the daily manc

Panic-stricken postgrads have taken to sacrificing younger students ahead of coursework deadlines, it has emerged.

Using the morally acceptable cover of testing virulently potent chemicals on live monkeys, Masters and PhD students have in fact been slicing open barely sedated first and second year students in order to bare their still beating hearts up to the barbaric paranormal forces that dictate their lives, and desperately lick the falling drops of blood from their withered, gurning jaws, in scenes reminiscent of racist 80s sequel Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom.

University health officials have stressed the importance of taking regular breaks and remaining hydrated during the assessment period

Senior Lecturers have been quick to deny these reports, but admitted that the demands of some courses had in the past exerted extreme psychological pressure on participants. Heavy workloads were said to have once resulted in several social sciences graduates gathering in the middle of Oxford Road and smearing their tired, broken carcasses in dog faeces before disembowelling themselves across the bus lane. Fortunately, however, Magic Bus services to and from the city centres' assorted chain pubs were not disrupted by the spectacle.

Speaking from inside a locked toilet cubicle, the university welfare and pastoral co-ordinator Steve Jones said: “Just because a small number of new students have gone missing, and another small group of graduate school students appear to have barricaded the upper staircases of the Stopford building at around the same time it does not mean the two events are connected. The reverse Biblical incantations daubed on the windows are definitely not painted in blood. And if they are it's probably primate blood extracted in a completely humane manner.”

The city of Manchester is enjoying the final days of its yearly holiday from the presence of the free-wheeling bastards who, for the purposes of council tax returns, study in the city.

With the largest student population in the country, the city operates for ten months of the year as a quasi theme-park, with stands selling semi-congealed 'food', ostentatious drug experimentation (often involving glitter) and assorted forms of face-painted ghastliness. Ginger tween rapper 'Professor Green' is set to perform, alongside pointless example of the decline of Western civilisation, 'Example'.

Chino enthusiast and eager fresher Tom Gardner said: “I've heard getting paralytically drunk eight times a week is the norm in Manchester. Hopefully I'll pass out in the street one night and get arse raped so I can laugh about it the next day and make everyone think I'm totally crazy. I've had some 'Celeb Paedo' t-shirts printed to let everyone know how outrageous I am. One's got Rolf Harris' face on top of an ice cream and the other features a naked Gary Glitter astride a Vietnamese child. If I end up living with a hippy I'll tell them it's a comment on working conditions in the Far East.”

Yes, there will be foam

A careful system of mutual distrust allows an uneasy peace to be maintained between the student residents - who are contained in an area modelled on nightmarish Greek island resorts such as Kavos, complete with genuine vomit encrusted pavements and soulless neon bars - and actual Mancunians. There have, however, been sporadic outbreaks of students taking their hairstyles into proper pubs; deliberately ignoring the ash-caked windows and evocative names such as The Cosh and Glare. Fortunately these attempts to attain an 'authentic' Manchester 'experience' are usually warded off with exuberantly friendly indications of imminent violence, often involving biting.

The University of Manchester has been ordered to revamp its graduation ceremony in order to better reflect the ‘institution’s’ mechanical assembly line approach to churning out mildly reputable degrees, UoM officials have revealed this week.

In the past the ‘university’ has attempted to disguise its total inadequacy by maintaining a traditional veneer as part of its graduation ceremony, which is located in a life-sized Lego replica of a real institution of higher education and includes beardy, friendly-looking men who pretend to know you.

However, a recent investigation by Education Standards Agency has revealed the University of Manchester to only contain traces of higher education, its principle components being post-teenage academic inertia, a misplaced sense of middle-class entitlement and modest parental expectation.

An ESA spokesman said: “we discovered that the lines of family members queueing outside the graduation ceremony were actually shorter than the lines of chang being hoovered up by graduates off their mortarboards. Clearly the university can only be described as an ‘institution’ in the broadest sense possible."

Graduation day substance abuse has reportedly become known as 'mortarboarding'

The new ceremony will take place in a soul-less, sweaty lecture theatre in Kilburn building in total silence. Graduates will wear purple boiler suits adorned with their UID number and will each receive a ‘UoM’ stamp on the back of their neck with a degree classification of ‘2-1’, ‘Do one’ or ‘You really fucked this one’. This is to be followed by a member of staff, who will wear a ceremonial black sack over their head sporting the university’s crest, shouting a Gordon Ramsay-inspired “degree: DONE" whilst doing their best to mimic the laboured, listless tone of a man who has long grown tired of his own personality.

Meanwhile, many students have reported that their emotional reaction upon receiving their degree classification was overshadowed by their relief at never again having to navigate the grey and white, Windows 95 wet dream that is Student System, which some experts have described as ‘list-porn’.

The Greater Manchester area is set to be transformed into a museum-cum-zoo for which visitors can pay to see the ups, downs, rashly thought through tattoos and facial scarring that often result from long term alcohol 'ab'use.

The idea, inspired by Hogarth's famous sketch Gin Alley and the less famous Withington 'pub' The Albert – which was built during the Cold War and remains to this day a viable bomb shelter – is set to drain new life from a city already hit by the northernwide cuts ordained by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and Second Lord of the Treasury, George Osborne. Though he has reportedly never visited the city personally, he said he experienced a “profitable epiphany” during a helicopter flyover in 2008.

All pavements will be fitted with glass corridors through which visitors can observe the 'inhabitants' of Manchester at a safe distance; and signs will encourage them not to strike on the walls of the passageway or anger the local population any further than their presence already likely has.

"Be sure to visit the Gift Shop"

Regular museum-person Will Andrews said: “I think this is a fantastic way for people from, not just around the country, but around the world, to get a true insight into the alcoholture that I'm told forms such an integral part of life in the city. I also relish the opportunity of being able to glare with contempt at those from 'The North' without shitting my silk boxers.”

The announcement comes at a particularly apt time, with Britons huddling down for another 'summer' of can-drinking in tents and dimly-lit, enclosed spaces. It is understood alcohol supplies, fags and pork scratchings will be air dropped into the city, although southern delicacies such as shower gel and water will be denied to the exhibits, allowing them to slowly deteriorate. This is intended to provide an 'authentic feel' to the exposition. It is hoped it will also offer an insight into the human condition for Manchester academics whose jobs involve detailed discussions of gender, nationality, death and other things that just happen to most people.

Curator of the project and weekend Londoner, Richard Stemming said: “What we hope to achieve with this museum is potentially phenomenal: it will be the largest installation of its kind in the world, and will transform the city from a cig-ridden debt hole into a profit pumping pipeline to the most important city in the country which is, of course, the capital, London. Essentially it will be a semi-living, wheezing metaphor for capitalism. Some people have suggested the project is similar to a concentration camp, but it really isn't.”

The unpredictability, fluidity, and sheer spitefulness of the 'summer' so far is actually proving hugely popular, it has emerged.

While many use the #Britishsummer as a heaven-sent, liquid ice-melter at grimly-lit evening Barbecues, and those in 'London' are often heard to complain about the slightest sign of airborne water – despite having spent their morning rubbing moisturiser into their freshly showered skin – in Manchester the fact that each day brings new climactic possibilities has been embraced by the battle-hardy local population.

Controller of both the Sun and Time itself, Rupert Murdoch, hails from a nation where rain is believed to be a mythic invention of Norse poets; and the inhabitants refuse to accept that there are forms of water upon which it is not possible to somehow glide. In response to the state of the British climate Murdoch generously offered to begin providing the Sun on Sunday, although some cynics argue this is merely a ploy to disseminate misinformation about 'foreigners', who, he claims, come over here to escape hot countries and then demand rain for their entire family. He has denied in the past that he himself is a 'foreigner', preferring the term unregistered tax 'payer', but admitted that it was probably problematic for him to spew hatred against people who emigrated in order to better themselves, rather than to gradually seize control of the nation's entire mass media. He explained this hypocrisy through repeated references to the profits of his shadowy cabal News International, and appeared baffled that no one was listening.

Worse than the worst kind of fictitious reptile, but reportedly 100% real

Murdoch has refused to comment directly on the accusation that he is an “unmitigated shit stain on the already yellowed seat of a chain pub”, but released a statement via one of his ghastly family members in which he said he believes his paper has much in common with the average day in Manchester: it teases its subjects with the possibility of exposed flesh, before descending into a depraved litany of misspellings, racism and inexplicable uses of capital letters.

Anthony Runter, who has created a brick shelter in the South Manchester outpost of Rusholme, said: “I wake up every morning with a hollow feeling in my stomach, as if I've been subjected to a back-alley kidney-apping overnight. Once the crust falls from my eyes, however, and I'm able to check I don't have any scars I didn't already know about, I realise it's the adrenaline rush from curtain-twitching anticipation.”

“Usually I'll open the blind using the 'slow reveal' technique - pioneered on 'Reality' TV shows such as the cleverly-titled Beauty and the Geek – which allows me to keep the little flutter of suncertainty going for as long as possible.”

Experts have predicted that your come down from the end of ‘Uneh’ is likely to continue until your youthful optimism has been adequately crushed by the looming spectre of ‘real life’.

The news comes despite widespread efforts to devise increasingly intricate home remedies to better deal with the barren post-university Manchester landscape, with some going as far as using multiple varieties of Tropicana to wash down a strict diet of Valium, Coco Pops and residual throat Ketamine.

Professor Sarah Tonin of Gurnstow University said: “Satisfaction levels among the newly unemployed are not likely to improve dramatically until a measure of acceptance is sustained for the inevitable whirling shit-storm of salary-based conversations, disappointing sexual endeavours and incremental advancements up the supermarket food-chain that comprises ‘real life’.”

“Whilst, unsurprisingly, many will struggle to come to terms with their hopeless fate for many months or even years, this waiting time may be somewhat reduced for the less human.”

However, amidst reports of rain returning to Manchester, the combination of pathetic fallacy and shrieking ennui has been too much for some erstwhile revellers, inducing them to come down ‘like a ton of fucking bricks’. It has been claimed that sufferers of this condition are considering a ‘wider array of life options’, including more dignified occupations like ‘binman’ and ‘drug dealer’ in a bid to avoid the Microsoft Office cluster-fuck that awaits.

UoM product Lee Armstrong, who has spent the last four days in bed ashing roll-ups into a sock whilst watching Anime films and crying at the end, said: “Doing the bins may not do wonders for your hygiene and sleeping pattern, but at least you’ll never have to sit through a power-point presentation called ‘Up-Selling: It’s not down to them, it’s up to you!’ or attend a conference for any reason ever.”

Never done a spread sheet in his fucking life

Meanwhile, surveys suggest that for 76% of male come-downees, the search for any sign of a penis is still ongoing. Whilst the whereabouts of most genitalia is still unknown, those who claim to have located it are reporting sizes ranging from ‘popcorn chicken’ to ‘sugar puff’.

Amid reports of mid-expedition defecation and journey times of up to two days it has been announced that renowned island-owner and official spokesperson of the Illuminati, Richard Branson, will be handed responsibility for the self-described 'shuttle bus'.

Branson has promised to maintain the low cost of the 'festival' transportation system, while hoping to improve efficiency and offer detainees the choice between an open-caged Austerity Class, and the less 'fun' First Class, which will feature allocated seating and a range of snacks and refreshments, at reasonable 'Airline' prices. The reason for the prices, however, remains unclear.

He swoops in from Heaven, like a vulture.

The decision to pass the contract over to Virgin was made after the previous operators were discovered to have failed to put in place any measures to ensure the smooth running of their so-called 'service', with one insider – who asked to remain anonymous – commenting: “There were a few meetings about route planning and timetables and stuff, but they usually ended with the consensus that Manchester buses have always run on 'magic' and that it was foolish to fix something that was only partially broken, and could easily be repainted blue."

Branson has a history of 'rescuing' public transport contracts from the hands of lesser, more profit orientated corporations and it is believed his altruism stems from his close relationship with the late Prime Minister Tony Blair, now widely regarded as the driving force behind the startling regeneration of the Middle East, and a complete breakdown in hostilities between Palestinian and Israeli leaders.

Though very few verifiable facts have emerged concerning the ordeal of passengers aboard this year's Express, unconfirmed reports detail wall-to-wall displays of morbidly exposed, hastily tattooed flesh and chants including: “We all live in a Hello magazine”, “E-D-L: Eat, Dump, Lick!” and “I took ya Mum's minge t'cash converters t'buy a pack of fags!”.

Somewhat popular nightclub Sankeys is to close its doors later this year, confirming fears among Manchester ‘clubbers’ that it may not actually be ‘the best club in the world’.

Traditionally any mention of Sankeys has invariably warranted someone pointing out that it was described as the ‘World’s Best Nightclub’, in a real magazine that you can buy in shops and everything. However, news of the club’s imminent closure has cast doubt into the deteriorated minds of Manchester’s vast ‘pillhead’ community as to whether Sankeys can even be accurately described as ‘good’.

Self-proclaimed ‘clubber’ Mike Ashcroft said, “the mens’ toilets were so tiny that people regularly had to queue for up to half an hour just to take some drugs. Lacking enough elbow room to maneuver a key up to your face is the worst design flaw a club can have, short of having a lighting system which allows you to see everyone’s ghastly revolving chins.”

The best logo in the world

The bottom floor of the building is to be turned into a Sankeys museum; confirmed exhibits so far include ‘real bodily fluids’, the feeling of disappointment and the lower deck of the decommissioned ‘Sankeys Disco Bus’. The vehicle in question is rumoured to include a robotic bus driver mannikin behind the steering wheel, which will be dressed in the customary driver’s uniform of a gimp mask and black latex y-fronts displaying the words ‘CONVICTED RAVE-IST’ over the crotch in pink block capitals.

All dissertations submitted to the University of Manchester this year are to be pasted onto the walls of the Northern Quarter for an 'art' installation, which has been described by lead 'artist' and revered flannel shirt-wearer Crispin Dante-Omega as 'intra-temporal', 'aconceptual' and other adjectives he heard on BBC Four.

Traditionally dissertations are ceremonially burned on the roof of University Place by those responsible for marking them, who then perform ritual chants, dancing around the flaming pile of 'research'. Inside sources reveal this is an attempt to cleanse the jaded, devouring apathy markers feel upon actually reading documents with titles such as 'Rice Re-imagined: Uncle Ben and Paternalism', 'To what extent could Alan Carr be described as "the Oscar Wilde of the mephedrone generation"?' and 'Corners: Do we need them?".

One marker described the sense of agonising despair felt when engaging with such texts as 'like reading the Ian Huntley wikipedia page for 10 hours a day'.

'Maverick'

However Dante-Omega, 36, unemployed, believes that by using the student work to paper-mache the Northern Quarter, in a piece entitled Dissertation, Tesselation, Wasted Education, he will be able to expose 'the true nature of education'.

"The dissertation is the distilled essence of education itself. Through the medium of interactive art, I hope to shed light on some of the uses of education; you'll be able to see education being ignored in favour of fruit machines and pasties. You'll be able to see education getting pissed up the wall outside a bar. The symbolism basically writes itself."

Concerns have been raised by some critics, however, at the lack of dissertations on display covering the work of Immanuel Kant. The artist today responded negatively to the criticisms, claiming the Northern Quarter to be 'positively heaving with Kants'.

"They must have been blind because, honestly, once you come into Northern Quarter you'll be seeing Kants in almost any direction you care to look. There's Kants all down Oldham Street. There's a whole load of Kants outisde Affleck's."

The University will re-launch its luxury fashion wear in the Autumn, it has emerged.

In lieu of 'mainstream' garments such as hoodies and t-shirts the shop will now stock micro-string vests and 'Kilts', popular for centuries among Scotland's sizeable transvestite community until their recent appropriation by Kanye West. The previously self-explanatory logo will be abbreviated to the more cryptic UoM and the clothes are to be offered in a range of new 'obscure' colours. Yellow will be renamed 'Quince', purple will be known as 'Bruised Flesh' and, in a controversial move, an off-white shade named 'Smeared Semen' is to be introduced.

Student blogger and self-proclaimed 'fashionista', Kate Jones, said: “I think it's great that they've chosen to bring the university brand into the 21st century. Up till now a lot of my friends wouldn't have dreamed of wearing anything with the University logo on in case people walked past and thought 'wanker'. Now people who see us will be too distracted trying to decipher the cunning acronym, or perplexed by the nuanced colourways.”

Needs more edge

The change has prompted a backlash from some quarters of the student population, however, with those whose identities are entirely rooted in their participation in organised sport complaining that the new line 'doesn't look enough like Hollister'. This group, often referred to as 'The Hitler Youth Element' has been buying up remaining 'stash' stock, and is reportedly spending faster than a widow at a charity slave auction.

The new clothes were shown for the first time last week on the Alan Gilbert 'big screen', which – in keeping with the style of the building - had until recently remained entirely superfluous. The clothing was modelled by fashion marketing PhD student Rolph Stewart and drew a small crowd of curious onlookers.

Universities are officially no longer breeding grounds for dissidents and rebels as political causes supported by UoM students are now less subversive than a Russell Howard guest appearance on The One Show, it has been claimed.

The news comes following last week’s anti-EDL rally, in which students were called upon to take to the streets in a flagrant display of not being racist.

Organiser of the march and chair of the OCCD (Only Cunts Could Disagree) society Mary Keller said “we used to just lift our agenda straight out of the Guardian but deemed it too radical after the Food section suggested ‘throwing in some coconut’ next time you’re cooking a butternut squash souffle, which could easily be construed as coded racist vitriol.”

The most controversial move of the day came when one student protestor arrived clad in a Union Jack burka, prompting acts of rabid confusion across the EDL ranks.

Skinhead-inciter Will Turner said “the symbolism was too much for some of the more racist racists to handle. One ‘England defender’ was reduced to smashing himself in the groin with a crucifix in an attempt regain control of the massive anti-Islamic hard-on he’d acquired”

Students were forced into action amidst growing fears that the EDL's new policies of 'coherence and credibility' were paying off

The rally comes as part of UoM’s ‘activism made simple’ season, which also features a pamphlet titled ‘3 Things We Don’t Like About Genocide’ and a march against violent sex crimes. Avid sexual assault-disliker James Marsh said, “events like this are great for beginner activists like myself as they give you the chance to get involved at no risk of being disagreed with, at least by people whose thoughts aren’t marred by Stella and fear.”

Students are resorting to increasingly unsettling levels of 'quirkiness', in a bid to deny the ubiquity of death, it has emerged.

Purveyor of second-hand Disney memorabilia, Dominic Hannon, said: “The majority of our business used to come from supplying faded Fantasia t-shirts to grossly overweight women and the producers of public safety videos called things like 'There's a Nonce Next Door'. Recently though we've begun to see a trickle of students coming into the shop and enquiring after some of our more obscure 80s merchandise. I even managed to get rid of a rare edition of Tintin in the Congo, a deeply-offensive, illustrated tour of European attitudes to central Africa, that I'd been given by David Starkey in return for several Popeye nudes.”

The most embarrassing participant in a programme that was presented by Jamie Oliver

Sales of 'kitsch' accessories, repulsive knitwear and straight-to-DVD Rom-Coms from the last decade are also at an all time high, with outbreaks of 'ironic' behaviour spreading through the student population like a particularly vicious form of impetigo. Other retro expressions of 'individuality' expected to see a surge in popularity this year include skateboarding, drive-by shootings and the Scottish version of 'Poohsticks', which remains illegal in most counties of southern England.

Ulrik Tanna, who recently released the five track EP Broken Space Keys in a Wireless Womb, said: “What was most important to me in the conceptualisation of this piece was that, in the context of a techno soundscape suffering massive post-industrial decline, we recognise mass production as a failed ideal. To convey this to the listener we ran a limited press of two hundred recycled TDK cassettes. Each copy of the album features the title in a different typeface. I think this highly personal, esoteric approach will re-establish the cultural value of art.”

Only 21% of students take any interest in student politics, as opposed to the 84% of Andrex customers who were able to share details of their post-defecation ritual thanks to the internet.

Tom Harvey, who aspires to be the University's Activities & Development Officer, said: “I'm hoping to pursue a career in the House of Commons after graduating which is why I'm standing. I think the experience of arousing feelings that amount to – at best – intense disinterest and – at worst – suspicion and hatred in everyone I meet will adequately prepare me for a future in British politics.”

The amount of power that should be afforded to the Student Executive Body remains a matter of great debate however. Some claim the influence it wields over such areas as recycling on campus, water fountain installation and toilet gender allocation allows the hapless young volunteers far too much scope for disastrous policy blunders.

In response to this there have been suggestions that the council should be reduced to a single member, in charge of 'Student Presence'. Duties would include 'attending meetings where the people actually in charge of the university make decisions' and 'sitting near the back'. The chief requirement would probably be possession of a human body, though proponents of the move have refused to rule out the possibility of a small animal being used.

This has generated some controversy, however, with the hilarious team behind 'comedy' candidate 'The Inanimate Carbon Rod' arguing such a reform would unfairly discriminate against their inclusion. The rod has already garnered over 1800 'likes' on human landfill site 'Facebook', indicating the level of its popularity among the easily-amused.

The funny idea is borrowed from a funny episode of 'The Simpsons'

Rod-handler Steve Green said: “For years the NUS has been led by people with less natural charm than a drunken, semi-naked Eric Pickles, but an equally inflated sense of their own importance. The rod perfectly mimics this lack of self-awareness and serves as a fitting allegory for the stiff-necked, impotent bureaucunts who take part in this sort of thing.”

All of the burgers served in the Union bar are entirely forged from deceased rats, it has emerged.

Bartender and meat apologist Jeremy Hope said: “It's really unfortunate as the burgers are one of our most popular 'grilled' items. On the other hand we've discovered that people quite like rat-meat. Or at least they can't easily discern the difference between rat-meat and beef when they consume it in a place that they've only visited through a mix of laziness and the desire to not have to even look at anyone who isn't a student.”

This image will feature in the Bar's 'contemporary re-brand'

Test results on 'The Kentucky' chicken burger are still pending, although they are rumoured to contain illicit, fox-based 'meat products'. Ironically this would remain in keeping with traditional Kentucky 'culture', in which 'chicken' is used to denote any animal roughly the size of a chicken. The cuisine was popularised worldwide by innovative restauranteur and gourmand 'Colonel Sanders'. Once shaped, the meats are battered, deep-fried and then swallowed in starkly-lit PVC cubicles, typically out of a distastefully-coloured cardboard bucket.

Neo-vegan media analyst Jay 'One' Lethridge said: “It's not that you are genuinely concerned about the contents of what you're eating. If you actually cared you'd avoid meat processed in a decommissioned Ukrainian power-plant and opt for something more readily identifiable. Instead the anger and panic that you are all feeling around the current 'meats scandal' is rooted in the realisation that you can't just believe everything you're told. Of course you all know that you shouldn't blindly trust everything you read – be it on a meat packet, an online dating profile or in a book by Jeremy Clarkson – but you prefer to maintain the illusion that you can because it makes your existence, if I can call it that, easier.”

“Media events such as 'The Great British Meats Scandal' make this desire to accept - the will to unhindered, delicious ignorance - untenable and as a result you all get very upset that you might actually have to think about things. Soon this'll all blow over though and you can go back to eating your rat-burgers. Maybe they'll even start chucking in bits of human.”

The exchange rate of 'fags' has remained 'largely stable' around the region of Manchester, as renewed government campaigns to promote something called an 'E-cigarette' have been violently rejected by the wheezing residents.

Cigarettes and their associated materials emerged as an informal currency in the economic slump of the 70s, with many in Greater Manchester finding conventional currency to be a needless obstacle in the constant pursuit of Richmond Super Kings.

Economist Bernard Aitken said on the origins of 'Fag-Sterling', "the use of cigarettes as currency is most common in prisons or trenches, however life in Manchester came to resemble these scenarios with increased police presence, higher levels of trench-foot than World War I and economic hardship forcing many families into living 'ten-deck to ten-deck'."

The introduction of electronic cigarettes was intended to slow down Manchester's lust for inhaling harmful chemicals, however the government has withdrawn the campaign after 'E-fag' stall attendant Edith Bellows was drowned for 'being a witch' within 6 minutes of opening.

'Trickery'

Such a hostile reaction was 'predictable' as fags represent 'the glue of society', according to student and Drum enthusiast Martin Baker; "The endless acquisition of things that slightly shorten your life is the only mutually enjoyed activity that bonds the students and locals together"

"Last week I befriended a usually abusive local school-child by lending him a pinch of Old Holborn. Before I could even find any Rizla he was vigorously chewing it to get a 'cheeky buzz to take the edge off'."

The briefly controversial group - whose 2004 release American Idiot is described on wikipedia as a 'rock opera' – will be one of the main acts at the inexplicably popular Manchester festival, it has emerged.

The band are known for their fierce criticism of American foreign policy and also featured on the soundtrack of popular spy-spoof Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. Green Day fan Emma Reid, who has a badge with a Banksy print and the statement 'War = Money' on her lapel, said: “I can't wait to see the guys do all their different songs about the eternal struggle of the affluent white male. Hopefully Billie Joe's voice hasn't lost any of the visceral rage that defined their sound now that he's a 41-year-old father-of-two.”

Parklife promoters – also responsible for post-apocalyptic 'rave' experiment 'The Warehouse Project' – have been notoriously tight-lipped about the acts who will be playing the festival alongside self-described 'rock stars' Green Day. Rumoured bookings include the recently bailed 'musical comedian' Freddie Starr, renowned internet user and part-time Hardstyle DJ Phillip Schofield, and novelty television homosexuals '4 Poofs & a Piano'.

Freddie Starr's act is said to involve elaborate shadow puppetry

The lack of clarity surrounding the location, content, size and all-important 'vibe' of the festival, combined with the use of a tiered ticketing system that punishes everything short of total unflinching commitment, has caused some frustration. Weekend tickets to the event are divided into four categories of increasing cost: 'Early Bird', 'Full Price', 'Full Fucking Price?' and - for those who like to know vaguely what they're paying for before they pay for it – the 'Statutory Assault' wristband, which guarantees being groped heavy-handedly upon both entry and exit.

However festival regular Tom Peace said: “It's not really about the music for me. My first taste of 'the Parklife Experience' was when a bloke chopped up a line of ket on his big toe and offered it to me with a wink. I didn't catch his name but the tattoo on his lower lip said 'Kaz'."

"As I left I saw a half-naked man lying on his back. He'd lifted his legs in the air so he could more easily piss into his own eyes.”