Riverside 2009 Pt 2

After a quick burst of Winnebago Deal’s palate cleansing bludgeon, we check in with Oxfordshire’s other favourite duo, as Little Fish crank up on the main stage. Reviewing them makes us feel like some Oxford music Grinch – no matter how good they clearly are, nor how entertaining their set is, we just can’t see them conquering the world and changing the face of music as we know it, as so many people seem to expect. A topic for another day, perhaps, as they certainly don’t put a foot wrong onstage (although not talking breathless nonsense about chickens between every song might be nice), and Juju and Nez are definitely the only people performing today who look like they were born to be onstage: they manage to eclipse the spectacle of Smilex’ caffeinated cabaret just by, you know, being there. In fact, far from being the authors of life affirming pop anthems, we think of Little Fish more as old fashioned craftspeople. The songs are pretty much all two chord bashes, with little more than repeated blues rock yelps over the top, and they don’t really say or do anything at all, but they are gorgeously honed and shaped and whittled to perfection. Less like the universal soul poetry of the much referenced Patti Smith, then, and more analogous to expert niche electronica producers, creating generic yet immaculate music for the discerning connoisseur.

“We’re very lucky to have them,” announces the Riverside MC about the closing act. Wait, is it a reunited Morrissey and Marr? Has Beefheart been coaxed out of retirement? No, it’s Tristan & The Troubadours, some lads from down the road. Keep some perspective, love. But admittedly they’ve come a very long way since they opened the main stage two years ago, and now offer a very confident set, replete with literate lyrics and interesting arrangements, something like Belle & Sebastian’s early effete library pop filtered through the matinee rock of locals Witches and Borderville. Very good indeed, and a fitting end to what had been a hugely satisfying afternoon of music – and all for blinking free, lest we forget. Some acts made more impression than others admittedly, but there was literally nothing on the bill deserving harsh criticism, and it was a pleasure from start to finish. The effort that goes into the festival should be applauded by all right-minded music fans.

Sunday

What could be more Gallic than a stripy top, an accordion and a Jacques Brel cover? Except for singing in like, French, and Les Clochards do that too. But even if you’re semi-bilingual, like us, there’s tons to enjoy here, from the intimate vocals to the tight, buoyant drumming, to the rich chocolaty bass, which wraps round us on “Lavinia”. Like The Relationships, a band with whom they share a close history, Les Clochards show that you don’t have to be like Tristan & The Troubadours, and fill your lyrics with death, ravens and black portent to be poetic, a well phrased piece of story telling can cut right to the quick. Pound for pound Sunday’s lineup wasn’t a patch on Saturday’s, but Les Clochards quietly turned in one of the sets of the weekend to a smattering of listeners.

Oh, fuck off! Look, we like covers bands in principle, we like ska and punk, we even like fun every once in awhile, but the repugnantly named When Alcohol Matters come from that horrible school of non-thought stating that a complete absence of talent and ideas are instantly justified by putting on some silly clothes. So, here we go, one of WAM is wearing a red beret and a kilt. Wild. The new wave era tunes they play are generally fine – “Geno”, “Too Much, Too Young”, and so on – and the dual saxes aren’t bad, but the rhythms are sluggish and the vocals are just terrible. Talk about a paucity of ideas: simply playing songs you quite like doesn’t make you a good band, especially if you don’t play them very well. Still, a kilt. Just imagine.

Anyway, if you really want to know when alcohol maters, talk to some of the revellers about their attempts to smuggle it onto the site! Some were successful, but Banjo Boy, our homebrew proffering chum from last year, was stopped at the gate with four cans of beer, so he just stood there in front of the entrance and drank them one after the other. Before lunch. You have to admire that sort of behaviour…unless you’re a hepatologist.

Over on the second stage young Chipping Norton outfit Relay may not be laden down by new ideas, but they’re worth a hundred WAMs. Most of their songs are lean and poppy jaunts very much on the vein of Arctic Monkeys, but when they strip things down they have quite a subtle touch, and Jamie Biles has the beginnings of a pleasant indie croon.

“Hi, I’m Judi, and I’m fourteen,” says Judi Luxmoore of Judi & The Jesters. And then she says it again. It’s either an apology in advance, or an attempt to make your friendly neighbourhood hatchetman reviewer look deep into his dark soul. And, no, we’re not in the business of destroying the dreams of nervous teenagers who have bit the bullet and climbed onstage, so let’s get this over with. The Jesters play dirt simple lightly countrified songs, that are part Kitty Wells, and part “The Wheels On The Bus Go Round & Round”, and once she gets warmed up Judi has a pleasing voice. There’s a huge amount of potential here, but let’s be straight, at the moment that’s all there is, and Judi’s presence on the bill is something of an indulgence. Worth investigating in a couple of years, perhaps, and definitely worth investigating if the alternative is WAM.

A walk back to the main stage really brings home how very different in size the two stages are. We wonder how many festival goers never even get past the toilet block over the weekend. Anyway, Alan Fraser is getting the benefit of the excellent PA on the main stage, and his jazz sax floats across the crowd with crystal clear sound. His tone is amazing, so pure and smooth, but the set itself is a real old West Coast jazz dawdle, like Stan Getz locked in an old folks home store cupboard and half buried under discarded surgical trusses. As the set progresses Fraser starts to bring out some interesting low end honks and rasps, and a decent swipe at Miles’ “All Blues” mean we almost let him get away with it, until his sanctimonious sign off, “Thanks for listening, those of you who were listening and not just hearing”. And there we were waiting for you to start playing, and not just making the right sounds. Supercilious old trout.

We’ve got a bit muddled, but we think the band we drop in on back at the second stage briefly is Man Make Fire. How about Man Throw All Your Instruments On It Whilst He There, if the limp soggy rendition of “Purple Haze” is anything to go by. Time for a swift exit.

Back To Haunt Us, Part Four: billypure make mention of our review of last year’s festival during their main stage set, and our allegation that they want to be The Waterboys. Well, that’s not quite what we meant, but they do knock out the same Waterboys cover version and unless we misheard, it sounds as though they actually got their name from the lyrics, so we reckon they’re being a bit defensive. Anyway, the song actually sounds lacklustre amongst some of their own, and their arrangement of “The Raggle Taggle Gypsy” is a searing folk rock delight. It’s a chirpy, chunky set, with some useful fiddle parts, and we enjoy it enormously. Does remind us a little of another band, though…oh, what are they called again…

Rob Stevenson from A Silent Film is firmly in the same breed as Juju from Little Fish, he looks so relaxed prowling around on the huge stage you’d think he was born and raised there. They play a textbook set of wide-armed emotirock (featuring a genius reworking of Underworld’s “Born Slippy”), Rob’s warm, falsetto-happy voice twining gorgeously around his keyboard lines (a synth in the body of a parlour upright piano, nice touch). No offence meant to the man, but our favourite track is the opener during which the guitarist is busy trying to sort out his hardware, and we get a spacious marimba led tune, as some of the music felt clogged and overly rich. And that’s our only criticism: ASF are like Inlight - although clearly so much better - in that their songs are all huge and simple, as if they’re trying to create music that can be seen from space. Look, we’re just over here, a few feet away, no need to telegraph the emotions, just let them happen. When the scale is brought down a peg or two, this band is disarmingly impressive.

Abingdon's Starting To Happen

Most of this review was used in Nightshift's 4 page report on the festival, but some of it has never been seen before. Be still, my beating heart.

TRUCK 2008, Hill Farm, Steventon

After last year’s festival, we really thought Truck had jumped the shark. Naturally, rescheduling was out of their control, but the general feeling was that the lineup was predictable and uninspired, and that Truck had been gradually ossifying into a noisy convalescent home for tedious country musicians. This year, however, turned out to be the best Truck for a long time. The lineup was pruned of some of the incumbents, but there was still a pleasant smattering of Truck favourites on offer; the site had been rethought but still kept to the familiar blueprint; and, most importantly, the atmosphere was wonderful. It’s so gladdening to see people going rubber-limb loopy in The Beat Hive before eating doughnuts and then sitting quietly to enjoy something acoustic at the Market Stage. More than anything else this year we got the impression that Truckers were open to all manner of different performances, and this was reflected in some surprising, but refreshing thematic booking policies, such as Crossword Records’ abstract hip-hop showcase, or the Sonic Cathedral shoegazing celebration. It was the sort of weekend to make anyone wax lyrical…anyone apart from Evan Dando, anyway…

Implausibly, our festival begins with a band from Hong Kong. DP is a guitar and drums scuzz riffing concotion, who make a great noise, but essentially feel like half of a good rock band. AC without the DC.

Vacuous Pop’s well received line-up begins with Load.Click.Shoot whose bandy-legged disco pop sends hordes of kids in horrible plastic shades, who look like extras from Weird Science, into a dancing frenzy. Is this because the band are good (which they are, with their snotty take on Foals-esque puzzle pop and excellent naughty schoolboy keyboards), or because these guys have been cocked for some day-glo musical fun all morning? Load, click, shoot indeed.

Hey, the naughty schoolboy has been doing his homework. Alphabet Backwards’ keyboard player shares a cheeky Korg buzz with the previous band, but plays it spiced with nonchalantly adept arpeggios and Herbie Hancock twiddles. The two singers may look like a cut-budget children’s presenters (Magpie, not Blue Peter; Look In, not Smash Hits), but they play impossibly, gorgeously, heart-burstingly jolly acoustic-led pop that would sound as at home in the Top 40 as it would at a drunken barndance.

A spot of lunch later The European Union provides our first visit to The Market Stage, once again the most comfy part of Truck, with the most reliable sound. Sadly, although European Union were billed as sounding like Nirvana we turn up to a minimal folk pop song played by sleepy robots. Thereafter they step up into a trudge down The Band’s avenue, good ol’ boys chord progressions overlaid with hammered elementary piano and drawled self-conscious vocals. Passable.

Admittedly it’s not our dream of a collaboration between Bellowhead and Fuck Buttons, but Buttonhead’s set starts incredibly, a repeated wordless three note vocal motif over some complex pomp rock that sounds like Philip Glass’ Einsten On The Beach played by Magma. Except that it also sounds like Godspeed You! Black Emperor played by Emerson, Lake & Palmer. Amazing. However, after a while the focus gets lost somewhere to the left of the kitchen sink, and the show becomes a valiant, but ultimately unsatisfying mashup; we would have stuck it out to the end anyway, of the falsetto vocals weren’t so tooth-pullingly terrible.

In diametric opposition to their look-at-me name, Holton’s Opulent Oog supply us with an untroubled, unobtrusive country lope. Pliant and friendly, perhaps, but with all the chutzpah of a shy 7 year old forced to recite in Sunday school. Of course, complaining about country pop at Truck is like shouting for “Born To be Wild” at Glyndebourne, so we’ll just edge away, quietly.

Over on the main stage, Little Fish are winning a small army of new fans. Aside from being musically spotless, Juju and Nez are rare in looking as though they were born to be onstage – even on the main stage, it’s rare to see an act that you can’t tear your eyes from. But, would it be terribly party-pooping of us to suggest that they write some more songs? There’s some padding in their repertoire, and the world doesn’t need another rock twopiece unless they’re very, very good. Worries for another day, perhaps, for now it’s another Fish victory.

There’s nothing precisely wrong with Green As A Primary’s melding of Mogwai and Prefuse 73, but this downtempo mood music is so fussily exact that it reminds us of bad cappuccino, polished foyers, overpriced theatre bars and aging bachelors trying to look urban and sophisticated in Stoke Newington. Could well sell millions, then…

“Who’s ready for some ramshackle, drunken, atonal, clueless, shambolic, dated indie, then?!” Perhaps it’s a good thing they don’t really go for MCs at Truck, as there’d be no real way of introducing “pop legends” The Television Personalities and their agonising set. Imagine a bad Go Betweens rip off encoded, bounced off the surface of Mars, and then reassembled in a brewery with half the data missing or corrupt. “Embarrasing” is the only word that serves.

Having found ourselves caught between two randomly scurrying children who appear to be demonstrating Brownian Motion for the deaf on the way back from the tea tent, we return to the main stage for Emmy The Great, who was a highlight of Truck 06. Sadly her music’s become more polite and tidy in the interim and this set turns into a nondescript wash of general pleasantness. Still, she’s retained an ear-catching literacy in her lyrics, and a delivery that seems to be intelligently hectoring and monstrously cute simultaneously, rather like losing a theological debate to a Care Bear.