Venue:
Bannau Brycheiniog
Date: 16/08/2026
Last Monday I was on my way back to Germany after a week in the Brecon Beacons/Bannau Brycheiniog with old friends from my university days who kindly invited me, back in February, to join them for their annual trip to the Green Man Festival. My first time, they were veterans with a plan. A 12 person tent, with 5 of us in it, we were spoiled for the week with cooked meals, cocktails and other stimulants. It more than lived up to 6 months of anticipation.
Much smaller than Glastonbury, it was a 10 minute walk from the camp to the main (Mountain) stage, and from there, 5 minutes at most to all the other stages. This meant, with the well- laid out festival programme, it was possible to organise a whole day of music, moving from the big ticket Mountain stage to the new band Rising stage, the quirky Walled Garden stage, the Babbling Tongues comedy tent, the world/dance Chai Wallah tent, the 2nd stage Far Out tent and the Round The Twist late night dance/DJ tent. If anything got a bit samey, or I’d heard enough, I could move quickly to something quite different across the site. Something I remember as being impossible at Glastonbury with the crowds and the distances.
There follow in the comments, my report on the Settlement days, then Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. I should warn you – it’s long – 4800 words (11 pages on Word)…
Let me get in early my thanks to those who camped with me (in both sense of the word) – Iain, Nick, Evan, Colin, Sammy, Leigh and Simon – for your generosities, your companionship and your impressive late night stamina. So glad I could come this year.
The audience:
Al age – families with small children, teenagers, old gits like us
It made me think..
There’s so much more to it than the music, but I think that’s what you’re most interested in. It’s a beautiful place and everyone there did there best to make it a beautiful week.
If you can get a ticket, I’d recommend it, but you will all probably go to Glastonbury next year, leaving a ticket for me again (I hope).
Settlement days (Mon -Wed)
We arrived on the Monday for 3 days of ‘settlement’ – far fewer people than would be arriving for the main event from Thursday, the main site closed off, it felt like a village fete, with mini golf, axe throwing, craft workshops for the kids and two stages with 3 acts each in the evening. The first two days were spent settling in with local Welsh language acts putting in a series of gently appreciated performances, usually in Welsh. A loosely observed curfew was completely broken by a silent disco on the first evening, (‘Living On A Prayer’ echoing out a capella like a ghostly GenX choir across the campsite), and by a drag Cabaret (Jolene Dover) thumping out camp classics at full volunteer until 01.30am.
Wednesday evening brought out the best, to my ears.
First, Internet Fatigue, a trio who met in a cafe in Aberystwyth, performed disjointed but articulate poetry over bass and skittery garage/jungle synths (name checking Tiresias and Orlando), accompanied by fast moving collages of found images and photos. Not immediately accessible, I loved their ambition and creativity, and bought a rather daring white t shirt with a vulva in pink on the front (‘Ur pussy is a palace’ being the slogan).
Next up was Cardiff- based Mantis, a big band featuring keys and percussion alongside standard set up, brought generous doses of hypnotic psychrock straight from the late 60s. A full sound that it was a pleasure to revel in, that I haven’t properly heard since Spacemen 3’s Sounds of Confusion.
Headlining the final day of the Settlement was Pain Killer, not the New York jazz/grindcore project of John Zorn, Bill Laswell and Mick Harris, which would have been incongruous and incredible. Think more a three-person White Stripes (with female drummer pounding out fierce complex tribal rhythms) and lead singer/ guitarist howling and growling and riffing wildly over an insistent and unforgiving beat. Enormous energy and power, it wasn’t a total surprise to see them step in for The Bug Club later in the week due to illness.
Thursday
Green Man proper started on the Thursday. The festival area was opened up, and my friends showed me around – countless food stalls – mainly local suppliers, 60+ beers from local brewers, a dedicated cider bar, and even a stall distributing ethically sourced DMA, mushrooms, weed, ecstasy and cocaine. This last may be a false memory.
The line-up was limited by a late afternoon start with the Mountain stage not yet open. We started with The Beatles Dub Club in full swing in the cinema tent. A veritable crowd pleaser, film footage of the fab four with their songs remixed and dubbed up live by the DJ on stage, I found it more Jive Bunny than daring and experimental. Others in my group were more positive.
That’s the beauty of a festival – if it’s not for you, you can walk away to another stage or tent. Which is what I did for the next act we moved to. Lime Garden in the Far Out tent were an easy draw for my friends.
I could do without their Brighton- based indie rock, so left for the Chai Wallah tent and Nana Benz du Togo. I’m so glad I did. The first of several acts from the continent, their positive messages of freedom, empowerment and feminism rang out from the voices of the 4 frontwomen, over a beat that kept the whole tent moving for 90 minutes. A joyful sound, perfect for the location.
Thursday evening ended for me with Mogwai. A constant crush of people rushing in, then rushing out, this was Marmite music. I’d often tried to get into their intense quiet/loud ambient post rock guitar roar, but never found the right moment or mood for them before. Live, it was more of the same really. Long period of longueur punctuated by explosive bursts of noise and blinding lights. At times I was captivated by it. But it was also easy to slip out of the mood and just wonder what I was listening to. A mixed bag of a day, then. But better was to come.
Friday
Over halfway through. I knew my way round the site. The big choices for the evening were Aldous Harding or Stewart Lee, Baxter Dury or Wilco. Tantalizing choices – can you guess what I went for?
But first, an afternoon of ambling from stage to stage to see what I could find. The band who really did it for me were The New Eves. 4 women – guitar, drums, violin and cello, all singing either individually, in harmony or across each other. This was not your standard rock band. Folk punk, again from Brighton. (What is it with that place?) A strong, strident sound, with cello and violin straining in Cale discordance, and drums thumping martial, this was Velvets dressed like The Last Dinner Party with strong influence of PJ Harvey’s pagan Gothic touches. I loved it and quickly found my way to Bandcamp to buy the album.
Wandering back to camp for an afternoon snooze, I passed Ata Kak playing to the bowl- like expanse of the Mountain stage. It wasn’t utter cack, but his blend of Ghanaian high life, hip-hop and 90s dance beats hadn’t really caught fire for me, and the midday sun was too intense, when I had other, late-night plans. I’m not in my 20s any more, I need my mid-afternoon nap…
Fresh from the depths of slumber and after a delicious meal with the group, I had a decision to make – the shapeshifting, off-kilter performance of absurdist material by a comedian or by a musician? Lee or Harding? As I arrived early, I stopped off to watch ML Buch in the Walled Garden. I can’t remember anything about her, which is not a great feature of a review of a music festival, but it does give you a prompt for the act I went to see – someone who constantly refers back to the words he’s just spoken, commenting on the act of telling jokes, and in his success or failure in the reaction of the audience, completely unfazed if his words sink, and taking as much pleasure in bombing as in getting a positive reaction.
Stewart Lee constantly refers to the act of touring and the ‘jokes’ themselves were merely a hanger for the cloak of meta cynicism at the fact he was touring the same material round the country. He did take particular pleasure in the Green Man audience being a bunch of middle class, Guardian-reading hippies: both in selecting very easy targets for ridicule – doorstepping naive evangelists (If Jesus is the answer, is the question ‘ what is there first name of the 80s/90s grunge rockers from Chicago The ___ Lizard?), and Donald Trump; and in dropping knowing comments about the foibles of a group he himself writes columns for. I’m glad to have seen him, and happy he’s doing it, but have no need to see him again.
For the second dilemma Baxter Dury won over Wilco. I’d enjoyed listening to his album when several AWers chose it as part of their album if the year some years ago, and there was a rather fine video of him playing lived in concert in Paris, showing something of his grace and danger, elegance and poise before an audience. Right at the front of the audience when the band came out, a rugged saturnine bass player throbbing out riffs and solid rhythms while a raven-haired multiple instrumentalist and backing singer provided the rest of the musical bed. Then on strode Baxter, peacocking provocatively across the whole stage, taking on and off his black jacket, revealing his closely tailored white shirt, sliding his silk scarf seductively around his neck and upper torso. And then the vocals started.
A gruff bark of a voice, somewhere between shouting and rapping, stentored out a series of images, peppered, indeed smothered in f***ing and blinding. A strange amalgam of Lydon, Cocker, Walker and Dury senior. Impressive and startling as the performance was, it got a bit samey after several songs.
I pushed back through the crowd, across the field to the Mountain stage to catch me a bit of Wilco. I sat down on the slope to listen to some of their impressive guitaring. Maybe it’s because I don’t know any of their songs, but after Baxter Dury it felt a bit flat. If I’d been there’re for the whole set, it might have gotten to me better, but after one song, I took off again to visit a prostitute.
Or rather the band Prostitute, in the Walled Garden. Very loud – a complete racket in fact. So different from anything else I’d see all weekend. It was too much for me, so I quit and entry back to the tent. There’d be more to see and hear the next day.
Saturday
Having wandered all over the place on Friday, on Saturday, I read the festival guide and set out a programme in the morning, mostly sticking to it.
First off at midday, Tamikrest. Saharan desert blues from the Mali/Algerian border lands in the tradition of and inspired by Tinariwen. They were perfect for the big open space of the Mountain stage on another hot day in the Welsh hills. Sitting there with a breakfast bun and a coffee for the first gentle semi acoustic songs – blues guitar and pedal steel, we were soon drawn into the moderate crowd close to the band to dance to the intertwining psychedelic blues guitars, throbbing bass and insistent drumming. A great way to start the day’s music.
From the Mountain to Far Out to catch the garage punk of The Bug Club, specifically to take a picture of @callcopse in front of the band for his daughter. They weren’t there, due to band illness. Pain Killer from earlier in the week filled in admirably, but we’d seen them already.
So I went back to the Mountain to watch Ana Frango Eléctrico, experimental pop boogie from Rio de Janeiro. Laid back gentle jazzy grooves with smooth Brazilian vocals, it didn’t set the audience on fire, but by the final song, the fun the band was having insinuated itself into the audience and they got a well-deserved cheer.
I needed a rest after all that, so went back to the tent for a kip. Having read good things about Nation of Language (influences of New Order, OND, Yellow Magic Orchestra, Kraftwerk, Brian Eno), l wanted to know if they could live up to such an impressive lists. As I walked down the golden pathway to the Mountain stage from the campsite, the slowly setting sun ahead of me in the west, the strains of the band wafted towards me in absolute glorious harmony of synth wash, muscular Hook bass and soaring McCluskey vocal. This was Hollywood movie stuff, the sense impressions forming indelibly in my various cortexes. I was back in the mid-80s. And as I got closer and closer, unknown pleasures came back to me with resounding strength. This was the undeniable highlight of my whole week, I knew it at that moment, even as the band were just getting into their stride. Finding my way to the front of the audience (rarely difficult at the gentle Green Man), I was soon lost in dance next to several moustachioed mullet-haired men and one transfixingly beautiful woman with a buzz cut and watermelon earrings and soft grey felt long skirt. Funny how you notice these things. It may be easy to note all the influences clear and present in their music, to dismiss them as derivative copyists, but if so they did it so beautifully and so joyfully that out didn’t matter to me. I completely loved their whole sound and rhythm. I have never and will never see(n) the classic New Order line up, but I swear that at one point NoL played a carbon copy of True Faith, just as the sun set. Oh my.
Nothing was going to come as close to musical ecstasy after that, but a succession of acts in the Far Out tent were mighty fine.
Friends told me Daniel Avery was a worthy successor to Andy Weatherall, and the last few tracks of his live set that I caught were fairly euphoric. No matter how well you plan, you can’t see everything, but you can get glimpses of a lot.
People trooped out, probably to the Mountain stage for the much-touted set by the Beta Band, due to start in 15 minutes. My whole group were going, but for me, I took the chance to head for the front of the tent stage ready for Mannequin Pussy. Crowds of late teenage boys and very enthusiastic girls surged in slightly afterwards, and l moved aside for them, next to another AW vintage bloke in grey hair and a JAMC Darklands t- shirt. Gesturing at it, I said ‘you’re wearing the right band for this performance. He agreed with me and was as keen as l was to see if MP lived up to the excitement generated by their last album ‘I Got Heaven’. The band came on to enormous cheers, fired up their big guns and roared off into their first song. The mosh pit came to life almost immediately, I became part of the wall around it, particularly elastic when it pulled back to make a gaping hole for everyone to launch themselves at each other. The band was enormously loud, not deafening, but with a bass drum kick that seemed to be linked to a device that made the whole tent reverberate like we in the back of a hot hatch on a small town high street with an enormous woofer speaker. It wasn’t deafening, but the vocals were muddy, and much as I enjoyed being thrown around by the nearby moshers and the bass drum kick, after four rather similar songs, I’d had enough and succumbed to the attention deficit that festivals seem to encourage.
Off I went to hear a bit of the Beta Band. I’d been ribbed all week for my lack of enthusiasm for these cult favourites. I’d never understood their appeal when the 3 EPs came out to universal indie love back in the day. Probably my lack of true music taste and cloth ears, but however many times I’d listened to Dry The Rain, (way beyond the tig 6), I couldn’t get it. Ambling over about a third way through their set, guess what song was just starting? Yup, DTsoddingR. As I knew the song, l thought there was a fair chance the live experience might cleanse the doors of my perception, that I would finally appreciate the masters of wry Scottish psychedelia. I dutifully sat and listened, arms resolutely unfolded. I would give them a chance. It was played and sung. It sounded like it did in the record. There was a massive red sun image behind the band on stage and that was it. No sudden revelation. It was no different to before. The others later told me the band had been magnificent and DTR was the only song played straight. All the rest of the set was made of brilliant reinterpretations of all- known tracks. I’m happy for them. But I’m also happy l walked away.
I went to the Walled Garden, location of many pleasant surprises during the weekend. And Haley Heynderickx was no exception. Filipino-American, she finger picked guitar and sung like Joni while a chamber accompaniment of cello, light drumming and bass flute gave such a contrast to the Mannequin Pussy bombast blast, I couldn’t help but stay for the whole fey performance. It was a delightful and refreshing counterpoint.
What I found amazing was that within only a few hundred metres of each other, completely different musical genres could be experienced, only minutes later. From delicate folky whimsy I went into the Far Out tent for the soulful Amy Winehousing of Celeste. Clearly going down exceptionally with an audience who’d been there since she started, it was too much of an abrupt shift for me – l needed something more up tempo to keep up with my itchy feet and eager ears. She would have been so good on a sunny afternoon on the Mountain stage, where there seemed to be people camped on fold-up chairs ensconced on the semi-circular hill looking down on that stage all day, from morning to night.
It was back to the Mountain I went for my last act of the night: Four Tet. Back to where I’d started the day. There’s not much to say about Kieran Hebden’s music except that it was the right choice for the final event of the peak day of the festival for me – so much good music, one act after another, climaxing in the vast synth sounds held and extended until the tension was almost too much, then released with gigantic phat techno beats that walloped out mercilessly into the belly of the hillside sitters, drenching us in floods of bright lights and revolving lasers. I was in that hill. My friends down at the front of the stage told me afterwards that there was so much love between all the dancing audience, including one Aldous Harding on the shoulders of a man next to one of our group.
We all congregate in the tent after to debrief on what an extraordinary performance that was. I called it quits, but the others, veteran Green Manners to the last, loaded up and headed out into the night for another full Daniel Avery DJ set. I wouldn’t see them until mid Sunday at the earliest.
Sunday
Sunday, a day of rest. Yeah, right. I had 12 more bands to see, and the grass wasn’t going to grow under my feet (although to be fair reason earlier in the week had started making the Green Man site slightly more verdant).
Midday starts with Eaves Wilder on the Mountain stage. Promising influences of Philip Larkin, Smokey Robinson CMAT AND Wet Leg, I was looking forward to something quirky and off beat. It wasn’t really. Fairly standard nondescript indie guitar music from what I could tell. Maybe it was as amazing as The Beta Band? Who knows. I went back to the tent, the first of several disappointments that day. I was spoiled by the surfeit of joys that Saturday brought.
The next act I saw was no disappointment. One of probably too few acts I saw in the Chai Wallahs tent (loosely world music), Suntou Susso & The Gambian Superstars more than lived up to their celebratory name. Suntou was a kora- playing Griot, and in between spellbinding tracks of reggae and high energy African dance music, he explained how to play his instrument, each of 4 fingers/thumbs playing a different rhythm and tone. 90 minutes of non- stop dancing. My friend and I agreed this was an unexpected highlight of the whole festival. Fortunately our path from the tent led us through the therapy and yoga section of the campsite for the first time, so we each stumped up for a back massage. Well worth it after a week of stomping around Welsh fields and hills.
After getting all my chakras realigned (or something), I made it to the Far Out tent to catch the dying embers of the last song by Welsh punk girl band Panic Shack. Even those few seconds told me there had been something wild and free and exciting there in the last hour. For another occasion. Punk’s not dead!
Hanging around in the Far Out tent, in slopes Scientist and a female MC/ singer for an hour of dub reggae. It’s fine and good, but a bit inert, and for such music I’d rather be out in the sunshine.
So I head back to the sunshine of the Mountain stage. To Anna Calvi. Who is playing a 4 hour set there. I exaggerate. It’s 75 minutes. But it feels much longer to me. In her red dress, red lipstick and red guitar, she cuts a remarkable image on stage and on the screen. I couldn’t get into her music at all. It’s not like anything I’ve heard before, her voice and her guitar are so unfamiliar and there’s no easy rhythm or melody to get into. And yet the funny thing was – I couldn’t get away from her music. I walked off to other stages to see what else was playing, but everything else at that time just seemed ordinary. And Anna Calvi was anything but ordinary. She was magnetic, a firm, confident stage presence. I wanted to inhabit her songs, and maybe later I will. I tried sitting on the hillside, letting the sound wash up to me. I tried going right up front, two rows back from her, to feel her presence. In the end, I moved to the bottom of the hill and just stood, watching. And then the last song came on. A cover of the Suicide classic ‘Ghostrider’. And then I started to get it. Maybe it was the motorik beat, pulsing glacially away, her icy tones measured against it, maybe it was the familiarity of the song, but for the entirety of played, I couldn’t help but move to it. So good.
I came back to the Mountain stage almost an hour later for Cat Power. A name, I thought I should give her a listen. This was the second disappointment. A decent rhythm section and a countryish guitar were overlaid with nondescript and frankly inarticulate vocals. It may be fine if you know and like her songs, but such poor enunciation made it tedious having to stain to catch any of the words she was drawling. The second disappointment of the day.
One of the friends arrived to watch the band and I dragged him off, insisting it wasn’t worth it. We made it to the Walled Garden to see the last of Lael Neale. It was such a relief to come across such a delightful pair, after the ear mugging I’d just endured. The minimalist synth and guitar set was just what was needed – beautiful light drone pop – fun and flighty and resoundingly popular with the audience. Music made for dancing. Lovely.
With that sadly ending, we were late for Fcukers in the Far Out tent. And how late we were. Not only was the tent completely full, but the whole field leading up to it was crammed with dancing folk gazing at the secondary screen. Fcukers should have changed stages with Cat Power. Their adrenaline- fuelled pop hedonism would have filled the Mountain arena with energy and life, while I doubt there’re would be enough Cat fans to even half fill the Far Out tent.
There were too many people for me, so I wanted to move on. To Chai Wallahs and a Leeds-based 7 piece, Submission Orchestra, playing dubstep, soul, ambient, electronica and jazz (almost one genre for each musician). It was a mess. A soul singer, a brass instrument player, a percussionist, several people working computers, synths and keyboards and bass player, I think. It was a beautiful mess, as jazz often is, but it took too much concentration. [If I had chosen more wisely, or with hindsight available, I should have gone to see The Itch, on the ‘Rising’ new bands stage at the same time, who I’d heard before the festival and thought were good. I was told they were excellent live. Alt pop electroclash. A bit Sleaford Mods, but more upbeat.]
But never mind that. Plenty more fish and all that. So we go back to the Walled Garden and Motrik, a bunch of AW-age krautrockers from Portland, Oregon, doing what it says on the tin with green spotlights on their glasses (they all wear glasses). Endlessly repetitive and intense drone music can be entertaining for a while if you switch your brain off. But getting peppered with loud, intense and fairly unvaried noise by a group of not very charismatic middle aged men is too much of a specialist fantasy for my taste, so we trooped off to regroup with the Fcukers contIngent and head off again for the final acts.
It’s coming to the climax of the evening and the festival. Who’s it going to be next. Four of us head to the Mountain stage for Wolf Alice. The other three go straight to the stage where Tricky would be playing, anticipating a crush. Wolf Alice are good, very good at what they do, and have an assurance and confidence that takes the audience with them. I was anticipating more bite, more rough edges to their music, and it all seemed a bit slick. I said goodbye to the others, who shortly would join the Tricky crowd, while I went back to the Far Out tent for the final act of the festival for me, hoping for a happy ending.
It was Sparks. If I wanted a happy ending, I sure enough got one. They were astonishing. Sure the drummer, guitarist and bass player kept a good solid basis for the music, but the energy of Ron (81) and particularly Russell (78) for their whole show was incredible. From the moment they came on stage they got a round of applause and cheers from the audience that you would expect at the end of a normal concert. The love shown was immense and unending. Russell addressed us ‘So. May we start?’ And then repeated that line again and again, as the song (ahem) started, each time with more camp inflection, and skipping around the stage. He couldn’t keep still, the whole of the 17 songs in their setlist. Apart from when he made way for his brother to rise from the keyboard and take the Mike, somewhat stiffly but with a smile, and to enormous cheers. Of course they played ‘This Town…’ and ‘When Do I Get To Sing My Way’, but possibly the most gleefully song was ‘(Baby, Baby) Can I Invade Your Country’, given a new Hormuz- shaped relevance this year.
I’m not a Sparks fan, so must of the songs were new to me. But that didn’t matter. It’s all pure pop, so they were all as catchy as hell. And the atmosphere in the tent was the best it had been all festival IMHO.
I almost floated back to the tent, stopping only to buy a marmite hash brown bap (food stalls across the site design their food to appeal to late nighters straggling back to their tents. A whisky nightcap and that was it for me. Others stayed up for the Roni Size DJ set and said it was immense and not just drum’n’bass, but for me enough is enough is enough is enough. (Close your eyes, time to fall asleep).
Well done if you made it to the end of this marathon read. I hope I did the festival justice.
Splendid work, top review!
Hmm that’s set my festival genes a-jangling. Do they take campervans?
I’m off to investigate Nation of Language.
I believe they do, yes
https://www.greenman.net/information/camping-lodging/
Nation of Language? I think they could appeal to the New Order fans here. Report back on what you find. It may be that they come over best in the live setting.
Great review Sal, really enjoyed having you along ❤️
Super write up, sounds like you had a ball!
Sparks really are brilliant live, aren’t they? So much love between the band and audience!
Yes, you were right, Freddy – all my misgivings were misplaced and it was exactly the right benevolent act to climax the benevolent Green Man. There was such positivity and bonhomie. it was tactile. I’m surprised we didn’t all end up on the floor frotting.
I have always relished a trip there, despite the music hitting few known boxes to me. Maybe next year. A lovely descriptive piece, I wonder if I could blag the whole week? Then again, I stil need to catch Beautiful Days, another hole in my bucket list I need filling.
Not much finger in the ear music at Green Man. Looking at the line up for Beautiful Days, it seems like much more of a heritage festival – I recognize 60-70% of the acts listed. I’d heard of about 10 of the 100 acts at Green Man, and actively listened to even fewer. It was a complete act of musical discovery for me.
I am glad you enjoyed the writing – it was tremendously evocative to retrace my steps over the week, and recall the feelings at each stage.
I didn’t read all, but shame you missed out on Wilco. You will very rarely see a better all round live act.
Festival is just a few miles from my hometown, but here I am stuck in Canada.
I know, I was thinking of you when I did sit down to watch them for a song, realising you would have watched their entire set, (and Jeff Tweedy’s guest spot with Dry Cleaning earlier).
Had there not been the competing attractions, I would have given them time to let their music play. Same for Beta Band and Aldous Harding, and many others. You just cannot do it all.
Thanks for thinking of me, yes I understand you can’t see everybody. Just checked the setlist; 5 songs from Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and 4 from A Ghost is Born. Very nice
Funnily enough, in the last four weeks I’ve seen both Baxter Dury and Wilco live for the first time. Enjoyed both, but preferred Wilco – such a lovely vibe. Obviously thought of dai while watching too.
I feel like a celebrity
Was there a crumpet stall, or baguettes dripping with garlic and hot molten butter?
Almost certainly. Before I went, @callcopse said it was described as a food festival with music attached to it as much as vice versa. There was almost every kind of delicacy, so many beers and single source ciders that Bacchus himself would have been replete with crumpet of every description.
fnarr, fnarr!
Enjoyed reading this. Love those festival days where you see so many different acts in quick succession that there’s no time to take it all in, so unprocessed experience just ends up being piled on top of unprocessed experience.
It’s also really nice to vicariously live through someone else’s good time, and to see that a good time was had.
I really like Nation of Language. Have been following their progress and plan to see them soonish.
I actually spent a Summer living with one of the acts reviewed above. I won’t say who, but I will say it’s one of the ones you seem to have enjoyed. And that they were a fantastic person.
DM me, I’d love to know. I promise not to tell.
Art work by the lovely Jack Teagle.
Da iawn bach.
I thought of you as I queued up for my morning coffee and the bloke in front of me greeted the barista “Bore da” as casual as you like. As you would, of course. Plenty of Welsh pride on display, from dragons adorning tent bunting to a guide to language in the festival guide and much bilingual information across the site.
It was my first time in the Brecon Beacons, and in the Wednesday, we went in a punishing walk up onto Dragons Back. Beautiful views, mind.
Beautiful part of the world. Always have caution when hiking there though as the weather can change very quickly and suddenly a beautiful day turns into a different one with horizontal rain (or sleet/snow in winter) and zero visibility.
Yes, we had that when we got to the top. Our lightweight cagoules were swiftly donned, as were waterproof trousers by those who had them. We had seen the rain cloud advancing swiftly towards us across the valley you see in there photo above, so it wasn’t surprising that we had to manage the ridge along the top in spattering, then heavy rain. Fortunately by the time we got round to the glorious spot above, the rain had moved on to menace and replenish other parts east of us, and we dried out on the sunny walk down to the valley bottom. We could have had it much worse.
My maternal grandfather, my taid was born and raised on a small farm in the Bannau Brycheiniog. He maintained that he thought it was the most beautiful place on earth until he saw more of Wales after which he thought there might be a few other places he liked just as much.
I’m going motorbiking for 5 days in a couple of weeks based in Brecon. I’ll pack waterproofs.
I love riding in Wales. On and off road.
Generally been lucky with the weather. Hope you will be too.
Thanks last time I went we had lovely weather for 4 days and one day riding over the Cader Idris in rain and spray with a Range Rover sitting 3 feet behind me. But as you know it’s worth it.
One of our favourite spots is the hilltop at Twmbarlwm, where we scattered my wife’s mother’s ashes. To the north and west are the rises and falls of the Beacons and looking south you can see the coast and the glower of England across the water, even on a clear day down to Exmoor and Dartmoor at the horizon. One side of the family can wave their Welsh nationalist willies across at the Devonians waving theirs from Dartmoor’s highest tors.
Ghost Rider (in the Church).
My fave Anna Calvi album is the live at Meltdown one.
Very interesting review, thanks. I went to a couple of the very early Green Man Festivals, (2005 and 2006) mainly because I was quite a fan of It’s Jo And Danny, who were the original founders before they sold it. It had a lovely, small time feel but I’d definitely heard of a few more of the bands they seem to have on there now. In fairness I may not have been paying that much attention! Incidentally, Jo Bartlett has now started up a new festival in West Sussex called The Wake, which has just run for it’s second year.
Great piece of work @salwarpe, takes me back to my younger days seeing that picture.
Alas my festival days are long gone.
Nice review, @salwarpe, and I’m envious you got to see my fave Haley Heynderickx live!
Less impressed by your choice to skip Wilco…but if you don’t feel it, you don’t.
I miss the years when I used to go to festivals (the ones I used to frequent are no more), but I’ve never been to that kind of multi-stage festivals, the ones I went to only had one act playing at a time. One of them did have two stages, but too close to each other to be able to have gigs on both simultaniously, so while one was being used, the other one was being set up for the next act.
Which meant shorter pauses between gigs than for the one stage festival, which was the one I liked best (great variety of acts, beautiful setting).
I don’t think I would have enjoyed a multi-stage festival, in truth. Too many difficult choices to make, not being able to relax and give the acts the time to convince me, rushing about to get to the (hopefully) right stage at the right time…sounds exhausting and unsatisfying to me – it wouldn’t suit my personality at all. But happy for everyone who loves it!
My body wouldn’t be able to handle a festival now anyway, too many aches and pains.
Thanks, Locust. I think I’d probably have enjoyed Wilco, if my attention deficit wasn’t whirred into action by so many alternatives grabbing for my attention. I just wasn’t able to sit still for long enough to let their vibes flow at me. Also, massive audience. For some reason, the smaller setting where Haley Heynderickx was playing lolled me into staying and watching, intrigued.
I think I saw more live acts in 5 days than I have done in the previous 15 years. I need to get my averages up, then I might not feel the urge to rush about next year.
Sounds like a proper festival, most excellent review. Suspect if I could trust the weather and they had comfy chairs, I could enjoy that.