Truck Festival 2026 - strong music, but some organisational issues

 Truck 2026, one of the best small festivals in the Uk and enjoying an increased capacity to 28000 from 24000 for the firs time in years came to a glorious end on Sunday in some Glorious Oxfordshire sunshine.

We headed off for the Thursday early entry option, not only giving us an extra days music but some of the best camping spots before the majority of revelers arrive throughout Friday. We're in Zodiac camping, a more relaxed experience with 24 hour shower access.

This also gives you priority arena entrance and we were set up in time to catch up and comer, Etta Marcus, on the main stage, a chilled opener with her hit Girls that Play coming in mid set.

Only a couple of stages open on a Thursday, with our Friends at This Feeling curating the stage of the same name. Here it's more indie bands and and we made our first trip of the evening to catch northern lads, The Cases in an energetic 30 minute set wish I wish had been a bit longer, We'd be here later on for The Slates but of course, it was mainstage headliner CMAT first.

 I'd not had the chance to see her as yet and was not disappointed, a full our and 15 of fun and Frolics from a performer who loves what she does and doesn't take life seriously, from getting a class of wine with an ice cub in on stage to stories and anecdotes, the sun set on day 1 leaving a really positive feeling for the weekend ahead.

As mentioned above, Friday is when the music really starts and most people arrive, Truck is very family friendly so for those with youngsters the "Little Truckers" area has stories, games, fun circus workshops and baby changing, as well as a cinema tent showing family friendly cartoons and movies, there's also campsite Yoga and other activities to enjoy. Although i'm probably best avoiding trying any Downward dogs at my age! 

There's a stage called the V and V, which hosts bands from Oxfordshire but on Friday BBC introducing arrive and we turned up for the first act of the day, Indiya, a young performer with soulful and pop overtones, with an enjoyable cover of TV Girls "Lovers Rock" - the melancholy of the lyrics captured perfectly with a different take on the music.

 

I mentioned organisation issues and this is where the first ones were starting to creep in, I was ill when i returned home (more on this later) and, despite Truck's pretty good record when it comes to customer welfare, water points were starting to leak in the arena and there was no hand sanitiser in the urinals, forcing hand washing at water points designed for filling bottles - given the temperatures and increase risk of cross contamination, this was certainly far different from last years "cleaner" experience... again, more on this later.

My favourite stage is The Nest! here you'll find more punk, hard rock, metal and alt acts - Irish band Adore were superb! i hadn't heard of them and headed over as they were the stage openers for the weekend, check them out if you like your punk.

Hung around for the next act - Twat Union - Femme Rock who are unashamedly proud and righty so! "Period Sex" is a song about what you think it is, I really hope we see more from the band who gave us the first ever play of their new song! 

A site wander took us over to the Market stage, which is headed up by the always awesome So Young - the second stage carries a lot of different sounds, from DJ's like Sigma to grunge like Keo, We caught the end of My First Time, they were ok.

Regulars to this page will know at the start of the year we able to cover Slag when they toured with Hot Wax, I thought their set was good but missing something at the time. Really good to see them again and a slot back on The Nest showcased what the band can do, I'm certainly impressed.

 

 

Those wanting a wake up call on Friday afternoon, or who maybe weren't quite feeling in the festival Vibe need to catch Joe and the Shit Boys, before catching them I only knew of the Faroe Islands were the exploits of hero football goalie Jens Knudsen - now I know their most famous musical export! see them, hear them! they rocked!

 

 

 

Primal Scream were Sub headliners to the Maccabees, we caught them at their best! Bobby Gillespie has good stage presence and this was a set of all the hits to get everyone signing too. Then decided to head over the Stalls and traders and then to the Tipsy Cow from some cheesy 80's bangers and dancing.


More organisational woes with just 1 set of showers and toilets in Zodiac leading long waiting times on Saturday morning - last year the same issues occcured despite Truck acknowledging them, with 4,500 in Zodiac a second set of Loo's are surely required. again, just 1 water point on the entire campsite for fast approaching 33 degree heat.

With this in mind it was important to find shade, Barricane on the V and V stage gave us some Irish inspired folk music.

We had to head back to camp to attend to a pet emergency at home which would also lead to missing some acts Sunday afternoon. However we headed back to the arena for the Rosadocs from Sheffield before a band I'd wanted to see for some time Adult DVD on the Market stage, They sound like Kasabian in some of their songs and a packed tent shows they're very much due for bigger soon.

Festival main Stagers The Vaccines ran through their first album in full, Truck was actually the first festival they ever played as an unknown act in the early 2000's on one of the smaller stages - a great testimony to the bands success as they had the crowd in the palm of their hand on the Truck stage.

 I'm a fan of Black Honey, as a neurodiverse person myself, Izzy B Phillps is someone I greatly look up to, the last time i saw them wasn't a great experience due to someone in the crowd, so to see them again was really good, they played some new stuff, But also treated us to All my Pride, hello Today and Corrine. 

Now the elephant in the room, Food poisoning! I was very ill Monday Morning and I'm pretty sure it came about due to lack of hand sanitizer in the arena (despite having my own which i did use) and people washing their hands in the water points, which were already leaking. People were unwell after bad food from a Yorkshire pudding stall which was closed down Sunday morning - i didnt have this but did eat something else from another stall which made me unwell. 

I dont want to blame Truck, as they run a great show, but accountability around hygiene with people washing hands in bottle fill points needs to be called into question. Assurances that this will improve really need to be forthcoming from the organisers.

A shorter Sunday music wise due to the pet emergency and we saw Mr Motivator bring the smiles on the morning workout, Norwich band Chest showed the site what they were about in a great set! they're from our home and we're proud of how far they've come!

 

We ended our time at truck with the end of Kid Kapichi's set and the Wombats before the fireworks went off.

Musically a great year, however I can't help but get the feeling the festival is starting to move away from what it started out as almost 30 years ago, a family friendly weekend of entertainment and vibes.  our first year was in 2017 where the site was smaller, there was local stalls and traders, over a decade letter it's more geared towards the same stalls you see at every festival and very much more profit first - people second that some of the bigger festivals we can name are.

Will we be back, most likely, Will be back many times going forwards - well - that depends very much on which direction the Truck decides to steer.