It's time for me to throw in the musical festival towel.
I mean, who was I kidding?
![What was I thinking?](/web/20170111174714im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/o/7/r/n/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gto6z6.png/1483935232882.jpg)
I don't claim to be revered for an expansive erudition on all things music, but I felt my musical taste was discerning and covered decades and genres.
But there were the obvious warning signs it was time to hang up the festival sneakers. I simply ignored them.
![The crowd was lapping it up.](/web/20170111174714im_/http://www.watoday.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/o/7/2/n/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gto6z6.png/1483935232882.jpg)
Having to Google half the bands playing at the Falls Festival in Fremantle should have triggered something in me.
And the fact I was old enough to be the father of 99 per cent of the music-goers should have sent me scurrying for the exit like it was my last night on earth.
Maybe because I tackled the Blues 'n' Roots Festival over the past 10 years with the gusto and alacrity of a St Bernard finding a mountain climber buried under snow, I kidded myself I was still "match fit" for music festivals.
But being surrounded by a crowd of ageing beatniks and Bodhisattvas under a vapour cloud of pot was no preparation for Falls.
It was the equivalent of landing on the shores of Normandy with a water pistol.
At first I thought I had stumbled into the dystopian world described in the under rated sci-fi book Logan's Run, where citizens live outrageous hedonistic lives until the age of 21, when they are put to death with a pleasure-inducing toxic gas.
But here it appeared the pleasure-seeking had no limits or end.
Given the amount of condoms strewn around Kings Square, music-goers had clearly become more creative when it came to sneaking in their drug of choice.
Don't get me wrong, back in the heyday of music festivals of the 90s the checklist involved pills, pot, wallet and some form of pants.
It's just at Falls, some punters had forgotten to tick off pants.
And bubbling under the surface, you sensed at any moment it was going to be like being stuck on a cruise ship where passengers one by one slowly became violently ill after coming down with gastro.
There was a splattering of people over the age of 30. But most of them huddled in the shadows like petrified antelope on the Serengeti Plain in Africa, waiting for the lions to leave the only muddy watering hole for 100 miles.
The only semi-conversation I had was with a young girl who launched into an excited riff about how she was convinced I was her drama teacher in high school.
The last time I was within the walls of any high school was in the early 80s!
And when I gave what can only be described as half a grin to a student I tutored at university, his eyes quickly narrowed to dark slits, before he suddenly skedaddled away as if he had just spotted sasquatch in a gardening hat.
Young revellers spying my camera clawed at my arms as if they had just spent the last six hours dog paddling in shark infested waters, just so I would take their photo.
The tiny photographer's pass could have read I was a registered sex offender, but the punters demanded I snap them pretending to exude the freewheeling spirit of the festival lifestyle.
The level of narcissism was amusing and alarming.
Ironically, the only person older than me was the father of hip-hop, the wonderful Grandmaster Flash.
The famous platter-spinning journeyman, decked out in his immaculate red Pumas, (check out Baz Luhrmann's latest cinematic creation, the Get Down for the reference) flawlessly scratched his way through a brief history of music.
It wasn't just hip-hop as he blended disco, UB40, Dizzee Rascal and even some classic AC/DC.
At this stage, I foolishly thought I would leap into the crowd that was whopping and hollering, but weaving through the mob was like navigating some tortuous mountain pass.
This "review" doesn't claim to be some slapdash attempt to capture the mixture of hip-hop, dub, dance and electronica.
And the acts I did see were exhilarating and explosive.
In the end, it wasn't some blinding moment of clarity that made me realise I was too old for music festivals; it was I just didn't have the will to wade through an ocean of boozed-up bon vivants.
Although, given I thought the Grandmaster gave me a wry grin after spotting blue Pumas, there is a chance I might come out of retirement at some stage.
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