All the festivals I’ve attended have had a remarkably different character. From Pukkelpop’s sixteen year old infested trashfest I go to Cologne’s c/o pop festival with it’s wanky, arty, upperbrow feel. (Both, however, shared an inordinate number of hot boys in common.) What with my partner in crime not arriving until later today, I have been doing the past two days solo. And I can assure you that it’s a fairly intimidating experience.

You enter the club. It’s a medium sized glass box with a concrete floor, populated by hip Germans in their late 20s, lots of black, square framed glasses going on here. There’s the feeling you crashed some industry get together as there’s not so much a party feel as a Schmoozing with the Somebodies. You imagine an alternate you who had been raised in this city, and could recognise that DJ, this promoter, that radio star, this producer, that music journalist.

You feel like there’s a huge highlighter circle hanging suspended in the air around you – you swear they all know that you’ve come alone. In fact that guy and girl opposite you laughing, surely they’re pointing at you. They’re talking about you, you know it. You sit down on the wooden benches that another group is sitting on. That way you hope to blend in, and to the inattentive eye you could perhaps pass for actually being with them. But at some point the group moves on, and you’re sitting there, so obviously alone, feeling very exposed and vulnerable.

You take out your mobile to send an sms. This is good because not only will you distract yourself from your self-consciousness, people will think you have friends and might be typing “Yo bitch, where are you? I’ve been sitting here for half and hour waiting for you! Get your ass down here.” You’re contemplating whether or not you should go and stand near another group – but then again perhaps someone’s watching you and how pathetic would that look? Even more pathetic than how this looks? Ahh, suddenly a couple sit down next to you and you’re safe again… for now.

You’re beginning to wonder whether the band/DJ/event was really worth this stress when this crazy wonderful song comes on and you don’t give a shit about how you must appear, you’re just happy to be here. Plus it inspires you, and you take a mental note to start up on some brilliant new project the next day. So surely this sort of mental agitation, ticking the creative clock inside of you, was worth it – after all the alternative was late night television in your hotel room. You’re torn between yes and the loud no in your head during the breaks between acts, or before the act that are excruciating and makes you wish you had Harry’s Invisibility Cloak to erase you from the scene.

There is one last element that sometimes plays a part – not always, but sometimes. Some guy/girl starts chatting with you. Like a desperate refugee you flee Alone-Ville and breathe a sigh of relief. But the company can now go to ways. (a) They turn out to be really cool and you have this nutty night where they show you all these local secrets and hell you swear you’ve met your new best friend. (b) They really start to give you the shits, especially when it’s some lonely guy trying to slag on you and now you’re thinking you’d rather be alone than have to exert all the energy required to meet the quota of forced conversation with the guy.

You know what? I don’t think it’s worth it. I’m getting too old to deal with this sort of stress.