Got out of London early on Friday evening and popped down to Brighton where I caught the second day of the Great Escape Festival, hailed as the biggest new music festival in Europe (over 200 bands and artists performing in 20-plus venues over three days). Definitely a good night out, but a little disappointing on the bird-front. Avoid Brighton if you’re looking for hot action. I gather it’s a different story if you’re into lovin’ of the slightly huskier, hairier and testosterone-heavy kind.
Musically, we didn’t get to see any of the bigger bands – the queues for the Fratellis and Yeasayer were short, but stagnant. We did manage to waste about forty minutes staggering around getting more and more irritated until we managed to squeeze our way past the bouncers to catch The Rifles (top left), which was pretty good. Not exactly ground-breaking rock, but the guys crank-out student-pleasing rock ala Arctic Monkeys, but without the lyrical genius of Alex Turner. Melodic, relatively clean, up-tempo: they’re not going to change the world, but they’ve got a solid fan-base in the UK and managed to motivate a decent-sized mosh-pit, which was a good laugh.
By far and away the best act we saw all evening was the first: whacky French electronic duo The Shoes (top right). They started at 19h15, which is an odd time for anything dance-related, but they rocked the 50- or 60-strong card from the moment they started up. Check out their MySpace page and listen to a few tracks. They were much better live, effortlessly combining hip-hop, beats, rap and house with a decidedly Daft Punk feel. Keep an eye on these guys.
Next we caught beat-boxer Beardyman (bottom left), who overcame technical problems at the start of his show with commendable comedic flair and got a pretty fair-sized crowd dancing to nothing but his voice. He got a bit cocky on the Kaos Pads, which spoiled the rest of his gig for me and we left a few minutes after. Fucking impressive when he restricts himself to his voice, but a little OTT once he brings in the electronic assistance. Here’s a sample from the show:
We finally staggered into the Brighton Coalition, a wicked bricked-arch club built into the foundations of the beachfront promenade. The Lovebox DJs were on when we arrived, but we were struggling to walk and we crashed on some sofas by the bar and got stuck into some more booze while we waited for Adam Freeland (bottom right) to hit the decks. But we didn’t make it. Some self-absorbed wankers called The Slips (erratum) came on before him – jocks just aren’t credible as electronic musicians. We wobbled around for about ten minutes hoping that we’d find a rhythm, but canned it and called an end to our night out at around 2am. Slightly earlier than hoped, but a pretty heavy evening that took us on a solid tour of the Brighton club-scene.
Thankfully, a few of the bands I missed out on will be hitting London over the next weeks, starting with Okkervil River at the intimate Borderline on Tuesday. Really amped for that one.
Otherwise a pretty lazy weekend. Just finished up Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade, so reckon I’m going to hit the hay and get the week off to a healthy start. Green-Free May is actually going pretty well so far. It hasn’t been all strawberries and cream, but no relapses so far and the old memory-box is ticking over faster than usual, so good times. And on that note, I’m out. Catch you tomorrow.