Weeley Festival was a British rock festival that took place in August 1971 near the small village of Weeley outside Clacton in Essex.
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Weeley Festival was organised by Clacton Round Table as a small charity fundraising event for around 5,000 people. When plans for that year's Isle of Wight Festival fell through, focus shifted to Weeley and the festival grew in importance. Advance ticket sales were over 100,000, and estimates of attendance are between 110,000 and 150,000[1]. The festival took place over the August Bank Holiday. The event was promoted as being non-stop music with acoustic acts scheduled to appear between the electric acts, and the music went on day and night.
The opening act were Hackensack, who played an extended set as no other acts had yet arrived. The Pink Fairies were not originally booked to play. They simply turned up and performed for free to the campers; they were so popular, however, that they were asked to play on the stage. Evergigging band Stray were famous for exploding dustbins on stage , and they managed , according to their website, be over enthusiastic with the pyrotechnics and caused the local coastguard to be alerted. The band had to apologise to the coastguard.
During the festival there were messages for Wally being read out over the sound system, and a Wally chant developed over the weekend. Evidence suggests that this was a continuation of the same behaviour at the Isle of Wight Festival in 1970 [2].
During the festival there were fights between a gang of Hells Angels and stall holders [3]. The Hells Angels were eventually driven away by a combined force of festival staff and stall holders.