I was the minister for UFOs and met C-3PO, Love for Cat Stevens and Four Tet
Plus: buying a house in an economic crisis, mums and dads' discos
You'll know ‘father and son’ if you’re a Cat Stevens fan. If you don’t, it’s one of his most loved tracks about leaving home and a young man fleeing the protective arms of his dad.
Picture the scene—ten men of a certain age, sleep-deprived and drinking cider. Three 18 years old boys were equally sleep-deprived because of six-hour shifts in the Bread and Roses beer tent. We’re together at the Glastonbury festival. The older people know every word in every lyric, the boys less so. On comes father and son.
The dads well up. I start to cry like a baby. My son puts his arms on my shoulder and gives me a kind, sympathetic look, and then, without any sense of irony, says, “I’ve got to go now, dad.” And so you do, Malachy, you do.
When you’re on the hill in forty years, please tell your friends you saw Cat Stevens play father and son with your dad - then hold back a tear.
Full List of Bands seen or partially seen
Friday (22,682 steps)
Ben Howard, The Hives, Martin Stephenson, The Mary Wallopers, Stefflon Don, The Foo Fighters, Stone, War Paint, Kelis, Madame Electrifie, Four Tet
Saturday (24,748 steps)
Tara Lily, Blue Lab Beat, The Murder Capital, Blossoms and Rick Astley, Pretenders, Leftfield, Fat boy slim
Sunday (27,652 steps)
Lottery winners, Cat Stevens, Blondie, The bootleg Beatles, Elton John
I won’t bore you with a full review, but as a new band, I think Stone have great potential. Their lead singer is wild, raw and charismatic.
Rick Astley stole the festival with his two performances.
Fatboy Slim had a multi-generational audience. Thankfully, the 18-year-old budding DJs did not see me dancing in the mums and dads’ section of the Park Stage field.
What was the best moment other than the unforgettable Cat Stevens conversation?Four Tet. Kieran Hebden is a genius.
New Friends
The thing I love about Glastonbury is the new friends you meet. Music is a leveller and conversation starter—so Joff, Simon, Katie, Craig, Hannah, Paul, Caroline, Ged and Eleanor. What a joy and a pleasure to meet you, and what a wonderful few days we had. And to my old regular friends, thanks for holding it together at Cat.
C-3PO
I also met and fell in love with Anthony Daniels, the actor who plays C-3P0!
New house, a new beginning
I vividly remember my first Q&A with school kids after being elected as an MP. Schoolchildren ask all sorts of questions that can floor you. “Why should we go to war” and "do you know the Queen?” are memorable. Very often, the kids have had such a build-up to your visit that they’ve formed a picture that you live in a different world to them. “Do you go to work in an aeroplane” was an early question. Sometimes, they thought I lived in a stately home, drove a range rover and had servants.
For me, the opposite was true. For all the normal reasons: job, separation, kids, ADHD etc., I’ve not had a mortgage in the place I’ve lived in for a very long time. I’ve lived the life of a nomad in shared or rented accommodation.
At 56, in the middle of a mortgage crisis, with house prices ready to plummet, I’ve bought a semi-detached house in Yorkshire. My kids, who used to think I lived in a Premier Inn, have their room, and I have plenty of space to put the paperwork and gear currently stored in friend’s garages, attics and warehouses around the country.
And after nearly three years of being obsessed with the declutter hub podcast, everything is in order. Every toilet has a brush, every pillow a protector, every plate a place.
I am fortunate to have savings and am not far off a pension. So the mortgage on my home is just about affordable. Don’t get me wrong, it’s painful, but I won’t lose my house unless disaster strikes.
I don’t think I’m exaggerating to say that millions of people ask themselves how they will make ends meet in the next couple of years, though. So when Rishi Sunak asked people to ‘hold their nerve’ on interest rates, it jarred with me.
That negative view people have of Rishi Sunak as an entitled ‘near billionaire’ really was on show with that comment. As an MP, I represented a constituency where owning your home was a distant dream. At least they will not lose their homes, but their dreams are shattered, and they have a PM who hasn’t noticed.
A senior Conservative minister recently told me, “Sunak doesn’t give a flying shit about real people - unless they are rich and powerful.” Even though I have many Conservative friends, I was taken aback at the vehemence of that statement. The Tories could fall further in the polls if it becomes a generally held view.
What happened to this story?
When a former member of the US intelligence service claims the government is holding the evidence that aliens exist, you’d think it would get a follow-up. I loved this article, particularly because I am a former Defence Minister who had responsibility for UFO policy. In 2006, I authorised many secret documents about UFO sitings to be published. Pro Tip: most UFOs have an explainable reason, usually low-flying military aircraft. I did meet the official who told me that half a dozen sitings could not be explained, though. I never saw the proof that aliens existed, but I asked, just in case!
Anyway, did I tell you I’ve met C-3PO?
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I used to be an agency photographer and one of the legends I met was Humpty, the real one from our childhood TV memories but C3P0, wow, I take a step back and doff my cap. That’s better than meeting an astronaut!
Or alien for that matter!!
I was lucky enough to work with Cat Stevens on his seminal 70's albums while at Island Records - what a sublime talent!