Festival season is upon us, and thank God, Britain, summer may have finally peeked his head out from behind those impossible snow and hailstorm clouds to make an appearance.

And really, although we joke and roll out eyes when anyone mentions it, the British summer is something quite wonderful. Sure many of us run to Costa del Sol, Ibiza and Magaluf, returning with bad tattoos and disturbing foam party stories, but those of us who stay certainly don’t miss out, in fact we possibly do summer with a little more class, dare we say?

The beauty of the British festival season is that in it’s evolution it is no longer a game of waiting for the headliners to be released and hoping that your favourite artists may turn up so you can pull out your kitsch-as-f**k “I’m with the band” geek shirt. We now know our favourite singer will show—somewhere, at some stage over the season, at one festival, in the very least. It’s just a matter of figuring out which festival it will be!

Rewind to keeping it classy. So perhaps we aren’t class 100% of the time when we’re in festival mode. Throw back to the rather loud couple in the tent next to me at a certain Sonisphere some years ago, who then offered me straight Absinthe from an Evian bottle at 5am to apologise for the volume of their antics, to those twats that like to set their tents on fire on the last day of Download, to the myriad of dodgy food poisoning stories that came hand in hand with mud vs. bodily fluid experiences at Glastonbury.

Yet we know how to have fun. We know how to dance in the rain (sorry, I mean mud…), queue for wellies, and cry over deflated airbeds at 4am in the morning. We cook a perfect bacon sandwich on those Poundland disposable BBQ’s, are the masters of sneaking our Jack Daniel’s hip flasks past main arena security, and yet we still manage to buy a pint or two once we are inside just because, and we never forget the first reason we all gather — for the pure and primal love of music.

And this year is no exception. We’re looking forward to singing along with The Cure at Bestival (@bestival), Deadmau5 and Catfish at Boardmasters (@boardmasters) (brilliant choice of headliners; mouse, cat, fish…no?), and Fatboy Slim, Jess Glynne and Tears for Fears will shout and let it all out at Camp Bestival (@campbestival). We’ll fill our soft spot for the smooth sounds of Muse, Adele and Coldplay at the mother of all festivals, Glastonbury (@glastoofficial), after throwing up our goats to Rammstein, Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden at Download (@downloadfest), while The Maccabees and New Order play for Latitude. SW4 (@southwestfour) is bringing the club anthems with The Chemical Brothers, Dizzee Rascal and Rudimental, and let’s not forget that Reading (@readingfestival) has already announced the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Imagine Dragons, Die Antwoord, and the Eagles of Death Metal.

It’s going to be one hell of an epic summer!

In the meantime, let us whet your appetite with a bit of #throwback fun to Bestival 2015—Carebear onesies and Lovebots make our hearts melt!