The idea for V came in 1996 when Pulp's front man Jarvis Cocker announced he would love to play two outdoor venues in two days. Pulp's promoters got together and came up with the idea of putting the gig into Victoria ParkWarrington and Hylands ParkChelmsford giving fans in both the North and South a chance to see the band. Then came the idea of adding more bands to the bill, putting on a second stage and letting people camp for the weekend. In the end Victoria Park was just too small for 3 stages and camping. So in August 1996 there was one day of artists in Victoria Park and 2 days at Hylands Park with camping. The northern leg of V97 was switched to Temple Newsam, Leeds to provide room for camping and three stages. In 1999 the Northern leg of the festival was moved to Weston Park in Staffordshire, and has remained there since.
It was quite well promoted as being "Pulp's festival" at the time. By the time it was announced, I was very much into my Britpop and my friend Peter called me over to his copy of the NME that morning in school and told me that we were going. I'd never been to a gig before and didn't even know whether Warrington or Chelmsford was nearer to me in Liverpool or not. His Dad drove us. He was the head of English at our school!
Festival was amazing although, in retrospect, I'd liked to have spent more time at the second stage, but I didn't really know much of the bands who played there back then. Although nowadays I would think a lineup of Elastica, SFA, Gorky's, Tiger, etc. to be pretty much a perfect festival lineup!
Instead we sat through Jonathan Richman (who I very much didn't get) and Stereolab. Who gave me a headache.
Gary Numan gave me the biggest headache ever! And I remember getting my first experience of crowd crushing when Cast came on. I saw again them at a festival last month, which made me get all nostalgic about V96, but this time round very few people around me knew who Cast were.