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When Richard Dunne was a young lad growing up in Stradbally, a regular hang out spot was ‘The Lawn’ where Electric Picnic is now hosted.
A guest on the recent LaoisToday podcast, Richard spoke about how the festival has grown, what it’s like to work in the family pub during Electric Picnic and why he is cycling from Tallaght to Stradbally for his 10th consecutive Tour de Picnic.
“I just think it’s a crazy to think as a young fella we used to sit out on the lawn in Stradbally and say to ourselves ‘wouldn’t this be the greatest concert venue in the world’ and for that to actually come true,” he said.
“The size it started off at to the size it is now it’s just phenomenal.
“It’s changed a lot. Anybody from the town could just jump over the fence (in the early years) if you knew the right place to get in. It’s like Fort Knox now you wouldn’t have a hope.”
Richard spoke of how the festival brings a huge economic boost to the area and says that every club and group benefits.
“In the town at the moment, there’s workers there they moved in as soon as Steam Rally was over. They’re eating in the restaurants and drinking in the pubs every night and as the weeks go on more and more people come around the place. Business are doing two months turnover in a weekend – it’s phenomenal.
“Every club and society in the town benefits once you can lobby them for x amount, they come up trumps.
It doesn’t matter what generation to the old to the young nobody has ever complained about it, ever.”
And as Richard prepares to cycle from Dublin to Stradbally once again as part of the Tour de Picnic for the tenth year running, he now does it for a very personal reason.
“Similar to the Picnic it started very low key – (we were) nearly getting killed by lorries. It’s gotten more official and there’s marshalls and all the rest and it’s very well organized and the charity that have got involved are more mainstream.
“It’s an 80k cycle from Tallaght to the picnic, they have a BBQ area and free beer when you get there. You’ve to raise 400 quid, it goes to charity and then you get a weekend pass. If i didn’t live in Stradbally there’s absolutely no way I could cycle down and then camp for the weekend, I’d say you wouldn’t recover for a month.
“There’s a stop in Athy in the GAA pitch to get food and all the rest before you get to Stradbally and there’s always a couple of hundred people swearing they’ll never do it again.
“Then there’s a few seasoned guys like me who take it easy and know it’s tough three days ahead of you.
“I started off just doing it for the charity angle but then in 2011 my daughter was born with a brain condition and she was in Temple Street for the first three months she was born. So I’ve obviously done a lot of fundraising since and Crumlin and Temple Street is a benefactor again this year.
“On the bike again this year and they actually funded me because I was the only person who’s done it every year.”
Celebrities in the bar
Richard will also be called on to pull a few pints over the weekend – but that has its upsides too with regular appearances from some top musicians.
“Mundy played a couple of times. He’s a family friend – I’ve known him since I was knee high to a grasshopper, so he’s brought down a couple of stragglers, a lot of the trad people so he’s had a couple in the kitchen so to speak.
“A lot of the Irish acts would be there, no real mainstream massive acts but the kind of local and Irish acts would come out for a few pints on the Sunday, especially when the GAA is on.”
Local residents
In Stradbally on Electric Picnic weekend, there is no other show in town, so to speak.
“Everybody goes to it.. Basically every resident is entitled to two passes. You can use them any day and pay 30 quid to charity. I hear there’s a row where the boundary ends and where it starts,” he laughs.
“There’s no point even getting the car out for the weekend. You have to walk everywhere – but nobody complains, it’s welcomed with opened arms.”
You can listen to the full LaoisToday Electric Picnic podcast here.
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