There are now more summer festivals to attend than ever before. We round up the best of 2011.

GLASTONBURY (Pilton, Somerset)

What to write about Glastonbury that hasn’t already been said? Almost three months on, I can’t remember details of setlists or what band members were wearing. I’ve forgotten just how awful the choice between bladder pain and enduring the toilet stench is. The gargantuan queues have, in my nostalgic brain, become jolly moments well spent, and the taste of Brothers lemon cider is a sensation I’d gladly recover.

Wednesday and Thursday are now just blurs of food and dancing. Best moments: jerk chicken and sweet chilli rice in The Park, and laughing so hard at my friend falling over in Cubehenge (a circle of huge glowing neon structures) that I ended up in the mud myself.
I began Friday with Metronomy, who seemed a little lost on the main stage at midday – their sound is much better suited to dark, closed in spaces (or anywhere people feel comfortable dancing) – but played a set that pleased the many dedicated fans down the front, and no doubt won them a few new followers.

Although Radiohead's set would have disappointed anyone wanting to hear the hits, it was utterly transcendental – rain and whisky mix in my mind with an overwhelming residual memory of the sound: layers and layers of melody topped with vocals just begging to be howled into the wind.

My enduring memory of Saturday is not Pulp or Coldplay, magnificent though they were, but the dance music in Chai Wallahs, a combination of tea shop, shisha bar and nightclub that only Glastonbury could pull off. We drank chai and brandy and ended the day – or, rather, began the next day – at the Stone Circle with candle flares and blankets.

Sunday was the only day I managed not to fall over, and what a glorious day it was. Most of it was spent at a silversmithing workshop in the Green Fields, bashing a small piece of metal for hours until it miraculously became a ring. Giddy with success, I ended the day lying in the sun in West Holts, listening to the Go! Team.

The beauty of Glastonbury is its diversity. You create the festival experience you want to have, whether that is dancing amongst industrial salvage, flopping into a deck chair with a cider, or learning new yoga moves in the Stone Circle. Or maybe, like me, doing all of the above.

[Anna Feintuck]

I'LL BE YOUR MIRROR (Alexandra Palace, London)

I’m sure we all have our own dream festival line-up. Since 1999, All Tomorrow’s Parties has been making such dreams a reality. Think of it as a sort of Make a Wish Foundation for the culturally significant: personages to draw up the bill over the last twelve years have included the likes of Belle & Sebastian, Jake & Dinos Chapman and Simpsons creator Matt Groening.

For this, the first in a new series of ATP events trading under the title 'I’ll Be Your Mirror’ , Bristol trip-hop innovators Portishead selected an eclectic yet consistent line-up in which they themselves took centre stage, providing headline sets on both nights. If this seems a greedy gesture, it was more than made up for by their generosity in bringing together a bevy of legends ranging from masked rapper MF Doom to erstwhile Mercury victor PJ Harvey to Nick Cave, who performed here with his Grinderman outfit.

The undercard was similarly laden with high spots: the Sunday opened with some earth-rattling drone from post-rock luminaries Godspeed You! Black Emperor and closed with a woozy late set from Caribou, in between which the Alexandra Palace masses were treated to barnstorming performances from Acoustic Ladyland (performing for the last ever time), Beach House and Anika, a political journalist who found herself taken under the wing of Portishead’s Geoff Barrow and ended up recording her debut album with support from Barrow’s own band Beak>.

It’s all pretty intense. The crowd is diverse and clearly brought together by one thing: they are all passionate about forward-thinking modern music, to a fault. In spite of its hipster credentials, ATP is not a festival "to be seen at". Everyone is far too busy ogling the latest act to bother looking like festival-goers. Nor do the acts appear to feel any pressure to put any gimmickry into their shows, although in this they may be simply following the lead set by the headliners, who demonstrate that they have compelling quietude down to a fine art.

In fact, all stocks of ostentation appear to have been reserved for Nick Cave, who, in spite of shedding his porn-star moustache, is still dedicated to perfecting his pelvic thrust. The moment when he straddles an audience member, shrieking his way through the middle-8 of Grinderman 2 album track Kitchenette ("It’s hard to relax!") will linger in some dark recess of my subconscious forevermore.

[Luke Healey]

GARDEN FESTIVAL (Zadar, Croatia)

After its sixth year, The Garden is fast becoming the place to check out on the festival calendar. The Croatian "back to our roots"  festival is the dramatic opposite of a mega-festival: a small site, a moderate sized line-up and only about 2500 people. And therein lies the beauty of the whole thing. It’s only when the music's tempo increases that you feel inclined to do anything at all beyond just being there.

The beautiful sunsets, great atmosphere and like-minded festival-goers continually bring life to Garden, with the music always matching the mood of the climate. There’s an emphasis on disco and house but with a diverse range of live acts and DJs throughout the week, there’s a varied selection of music with the likes of Electric Wire Hustle, Quantic and Motor City Drum Ensemble providing a good mix of hip-hop, jazz, soul and beyond.

The weekend saw an eclectic set from headliners Soul Clap and Wolf & Lamb on the beach terrace dropping deep disco bombs aplenty. Babarella’s nightclub, a 70s-style discothèque in the heart of Garden’s pine-clad peninsula, played host to different cult nights from around the UK.

And then there were the boat parties, charting the Adriatic waters twice a day with always impressive line-ups. Whether for a sun-bathed afternoon session of funk or a late trip to mix a sunset with some techno, the parties always capture the imagination.

All the artists got plenty of chances to play, whether on the boats, Barbarella’s, The Beach Bar or the Main Stage. The Garden cultivated a great crowd, blissfully free of the kind of teenyboppers you get at a lot of other festivals.

This year, the owners stayed true to their ethos, limiting the capacity when there must be a massive temptation to make this garden grow - but by expanding it they’d be in danger of losing the things that make it so unique. It may only be so long before Garden becomes the worst kept secret on the festival calendar.

[Pierce Higgins]

END OF THE ROAD FESTIVAL (Larmer Tree Gardens, Wiltshire)

Placed in the middle of Dorset, the 10,000 capacity festival is strewn with fairy lights, hay bales, and is far more laid-back than bigger festivals. It’s family-friendly, it’s picturesque, but never feels tame.

The atmosphere at a festival can often feel diluted when compared to a regular venue. This is because a sizeable portion of the audience is there incidentally. But when the crowd know the words to the Clap Your Hands Say Yeah back catalogue, or the Timber Timbre debut, you know this is not the case. The atmosphere for most bands was equivalent to an intimate gig.

Physically tUnE-yArDs were the most impressive act. They have a huge sound for a band with only a bass player and front-woman. The entire act was based around looping pedals. Chords and vocals, heard briefly, come back to form a multi-layered sound that builds through the song. It looked chaotic, but sounded incredibly precise.

Seeing the inner workings of Joanna Newsom’s sound was staggering. Newsom’s harp carried the set, persistently contravening the orthodoxy of such an unusual instrument. Acts like Beirut, Timber Timbre and Lykke Li followed in a similar strain in that they were intricate and sophisticated. Breaking the mould was The Fall. Although most of the set came from the last four albums, they sounded as good as ever. They were on form, and not just because Mark E. Smith didn’t walk off.

But what impressed me the most about End of the Road was the overall quality of musicianship. Nearly every band was confident with what they played. The music was not manufactured, it was authentic. Most artists knew exactly how they wanted to sound and recreated it, even toying with their sound in a way that more experienced musicians can struggle with. That is a sign of confidence and ability. End of the Road was completely about the music.

[Alex Ross]

LOVEBOX (Victoria Park, London)

Now into its ninth year, Lovebox has cemented itself at the forefront of London’s festival offerings. Priding itself on its eclectic line-ups, the curators, Groove Armada, have helped establish the festival as a cornerstone of the capital’s diversifying and innovative music scene.

Although pocketed away in Mile End’s Victoria Park, and split into three separate days without camping, Lovebox provides nothing less than the full festival experience come rain or shine. Each day boasts a changing theme: Bang The Box label hosting Friday’s proceedings, ‘Music Safari’ on Saturday, providing all things from Snoop Dog to Hospitality’s finest, and a Sunday of, ‘Out and Out Fierce’, celebrating everything fabulous and weirdly wonderful.

Spread over a handful of stages, the festival’s music was accompanied nicely by a number of art installations, giving it the condensed feel of the huge variety that often only comes with the larger summer festivals.

Highlight performances saw the big name acts of Example and Scissor Sisters draw some of the largest crowds. However special mention must go to a number of the supporting acts lower down the bill. This included the formidable Kelis, who sung to her heart’s content in a skeleton print outfit, bringing to life her catalogue of hits, from the new Bounce, to Acapella, and of course, Milkshake.

 The Ed Banger All Stars got the party well and truly started on Friday too, with appearances from French House greats Cassius, along with the new jackin’ house beats of Carte Blanche, who performed with their own roller skaters.

There was indeed something for everyone this year, as festival closers 2manydjs reinforced, bringing to life their Under The Covers tour of mashup CDs, with their album artwork cut visuals. No genre was left unmixed by the Dewaele brothers as they sent the main stage into raptures, closing the festival fittingly to a confetti cannon, and the John Paul Young classic, Love is in The Air.

[Joshua Angrave]

T IN THE PARK (Balado, Perth and Kinross)

With an embarrassingly star studded line up (Beyoncé and Pulp weren’t even headlining), it was only the pre-festival forecast of “thunder and heavy rain” which drew any doubts on the huge potential promised by this year’s T in the Park.

Gloomy skies and gloomy bands seemed like the only thing of note on a rather disappointing Friday until Jessie J’s unfortunate leg break saw Tom Jones bumped up to the main stage.The evergreen Welshman commanded the stage with his supreme voice and brilliant backing band, and as the hits came out so too did the sun. As thousands of sun basked (and already sun burnt) Scots bellowed along to Delilah it was clear that T in the Park had begun.

That night’s headliners Arctic Monkeys would have been wise to watch Tom Jones’ crowd pleasing set earlier in the day as they produced a disappointing performance, lacking in both intensity and emotion.

The sun was still shining on Saturday and the party feel was in full swing as festival-goers jumped around in shorts and flip-flops to House of Pain. On the back of her impressive Glastonbury performance Beyoncé lit up the evening with an unbelievably energetic display, showing off her remarkable singing and dancing abilities.

Coldplay had the unenviable task of following Beyoncé, while competing for fans with Primal Scream’s impressive Screamadelica set on at the King Tut’s Wah Wah tent. They dealt with any potential pressures comfortably, with a triumphant set focusing heavily on their earlier albums.

Sunday saw the inevitable downpour of rain, right in the middle of Blondie’s greatest hits. As artists tried their hardest to keep the soggy fans’ spirits high, it took a glorious set from Pulp followed by a mammoth two-hour Foo Fighters show to make sure T in the Park ended as fantastically as it deserved. 

[Tom Kinney]