Anyway, Indietracks. With such fond memories of last year's festival, could it live up to expectations and again be the highlight of the festival summer? Well, we'll see. There's still End Of The Road to go, but Indietracks is always gonna be hard to beat.
Here's some thoughts and observations from Indietracks 2010.
FRIDAY
We got to the festival site just in time for Allo Darlin's soundcheck, leaving me in charge of solo tent construction. Our tent is a bastard to put together, but the friendly souls next to our pitch helped out, so it was easier than expected. Then, with an electricity plug conveniently located in the handicapped toilets I even managed to sort out the blow-up mattress without resorting to lung power. Hurray!
Music o'clock. First band on were the lovely Veronica Falls. Not everyone had managed to sort out tent and festival wristbands that early, so it was a bit empty by the stage, but they soldiered on, playing a great set of oldies and newies....well, as old as a band that young can.
Actually, the turn-out probably didn't bother them a huge deal. They were playing the 1234 Festival in London on Saturday and Truck Festival in Oxfordshire on Sunday, so they had a pretty impressive festival weekend ahead of them.
Second on were Allo Darlin' and by now the crowd was much bigger. The band was on top-form as usual and it was lovely to see them on such a big stage. Definitely one of the best AD shows I've seen, up there with the album launch at The Lexington and the early lunch show at The British Music Embassy in Austin, both of which are hard to beat.
The ale started taking its toll and despite being very excited about seeing Eddie Argos and Everybody Was In The French Resistance...Now! I can't remember much from their set. I do remember talking about them beforehand about how they should play a cover of Art Brut's 'Formed A Band' and call it 'Formed Another Band'. Surprisingly, they did cover that very song, but decided to change the lyrics to "Formed A Side Project", which surely must have been far more difficult to sing.
Then...DISCO TIME with two competing indie clubnights playing in two different tents. Again, the memory is a bit muddled, but I do remember the people in the big tent playing The Moldy Peaches, so they win the song of the evening competetion. For atmosphere and general awesomeness you couldn't beat the Come Out 2Nite kids in the small tent, so they win the overall fun competition. Hurray!
There was dancing!
Posing!
And...erm...more...dancing?SATURDAY
Some people didn't feel so good in the morning.
Personally, I saved my own 'I think I'm gonna die' morning for Monday. My fIrst band of the day was Red Shoe Diaries, who we played with in Nottingham and who are great. Unfortunately, I could only watch a few songs before I had to rush for the train, where Jam On Bread from Manchester was playing. The carriage was absolutely packed and Steve played a lovely set, with the moustachioed fella from Internet Forever on knee-drums and melodica.
It was a great start to the day. Jam On Bread has a new record out and the packaging is pretty awesome. You should look him up on myspace. He also recommends listening to Moustache of Insanity in his liner notes, which is very nice of him and came as a complete surprise to us.Feeling a bit better, Dan got the privilege of being the subject of my final Indietracks polaroid.
So that was it, in Polaroid land anyway. The festival of course, carried on. After Jam On Bread I had a bit of a break and helped manning the merch tent. Then eventually I headed to the indoor stage for The Just Joans. They were great as usual, but that stage never does anyone any favours....unless it's raining. After they finished I cought some of The Smittens set on the main stage. Again, despite missing my favorite song of theirs, 100 Roses, they were awesome.
Another break before heading over to the church to catch David Tattersall. Despite not feeling very well and telling us in detail of all the vomiting he'd been doing during the day, David played a beautiful set. It was the perfect way to end the evening and in fact that's what we did. I know nothing about The Primitives and what I heard didn't really spark any interest, so we went to bed. Yes, that's right. In bed before 11 during a festival. Rock n'roll!
SUNDAY
Despite being woken up by the sounds of the disco tent on the camp site at 2am, I woke up feeling fresh as a daisy.
We headed over to the festival site, where the drummer from Ballboy was getting married. Smiles all around and a lovely way to start the day. Winston Echo was the first band on what was my busiest day. Winston was awesome. Awesome!
Internet Forever were great, but again, that bloody shed stage ruined a bit of the enjoyment.
The rest of the evening was spent in a drunken mess by the main stage, watching Standard Fare, Shrag, Slow Club and finally The Pains of Being Pure at Heart. All were great.
My evening finished somewhere half-way through the Pains set. I then woke up the following morning in my tent with a drawing of a cartoon lion on my shin. I deserved to feel like shit and I really did.
I did take alot of photos during the weekend, but thought I'd just use the polaroids for this post. You can view my Indietracks set on Flickr here.
Bring on Indietracks 2011!
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