Whilst the courts of Clare College are more pristine than prehistoric, Clare May Ball’s “Primordial” theme combined creativity and excellent ents to produce a thoroughly enjoyable night.

The ball kicked off with a grim memento mori. Wrinkled and wizened by years of student gigs, kebabs and disappointment, Jo, Paul and Bradley did a good job of looking like they still felt reaching for the stars was a possibility. In the mouths of the dregs of this former pop sensation, the lines “don’t stop, never give up” acquired a melancholia Lars von Trier would have been proud of. Yet S Club 3 were a huge hit with a crowd of nostalgic twenty-somethings enthusiastically belting out every word so the singers didn’t have to.

S Club 3 set the tone for a main stage line up to suit every taste. The awesome Swiss Lips pulled a smaller crowd but their Mancunian electro-pop stylings brought some joy division-infused northern drizzle to the beautifully decorated surroundings. The main stage continued to feature winner after winner – an energetic set from Pendulum followed by Cambridge staples Denim and Truly Medley Deeply - and the smaller stages provided a similar parade of musical variety.

Buoyed by the great music on offer, I was happy to ignore a few of the ball’s defects. Excluding some burnt eggs Benedict at the end of the night, the food was generally high quality; the bangers and mash and paella were particularly good. But the food was lacking in variety and quantity; queues were long and food tents packed up too quickly. There was also a distinct lack of bins, which meant by the end of the night parts of the college looked like a Jurassic landfill sight.  

This might have been overlooked had the alcohol not been a bit sparse for my liking; the cocktails from the Master’s Garden were gorgeous, but booze sometimes seemed a trek away.

The theme manifested itself in some truly imaginative ways, including a dinosaur being led out of the main stage at about midnight, smoke rising from the pond in the sunken garden, and the chance to pose with a massive anaconda. The theme’s implications for the insect community were less than terrific; this is the first and the last time I have tried fried grasshopper, but even though it tasted gross, the chance to eat insects whilst wearing an anaconda as a scarf gave the ball an original edge.

Next to a games marquee and photo booth, ball-goers were offered the chance to sit in a tent surrounded by butterflies with plastic flowers hanging from the roof. The tent was a lovely idea, but by the time the queues had died down around 3am most of the butterflies had died, their corpses strewn in a box on the floor. I christened them Paul, Jo, and Bradley and mourned their early passing.

I wasn’t given long to ponder the inevitability of decay and death, since the Fruity Clave Samba Band injected infectious energy into Old Court just before the survivors’ photo, and I skipped out of Clare feeling enlivened and invigorated by the evening’s antediluvian entertainment.