhere and hurling grapes and oranges in every direction… Extortionate rates for food (E7 for a breakfast roll) saw many wallets empty quicker than initially expected…

It was gentlemanly handshakes all round when Noel Gallagher met Starsailor in the Press Area. A stark contrast to the previous day when T In The Park security had to stop them indulging in fisticuffs. It appears that ‘Sailor singer James Walsh wanted Gallagher Sr. to explain some derogatory remarks he made about them in a recent press interview… Lovely and well proportioned as it is, Stuart Clark would’ve preferred it if one of The Parkinsons hadn’t shown him his todger. And bitten his head off for mentioning The Hives! As for their hastily rearranged TV Tent set, the Anglo-Portuguese quartet seriously rocked. Imagine an even more balls to the wall D4 and you’ll have some idea of the racket they make… Which big, nasty national radio station objected to poor, sweet Phantom FM broadcasting live from the backstage area?… The much kinder Spin FM played a blinder with eight hours of live coverage each day. After a bit of a shaky start, the 103.8FM crew are starting to deliver the goods. Big time… Rory Rev’s teeth modelling days are over for good after a flying TV Tent microphone stand chipped one of his pearly whites. Unperturbed, the whole group jumped into bed with Stuart Clark. A rather unsavory episode which will soon be viewable on hotpress.com… Saturday night saw a very, very relaxed Robbie Keane enjoying a tipple or three in the Media Bar… Top publicist “Dangerous” Dan Oggly was unable to attend Witnness because his young lady, Jackie, selfishly went into labour on Saturday morning. They’re now the proud parents of a 6lbs 12oz baby boy. Congratulations… Ian Brown arrived on stage wearing a weird shirt-like affair fashioned from the tricolour, the old crowd pleaser… While the masses dealt with the mud, the lucky few in the Treatment Area reclined in an Arabic-style opium den being entertained by dark-eyed belly dancers gyrating to ‘Get Yr Freak On’… Hot Press Art Director Simon Roche successfully passed himself off as a member of a popular indie band and spent a very pleasant 10 minutes holding court in the Signing Tent… Lorraine Keane has reason to feel chuffed with herself after eliciting more Treatment area wolf whistles than Gwen Stefani…

Spotted backstage: Andy Rourke from The Smiths hanging out with the Scream Team. Affectionately referred to as 'Rourkey' by fellow Manc Mani…

A meeting of great Glaswegian indie minds – Bobby Gillespie, Norman Blake of Teenage Fanclub and Eugene Kelly of The Vaselines comparing notes and colourful local tales… A very relaxed Kevin Shields, happy to be spending a few days in Ireland to visit his parents in Shankill…