Entertainment & Music Getting alcohol into a festival...

[The Passenger]

I go to Meredith/Golden Plains and others. You can take as much piss as you can drink and I've never had trouble gettin' in with a stash of narcotics.

funnily enough i was going to mention those two festivals as seemingly the best one's going around, but having never been to either of them i couldn't comment. most people i know who have been to these said they were good value and good fun,

i rarely hear all round positive reviews about australian fests, at least certainly not in comparison to my own experiences at two european fests and the countless peer reviews i've heard from others over the years. sure people have good time, but there are almost always buts - "I spent over $1000, the line-up was pretty average but we had fun, our booze got confiscated etc,."

it's just a shame. i really think we deserve better. australia has always struggled to get numerous big names out at one time due to travel and sparse population issues, and with the glut of festivals appearing in the last few years the issue of band quality is not one that promoters can really fix to be honest. but we can certainly take a much more relaxed and inviting approach to the way the festivals are run and organised.

it's interesting that i've seen many many many more fights at australian gigs, (band gigs, one-day fests, multi-day fests), than i have at overseas music venues. without being assed to work it out i've probably spent roughly the same amount of hours in australian gigs and overseas gigs. i'm a major believer overzealous and overbearing security is a reason for that.

P.S. 'tis a shame about the swear filter, BT

yes it looks a bit odd

 

[ants79]

I haven't been to a festival for a few years, got old and married, but was a regular back in the day. First Falls i attended, we pulled off the side panels in a station wagon behind the speakers, we made the mistake of packing the bottles in with towels so they wouldn't break or rattle. Security guy actually shook the doors, and tapped the outside of the panels. Got to where the grog was stashed and got suss, luckily he didn't have any tools, even though he'd looked at a tool kit we had in the car already. He let us go, but we were very lucky. That day we made a vow that we would take it to the next level and never come close to losing our precious cargo again. For the record, we never lost a drop.

The following year we bought those aluminium water/metho hiking bottles, painted them black, tipped alcohol in, then wired them underneath the car (making sure they were accessable without jacking car up when we arrived) and up in the dash (they were visible if you looked up there, but only if you knew what they were). We took an old VB commodore, so there was lots of spots underneath. As is always the way, i don't think we even got searched that year, was tempted to tell them there was 5 litres of spirits in the vehicle and challenge them to find it.

One festival a mate had a glass jar of gherkins he'd packed, they found that and confiscated it, we made a big deal out of it (mostly to hang crap on our mate for bringing them in), but reckon they stopped looking after that. Decoy's are good.

The searchers always made a point of saying "you guys really like coke" or something along those lines because we had so many slabs for mixing.

A friend of ours worked for a clothing store which had a stall at most of the festivals so we came to an arrangement to get them to take our stuff in for a small fee. They didn't get searched and if they did their van was litterally packed solid of clothes, the supplies was the first thing in and last thing out. That was the best way as we just put the stuff in backpacks and brought it back to camp.

One year we were in line behind a budget rent a truck with couches etc in the back. We were talking to them on a CB, so the driver was asking us what was going on in the back while they searched. They found a slab of Toohey's Red in their couch, we were like "dude they've found your stash" and he was like "it's alright, that's the decoy". It worked, we caught up with them later and they'd got a ridiculous amount of stuff in, they never told us how though.

I love chatting to people at festivals about how they got it in, hear some ingenious ideas, most of which have been mentioned above.

My tips:
- be really nice to the people searching, helps if they're attractive young women, have a chat and a joke and a whinge about not being able to bring grog in. If there's multiple lines to get in, try to go to the one with young chicks, for two reasons, first i won't mention, second, they're probably just doing it for a free ticket so won't give a crap. Try to avoid the lines with security guard types on it.
- remember, there's a heap of cars they've got to get through in the day, they can't spend too long on each car or people will get grumpy. So you probably don't need to go too overboard.
- keep it out of the obvious spots, and don't have anything out of the ordinary that attracts attention to it. 10 loaves of bread for 2 days is suspicious. Middle of a bag with clothes etc is usually pretty safe, they're not going to reach in to your dirty undies, they'll pat down the outside. Don't leave a torch or anything hard that feels like a bottle on the outside where they can feel it in a pat down, then they'll look harder.
- the people that train the searchers are probably reading this thread, so think of something that hasn't been mentioned.

Enjoy yourselves.

 

[Jordie_tackles]

*Person complains we cant get enough quality acts into Australian festivals, while suggesting how to rip festival organisers out of profits*

end thread.

You cant have it both ways, Europe is cheap in general, if you want to earn 3 bucks an hour move to Poland.

 

[Silent Alarm]

Never been to a camping festival, but I'm contemplating Southbound just as a way to say goodbye to my mates. Hmm. I've had good luck with getting into festivals when I shouldn't, so maybe my luck will continue.

 

[Slim Charles]

Wouldn't even worry about hiding alcohol. They didn't even look or ask us if we had it last year, which was disappointing as we spent a while trying to hide it.

But if you do want to, and drink goon, buy the 5L water boxed water and take out the sack and replace with goon. Good times will be had.

 

[magic_johnson!]

Went to falls last year, they barely checked. we had two slabs of water with us, with about 1/6 of the bottles filled with vodka, keeping the seal intact. Also had a couple of flasks behind the glove box. The bloke just told us to open the boot, he said he wasn't allowed to touch anything so i got out and opened it, saw it was full of s**t and told us to close it and that we were sweet.

Had a mate volunteering doing this job and he said he couldn't really give a s**t, he only took it if someone owned up to having some.

 

[Zach Package]

anyone got any nifty ideas?

 

[little graham]

Who want to go to all that effort smuggling alcohol in, when there's all that sex and drugs inside freely available?

Queers!

 

[Stratton_Gun]

Apparently some girls soak their tampons in vodka

 

[Allikat]

Last time I went to Southbound we ended up sneaking too much in. We took a heap of booze home even after giving some away.
- Bottle in the bread. Tip: Freeze the bread once you've put it back together so they can't squeeze it
- Syringed into an unopened water bottle & unopened contact solution
- rolled up in the middle of the tent. Tents are heaps less flexible than sleeping bags so harder to find
- One of the girls had 2 flasks gaffa taped to her stomach, wore a flanno over the top & the person at the gate actually asked when she was due
- Put into water pistols - also a convenient way to drink it
- And the boys literally poured a couple of litres into the bottom of their eski & said the ice melted.

 

[iDon]

Bought a slab of water, taken out bottles without breaking packing, replace water with vodka, put back in. = success.

I have also put an ice tea bottle of johnnie, stuffed it into my size 13 boots, put boots on outside of backpack in plain sight. Going for the most obvious way, to throw them off guard.

 

[little graham]

Apparently some girls soak their tampons in vodka

Is that why they call it a bloody mary.....

 

[JUBJUB]

Apparently some girls soak their tampons in vodka

Pardon the pun but that sounds bloody awful

 

[JUBJUB]

anyone got any nifty ideas?

this guy has been asking the same question

 

[Gosha]

Bring a massive esky, put the slab at the bottom, fill it with ice then put food and non alcoholic beverages on the top so it just looks like it's filled with that. They're not going to start pulling out all your food and ice from your esky. If you're really paranoid put a fake plastic layer the same colour of the inside of your esky (obviously) above the slab.

Buy a box of coke cans and open it without damaging the box (using a knife) then take all the cans out, fill them with beer and there's one spot in the box that can be seen through a slot where the handles are, put two cans of coke there to make it looks like it's filled with cokes, superglue the box back together.

Build a fake floor using timber if you have a ute or van then cover it with carpet (done this before and fit roughly ten slabs in and plenty of straight bottles).

The spare tyre trick is pretty obvious but it's good if you have heaps of luggage in the back because it means they have to take everything out and they never search that thoroughly. Just put heaps of heavy s**t on top of it because usually one security guard will check and he/she won't be bothered taking all the heavy stuff out.

If you're bringing it vodka just put it in Mount Franklin bottles and take the cap off with pliers so it doesn't break the seal. You can then push it back on pretty easily. The same goes with Canadian Club and Ginger Ale, Absinthe and Listerine etc.

I'd just keep a straight bottle dacked on me because if you're going to a festival where they don't allow alcohol then they're not going to body search you. If you want to be a massive smartarse just have a bottle of Vodka in a huge Mount Franklin bottle and pretend to drink it while they're searching your car.

Just make sure you bring cans and plastic, if worst comes to worst they might let you take it in. The one thing they don't like is glass/bottles.

Good luck.

 

[ash_1050]

There's plenty of ways to get alcohol in. Thread needs to be about getting drugs into a music festival.

 

[Gough]

On top of head, under hat.

 

[Shupe]

On top of head, under hat.

Did this. Saw dog, still panicked. Ran away and hid.

 

[katana]

you'd have to be *ed to not get drugs in. i reckon those dogs are just for show like I've seen them gloss over some pretty hefty quantities and not even stop. the ones at airports maybe are more legit but I've met a lot of dogs and I was smarter than most of them.

the hat is a good tip.

 

[Marklar_33]

I've met a lot of dogs and I was smarter than most of them.

Only most?

 

[Gosha]

Only most?

Lmao

 

[Silent Alarm]

Once met a bloke at Listen Out who bought a ticket off my mate. He hung around us 'just until his mates came' which was about two hours, and then kept 'bumping into us.' When he cottoned onto the fact we were far more than happy hanging out without him, he reckoned he had all this coke up and his arse and invited us into a toilet cubicle to partake.

What a load of s**t

 

[Doggy doo doo]

These lids have a small hole on one side, I fit almost 4 bottles of vodka in one lid, I blue tacked the hole and removed the lid for the person to check so they didn't feel the weight of the lid.
Only drank half

 

[bombersfan4000]

hey, just wondering if anyone's got any ideas as to how to smuggle alcohol into a concert that goes for three days...

ideas ive got so far are:
vodka in water bottles (seal unbroken)
bottle rolled up in sleeping bags. and of course hip flasks

anything else?

Simple a hipflask down the jocks or one of those 375 ml bottles easy to throw away when finished

 

[crownie]

best way is to be mates with a band that is playing.

got a VIP ticket for one of the pyramid rock festivals and the car we were in never got searched for any of the days as we came and went with supplies most likely due to the fact we were camping in the section where all the bands did.