Venue:
Catton Hall, near Alrewas
Date: 27/05/2016
Day 1: Barely 15 minutes from my front door, I had the luxury of a leisurely lie-in ahead of being able to put my tent up and still be in the arena for midday. Traditionally the first couple of hours are for finding ones bearings, without anyone of much cop playing. 5 main stages, the Pallet, for the bigger bands, another in the woods, called the,um, Woodlands, for 2nd stringers, and then a hotch potch of marquees for dance, cabaret and such like. All easily accessible around a central fairground and all the usual outlets for festival food and clothing. First band for me were Roughneck Riot, one of the slew of shouty thrash/folk/punk bands, filling out their orthodox rhythm section with the now de rigeur accordions and banjos. A rousing start and another new to me, The King Blues, with energetic flashes of angry near rap from the dapper front man. Entertaining enough, but made me miss Attila the Stockbroker, one of many names from the past who showed up. I had always thought Reverend and the Makers would be shite and, do you know, I wasn’t wrong. Terrorvision couldn’t convince me either of their worth, it taking Killing Joke to seize again the interest of this member of the crowd. Looking somewhat disturbingly like Alice Cooper, Jaz Coleman strutted around the stage, gurning and grimacing for all his worth, words largely rudimentary, or at least, unintelligible. But the band were as tight as the proverbial, a juddering powerhouse of industrial noise that I rather enjoyed, even if I could find myself humming none of the tunes later. Youth’s bass was particularly vivid, even if he now needs to retire that nom de guerre, looking more like Harry Enfield in his You don’t want to be doing that persona, albeit with wispy dreads about his pate. Also, coming from my folkie axis, this was my first experience, in 44 years of giggling that I came to find myself in a mosh pit, or on the edge of one. Actually a bit rough for me, but one I kept finding at this festival. Closing the bill this night were the Levellers, now an amiable a bunch of dudes as befits their transition from threats to treasures, sticking wisely to very little new. But, was it just me, were they not a bit more fun when you had to count your chances of getting out alive from their very scary shows and audiences of the 90s? Then it was off to bed for me, I’m too old for the dance tent, but they thoughtfully kept me awake until 3, so as not to miss anything.
I didn’t see Kid Dynamite today.
The audience:
Possibly wider in age range than even Shrewsbury and Cambridge folk festival, from tots to their grandparents, but predominantly the top end, at times making me feel young. And o so middle class, with a strong representation of positively elderly crusties and punks, roaming in large packs, their cubs and pups at their side. A bit like a Cropredy audience, down on their luck and living in squats.
It made me think..
Where are these people the rest of the year? I should add for all their formidable appearances, all were good natured and enjoying the sun. And if T shirts indicate the size of the band, New Model Army and Ferocious Dog should be the biggest in the land, so many present of their acolytes.
Day 2: Bet not many of the campers went home on saturday and mowed the lawn, but I did, such are my rock and roll credentials. OK, I had an ablute away from the festerval facilities, SWIDT, and had to take the Squeezes daughter to a Docs appt at midday, but, as I said, rock and roll. This had me back just in time for the end of the Moulettes, current folk festival darlings and all a bit serious for me. Skerryvore had been looking forward to, getting my essential fix of bagpipes therefrom. OK, they are from the poppier end of the hebridean bands that vie for coming from the smallest islands, Tiree in their case. But they were fine and hit the spot for when nothing but highland war pipes will work. Of course I wept. To restore composure I nipped over to the Woodland to catch yestheyarestillgoing Blyth Power. Joseph Porter still entertains from behind his drums in a thoroughly idiosyncratic way, all odd asides and untrained warble, songs about trains and the civil war.And he still looks only about 40, despite ploughing his own unique style for as least as long. Good band in a ramshackle way, the keyboards and guitar getting specific mention. I missed the Cockney Rejects. Deliberately. Wilko Johnson next and he was absolutely incandescent. At Lunar last year he was good, but this was nothing short of a barnstormer. Looking in excellent fettle, he banged his way through all the hits from the Feelgoods as well as his more recent stuff, the bass playing, as ever, of Norman Watt-Roy, astonishing and amazing, as he ruins yet another shirt in sweat. Billy Bragg, next on, was at the back of the stage, singing along, as were the entire audience, but he probably wondering how the hell to follow that. Luckily he took a wise move and largely stuck to his solo electric street agitator persona, occasionally augmented by 2nd guitar/pedal steel. He was jovial and jolly jolly good. And hell yes, he had everyone there thinking Bremain was the wise move, if only for the duration of his act, so no harm done there! Then it was a group labelled as Black Uhuru. Tight, ultra tight reggae band with 3 singers, two male, one female, tick, but, although they sang some of their “hits”, this was no subversive counter culture, this was summery sing songs with added dub. It was good but it wasn’t Black Uhuru. So finally the draw of the bill, at least for a good number present, with PiL. I was intrigued rather than expectant, but the augurs were good as the band, Geoffrey Bayldon, Phill Jupitus and Chris Evans, or they could have been, plugged into a bass drenched churn not dissimilar to Killing Joke. But the shock as Lydon/Rotten appeared was immense, as was he, having morphed into Jabba the Hut since the marge adverts. I could take about half an hour before his monotain wail became annoying, but glad I made the effort. Bedtime.
I didn’t see Kid Dynamite today.
http://i1353.photobucket.com/albums/q678/Xuxi58/CIMG2262_zpswrpjdugm.jpg
Day 3: Well, despite cataloguing our T shirt choices by SMS, myself and Kid Dynamite had failed to make AW contact, so arranged a 2 o’clock beer tent rendezvous. I was in my Ukrainians bright yellow one and he is his New Model Army black one, couture lovers. He responded by taking me over to see the Barsteward sons of Val Doonican in the woodland. Wigs, wooly tank-tops and bowdlerised covers, think Portaloo for Waterloo, high brow filth of a top drawer. But not a top drawer I could keep open too long. (Still, he is much younger than me 😉 Making my excuses I ploughed back to the main stage for more folk-thrash, this time of an irish hue, Mad Dog McCrea. Good festival fare, or drunk in a pub in Skibereen, but a tad too generic. They hit their high point with a Raggle Taggle Gypsy at song 2, but were a good craic for all that. The prospect of Bad Manners was enough to send me scattering to pull down the tent, ready for a quick getaway, dallying a while in the dance tent for Loop Guru DJ set which was excellent if incongruous at 3pm on a hot summer sunday. Coming back I caught the end of From the Jam, which seemed a bit wrong, even if Bruce Foxton was present. It was all beginning to feel a bit heritage. Squeeze could have taken that too far, and, in a way, they did, but in a fabulous way. So much better than the Difford/Tillbrook Morecombe and Wise duo of a year or 2 back, this was smiles all round. With an additional 4 musicians, largely unrecognisable, the burly figure of John Bentley on bass being changed for a comely female. I think the drummer has been with them a while, as he seems to have taken on the character of the group, but I still miss Gilson. What did they play? Well, all the hits, basically, 2 or 3 off newie, Cradle to the Grave and, unusually, a couple of covers, including a not half bad Harper Valley PTA. The next project? About a 1/3 of the set were radical rejigs, with ukeleles and rudimentary drums front of stage, so much better than that sounds. Off with a bang, no encore, but apparently the last song played had been the encore when KD had seen them in Brizzle so that was OK. Goodbye Girl, of course, by the way. I hate to say it, but their show, followed closely by Wilko and Bragg, was my highpoint of the whole shebang. You just can’t argue with songs of such quality, belted out with love by a band clearly enjoying themselves again, even if Difford is near sidelined to the Glenn Tillbrook show. An several thousand singing along, word perfect, is a joy to behold. I confess I felt neither Asian Dub Foundation or Stiff Little Fingers could top that, so drove home, a happy if weary fella, a G&T in my jim-jams seeming eminently preferable to the pollen count that had hammered me so relentlessly for 3 days.
KD asked if I’d come again. Do you know, I might just.
http://i1353.photobucket.com/albums/q678/Xuxi58/CIMG2271_zpsv0xh6rpb.jpg
Lovely summation there, @retropath2. I wrote a bit about the festival background when I reviewed last year’s event (https://theafterword.co.uk/bearded-theory-2015/), and a lot of that holds true for this year as well. But what about the music?
First band we saw on the Friday was Zombie Met Girl on the main stage. Garage surf punk with heavy Cramps and Dead Kennedys influences, so right up my street. We also caught some of the Roughneck Riot, urgent shouty punk laced with banjo and accordion.They are a one trick pony, but the trick was good enough to keep us watching for half an hour before heading to the Woodlands to see Stevie One Bloke One Mandolin. That was probably a mistake, a set full of mandolin (duh) dirges sung by an English bloke affecting a bluesy drawl who probably fancies himself as providing the songs for an old American TV series, the kind that used to be on ITV of a Saturday teatime, probably about a loner travelling the Rocky Mountains righting wrongs and dispensing his own brand of frontier justice between the commercial breaks. I blame Seasick Steve. Next up was Attila The Stockbroker, and I’m afraid Retro missed a treat here. Passionate ranting from an unashamedly left wing perspective, but leavened with plenty of humour and football. Sticking with the Woodland, we opt for Wonk Unit. Three days later I am still not sure if this was tongue in cheek punk rock or some kind of performance art piece. The singer is a man-child claiming to be a builder who recites some of his childhood poems and then sings them over a nicely groovy three chord thrash laced with Bontempi organ and trumpet. I’d go see them again.
And then Killing Joke roll round. Their juddering apocalyptic tribal noise is well described above, with an absolutely thunderous rhythm section. For an hour they turn a sunny field in rural England into a landscape of smouldering wreckage, burnt out tower blocks and crashed airplanes. Band of the day for me. Levellers are a fun way to wind things down. As Retro notes, any semblance of danger or edge has long gone from their sets, but it’s amiable crowd pleasing stuff, and they deserve credit for mixing up the setlist and not relying on the old warhorses they’ve trotted out the last few times I’ve seen them. No credit at all for forgetting the final verse of Riverflow though, eh Mr Chadwick?
First band on Saturday was Moulettes for us as well. Proggy folk that made a decent accompaniment to sipping cider in the sun. Later that afternoon, Blyth Power are a true hidden English treasure. Songs about cricket, kings and being stationed in the Holy Land with the Knights Templar as a metaphor for hating your bandmates. I’ve loved them for years, and I wish they’d gig more often – they are really a part time proposition these days as children and day jobs have curtailed the old permatouring outfit. Senser are nakedly a nostalgia trip for early 90s indie kids. Eject and No Comply are still fierce songs, but, you know, I used to mock my dad for going to see the Sixties bands of his youth on the chicken in a basket circuit in the Eighties, and this isn’t really that different. Back at the main stage, not as much love for Wilko Johnson as Retro had from me, I’m afraid. I can see he’s good, and the band are super tight, but somehow it just doesn’t move me. Billy Bragg on the other hand offers a masterclass in how to play to a festival audience. He’s onto a good thing with a six o clock slot on one of the sunniest afternoons of the year anyway, but a singalong set of beloved classics with a gentle smattering of new, plus his amiable persona and engaging stage banter make for one of the most purely enjoyable hours of the whole weekend. Then something calling itself Black Uhuru takes the stage. No Sly, no Robbie, no Michael Rose, no Duckie Simpson, obviously no Puma Jones…they’re a decent reggae act, alright, but they’re not Black Uhuru. And they don’t play Youth Of Eglington either. Public Image Limited to finish then. As Retro says. Lydon’s appearance is a palpable shock to the audience. I saw them five or six years ago, and he was nothing like the post punk Christopher Biggins he is now. That ultimately irrelevant moan aside, PiL are tremendous. The sonic palette is not a million miles from Killing Joke’s throb with a challenging experimentalism that is super ballsy for any festival headline set, let alone one from a band that’s pushing forty years old. I didn’t come out whistling any of the tunes, but I knew I’d just seen something excellent. A quick hour of acid techno in the dance tent and so to bed.
Looking at the programme in advance, Sunday was probably the least interesting day of the three, but Rumour Cubes started quite nicely with a set of heavily Godspeed-indebted post-rock. I’ve probably seen The Bar Steward Sons Of Val Doonican enough times now. They can be funny, and they go down a treat with the massive crowd in the Woodland, but what made me laugh lots last year seems a bit forced when it’s largely the same gags this time round. I probably oversold them to Retro, and I apologise for that, but at least he got to see my friends’ terrible facial hair, so not a complete write off. I did miss Talisman on the main stage though, who would have been interesting. True fact: Mad Dog McCrea played at my cousin’s wedding reception fifteen years ago. They’re doing well now and building up bit of a head of steam after gigging round Plymouth for years, and I wish them well with it, but it’s hard to disagree with Retro’s assessment, apart from to say that I also liked the one that sounded like Shooglenifty. Bit of a break from the music after that, as we devote a few hours to sitting in the sun (seriously, the weather was unbelievably good this year, all that wet weather gear left mouldering back at the tent) and strolling round generally soaking up the relaxed festival atmosphere, plus some of the lovely Thornbridge beers on offer. A final brief encounter with Mr Path, and then the last act I see are Ott And The All-Seeing I closing the dance tent. It’s intricate psychedelic electronica with a heavy dub influence, and it’s really good, an unexpected treat to round off another great festy. Roll on next year.
“A bit like a Cropredy audience, down on their luck and living in squats.”
Love it!
I sometimes feel the same way about the audience and the bands at Roskilde. What do they do for the other 360 days if the year? Very few of the bands there ever make it to Stockholm.
An entertaining and very informative review.