Terror Firma. Matthew Thomas

       9. If You Tolerate This Your CD Collection Will Be Next

      Not far from where Kate had conducted her interview with farmer Smith, a swampy field just outside Glastonbury was packed with people, just as it always was at this time of year.

      But the crowds of bleary-eyed festival-goers weren’t solely here for the music. Judging by the mud, and the queues for the toilets, they weren’t here for their health either. There existed third-world refugee camps with better sanitary conditions than these. But at least the victims of mankind’s latest war weren’t crowded out by gaudily tie-dyed stalls manned by grey-haired hippies trying to sell everything from Abduction Survival Kits and King Arthur radio clock alarms to Make Quorn Edible recipe books. There was more crystal in this quiet Somerset town than all the chandeliers in the Versailles Hall of Mirrors put together, but fortunately there wasn’t a delegation of high-level Germans getting stitched up nearby. The ‘Glastonbury Experience’ was designed to cater for far more than just the anally-retentive masochistic music fan, it was ingeniously crafted to appeal to people wishing to make a ‘lifestyle choice’.

And what a choice it was. The masses of combat-trouser-clad off-duty estate agents and junior management consultants were there for the dope. If they’d wanted music they had perfectly good CD players in their Audis and BMWs clogging the huge car parks nearby. They were doing something far more profound than simply having a boogie – they were making a stand against the relentless drive of consumerism, and they thought £49.95¹ a head to do so was a bit of a bargain.

      Some went with the loud intention of dropping a few ‘e’s’. But the only letter these frustrated public-school boys had ever dropped were ‘h’s’, in a sad attempt to sound more working class.

      The admission was a particular bargain this year, though the organizers didn’t realize that yet. If they had known the identity of that year’s mystery gate-crasher they could have safely trebled the prices, and still sold out ten times over. Lounging in their distant Tuscan villas, value for money had been the last thing in mind – but then soon enough, so too would be mere profit.

      As the latest mumbling, moody three-piece band to crawl from the mean streets of Newport left the stage, safe in the knowledge that if you’re Welsh and grew up in a terraced house no one would ever accuse you of being pretentious, the next act was warming up ready to go on. But this performer wasn’t limbering up backstage. No mineral-water-equipped green room hung with nubile groupies was temporary home to this show-biz heavy weight, just as he wasn’t to be flown in last minute on a private luxury jet. The anxious stage manager didn’t know it yet, but the next visitor was zooming in from much further afield, both in space and time.

      Accompanied by a bone-shaking electrical hum, a perfectly triangular black craft slowly descended through the veil of low grey cloud. It came to rest hovering two hundred feet above the sea of upturned awe-struck faces, bathing them in the single baleful yellow light that shone from its keel like an unblinking evil eye. Without a sound the ship effortlessly glided further forward, stopping to float directly over the deserted stage.

      The golden light pulsated for a moment, then a single radiant figure slowly descended through the glowing column, as if suspended by an unseen wire.

      If the crowd had been speechless before, soon they were hypnotized by the man hunched statue-still up on stage. He wore a spotless white jump-suit, flared cuffs glittering sequin-laced under the eerie light. Behind his lavishly coiffured head stretched an arching radar-dish collar. His bloated top lip was curled in a famous uncontemptuous sneer, as he pressed it hard against a rhinestone-encrusted radio-mike; his other jewel-heavy hand thrust back and up behind him in a quivering stance. The wrap-around shades he wore would have done a welder or an oversensitive vampire proud.

      If this was a publicity stunt then it was well worth the admission fee alone. This was the best Elvis impersonator anyone had ever seen, and he certainly knew how to make an entrance. The sideburns were a touch too long and curly, and shot through with grey if truth be told, but every other detail was spot on. Authentically enough he didn’t seem to have missed too many meals lately – what a commendable touch of professionalism in this slapdash age.

      Elvis didn’t move his ostentatiously bowed head from where it was hunched over the mike. He had the voice down pat too – a harmonious Dixie drawl wrapped up in a diamond-studded velvet glove.

      ‘I’d just like to tell y’all, I don’t eat meat no more – not since the military started pumping it full of filthy GM hormones. This next number goes out to all those reformed meat-eaters out there – and by that I don’t mean hamburger lovers, you dig?’ He formed his upturned hand into a Churchillian victory salute, ‘Viva Lost Vegans, everywhere.’

      The King then broke into a stirring rendition of one of his best-loved numbers. Accompanied by an unseen orchestra, which seemed to blare out from the black ship above, he tore through ‘Always On My Mind’, singing not just to the audience but the entire human race. Any doubts that he was the real thing evaporated the moment he opened his mouth. When he pleaded with them to ‘give me one more chance to keep you satisfied’ the crowd would have hit the roof, if there’d been a roof to hit.

      When the noise had subsided to a mere deafening roar, Elvis held up a shaky hand for silence. ‘Where’ve ya been, ya Highness?’ yelled an impatient reveller from the crowd’s rippling front row.

      One of the King’s trembling trouser legs started wobbling of its own accord, generating a terrific breeze as it did so. ‘Well, howdy there, li’l pardner. Been staying up at the government-run heartbreak hotel, but now I’ve come back to you folks for good – aha huuuu.’

      The crowd erupted into ecstatic screaming delight. Elvis held up a calming hand once again. A fistful of glittering jewellery sparkled amidst the golden light.

      ‘First I’ve got some news to tell ya. Don’t figure y’all like it much.’

      As one the crowd fell silent. Elvis continued in his lilting sing-song voice.

      ‘I ain’t been gone of my own free will. Been a prisoner dancing to a dishonest warden’s very own jailhouse rock. For all those long years I been gone, I was held hostage by darkly sinister forces. Yes folks, there’s a conspiracy going on behind your backs, perpetrated by your evil governments and the corrupt politicians who spin you their cynical lies.’

      There was a howl of incredulous rage, plus some shouts for further songs by some of the less politically-aware festival goers. But this crowd was far from dubious of the great man’s claims, there were plenty here today well capable of believing what he told, many who were completely unsurprised by it in fact – and didn’t the unseen puppeteers just know it.

      ‘Those same good ole boys who got to Kennedy, well they got to me too. Kidnapped me from my very own john. Well now I’m here in Engle-land for the very first time, ready to start my come-back tour. Gonna be some show!’

      Meanwhile a single unmarked helicopter had come to hover above the crowd. Those camped beneath it felt the brutal effects of its rotor down-wash – tents and teepees flattening beneath its steady thumping force; but its turbines gave off no sound. As it hung there like a spiteful wasp Elvis continued his heart-felt manifesto.

      ‘Hard to believe, I know, but there’s more to their depraved schemings than just my heinous incarceration. Your governments have kidnapped others too – but not just men and women like you and me. They’ve got hangars full of crashed space-aliens – little peace-loving grey brothers who mean to do us no harm. Help me to set them free!’

      Those