My journey kicked off on Tuesday morning with a cab from the house in Oranmore to the train station and catching the connection from Galway Bus station to Sligo and a taxi straight to the festival site, where I met Kevin who had my camping gear with him and the volunteer coordinators Aoife and Arthur. While waiting around to get accredited and get my camping spot I brought out my blue tooth speaker and immediately assaulted Aoife’s and Arthur’s ears with the sounds of Moderat, who are cropping up at our next festival.
Aoife managed to get me into Core Camping, the production area and about 30 seconds from Kevin’s campervan. I was camping next to some of the main stage crew so hopped into the car with Conor, Chris and friends who were going out for a dip into the Rosses Point beach. Did I forget to mention the weather, sun cracking the stones and beautiful warm temperatures and Chris giving me a few chilled beers as I’d still to do my shopping for the next few days. I didn’t get back till late, so called it a day as it would be an early start in the morning.
Wednesday 31st May.
Duties today involved basically directing appropriate traffic to the production area and to make sure vehicles stuck to the one way system most of the time, I was working with a nice team of lads and lassies. It was hot and dusty but I was at least in the shade for most of my shift. Got a break and had a nice vegetarian meal of chick peas and vegetables with rice and a few breaks through the days duration. Kevin supplying me with some great coffee to keep me going.
Thursday 1st June.
Thursday was a more hectic kind of day as the festival drew nearer, it could be really busy in bursts, quiet for half an hour and then very busy in the space of a few minutes. My job today was to take down details of arriving vehicles, the registration, the name of company or trader and the rough time that they arrived onsite. We instructed them to pull over left and to get accredited. Eventually the rules changed the nearer it got to festival time, the road only used now by production traffic and for the arriving campervans being directed to the old crew field we stayed last year at. On the last few hours we were told to go out onto the main road to direct traffic to drive right side of the road as the festival barrier was in place on the left side. I was working with a great team of lads who I’ve forgotten the names of already. The lad I was working with had to do another two hours and the heat seemed to be peaking then, but was glad to be finished. I heard people calling my name, t’was Heather and the campervan girls and Rod McCreesh, but having just finished my shift I was dead on my feet and had to lie down for at least 20 minutes. Myself and Kevin went exploring where we caught the second act on Thursday at the Wild West Stage, The Fallen Folk, a bluesy country sound and easy going for the time that was in it, had a blether with Chris, one main stage workers who was having a can. This was the only time we ventured into the main arena on Thursday and sat up to the early hours in Kevin’s camper.
Friday 2nd June.
Friday started legendary, a lie in and some lovely Americana coffee from Kevin followed by bacon sandwiches and later on burgers too sorted. Wandering around I met many familiar faces. The lovely Ann Delaney, who I had an interesting chat with about festivals. She elaborated that festival line ups mean nothing to her really and that she more likes the sociable aspects of events, helping out and meeting and talking to people. She was interested in giving Sligo a bash and confessed that she did enjoy some of the live folk music in The Church. The Church is the same wooden one that the Haunt folk used last year but this time round it was a live unplugged venue for trad and folk bands. First music of the day for myself and Kevin was the Inspiral Carpets.
The Inspiral Carpets – The Mighty Oak Main Stage. 18.45 – 19.45 PM.
This was the first time catching one of the original Madchester acts from the 90s, having never caught the Stone Roses or Happy Mondays, I was intrigued about this group. I enjoyed their set, loud rocky sound with a touch of Northern Soul about it too. I liked the fact that Inspiral Carpets had a notable keyboard sound that the others mentioned didn’t have. They were like the Stranglers of the Madchester scene, much like the Stranglers were marked out of the distinctive punk scene because they had a prog rock Hammond organ player in the group. The group played all their big hits and pulled in a decent crowd in the process, including my sisters friend from Bandon, Lucia Finnegan.
We took a troop over to the District 23 and bumped into Danyl Hartshorn and his girlfriend Moon Dart and a bunch of other folk who were flattening the grass over some heavy beats.
Jon Hussey – District 23 20.00 – 21.00 PM.
Jon Hussey plays nice crunchy melodic ambient techno and seemed to pull a nice crowd into the field, the midgies were having a field day all this human flesh jumping around the place, hopefully we might see more Jon Hussey at the festivals, perhaps he might pop up in the Home Beat curated stage at Body & Soul, similar in feel to the great Neil Flynn. It was around this time I heard from a few folk that John Digweed had cancelled due to illness but Sasha would do the headline set at the Wild West stage.
Sunil Sharpe – District 23 21.00 – 22.30 PM.
Every time I see Sunil Sharpe he always delivers, he is a mighty force in the Irish techno scene. Tonight’s set was no exception, mauling, gnashy thumping techno, the beats coming done nasty and hard and the crowd absolutely eating up the floor. I love the stuff he does with Tinfoil too, industrial sheets of metal scraping techno. No doubt I’ll see you at another festival very soon.
Mauro Picotto District 23 22.30 PM – 12.00 AM.
Now I wouldn’t be much of a trance fan but I’ve never saw a trance DJ, so why not, I say. Picotto blew me away, not only did he match the crunchy techno beats that preceded him but he brought a Euro Trance vibe to the arena which was refreshing and also exhilarating. I say this especially because I was a Life Festival veteran for 4 or 5 years and although they did explore different dance types of music they never ventured near Euro Trance or Trance for that matter unless you consider Psy-Trance which is different again. Same with Townlands featuring different dance types. Anyways the crowd gathered and I’d say the majority of the young at this stage were energised up a few notches by Ricotto’s performance. He lifted the level right off when he dropped his most famous number Comodo and the whole arena sang the melody back to him. A wicked end to proceedings at District 23 for Friday night.
https://ra.co/dj/mauropicotto/biography
Sasha – Wild West Stage 12.00 AM – 2.00 AM.
Sasha also brought a Euro Trance vibe to the Wild West Stage going into the small hours, but by this time I was dead on my feet, as It was my first festival this year and I was ready to collapse into my tent. Kevin didn’t want me to go but I had already made up my mind by then.
Sasha Home
Saturday 3rd June.
Today it was just too hot to move, myself and Kevin just stayed in the shade of his camper for a chunk of the afternoon and stocking his fridge with my remaining cans of Guinness. Some coffees and a visit to say hello at the volunteer tent which also offered some much needed shade. At some point I decided to head off to the arena myself as I wanted to interview Peter from Toxic Dogs and maybe catch some more acts in the church as well as main stages, agreeing to text Kevin when in there. It must have been the back of 5 in the afternoon as the first venue I came to was the church.
Paddy from Cadi – The Church 16.30 – 17.30 PM.
Caught a bit of this set and enjoyed it for its laidback mood, Paddy takes well known songs, such as the one you hear here, Black is the colour and he puts his own jokey swirl on the ballad, he had a nice wee audience in the building too, probably the most shaded place in the festival.
https://www.facebook.com/carlos.herrero.902
Hazey Haze – Wild West Stage 17.15 – 18.15 PM.
Caught a bit of Hazey Haze’s set, the Limerick rapper has a charm in which he doesn’t take himself too seriously, so his act borders on comedic genius. He will send himself up but just as easily he can make a damn fine rhyme or Limerick (haha). He also uses Gaelic in his lyrics much like his soul brothers Kneecap and was winning over a few listeners gradually. Like there was an audience but they were all spread out sitting on the grass or in shaded parts of the arena watching the gig. Anyway he done a decent job for the hour slot and hopefully we will see him at another event.
https://hazey-haze.bandcamp.com/album/is-mise
I took a walk up to the Toxic Dogs Arena which is nestled directly behind the District 23 stage so a nice soundtrack of Drum and Bass emitting out of there courtesy of Ailbhe Treanor. I wanted to get an interview with someone from the Toxic Dogs group and I thought Peter Vamos to be the ideal candidate.
The Toxic Dogs Arena.
Back to the church to check out a few more acts.
Varo – The Church 21.00 – 22.00 PM.
This review has been hard as all the times is mixed up and confusing, Varos are billed as closing this stage but they were on before Mules and Men. Anyway Varos is a lovely hybrid of Irish and Scottish traditional music with classical , jazz, French folk and world music. During the tunes the fiddler was keeping time with her foot and switching the foot to pumping a harmonium that another musician was playing next to her. I took a clip of them playing some jigs.
https://www.varodublin.com/about-b
Mules & Men – The Church 10.30 PM – 12.00 AM.
I enjoyed Mules & Men’s set, described as progressive bluegrass they absolutely kicked ass, the mandolin player is incredible with the bluegrass in much the same way that Declan Corey rules the roost when it come to Irish trad playing on the mandolin and bouzouki. But the whole band looks the part all hunched over each other standing and this really adds the charm to their music.
Mules And Men
Rudimental – The Main Stage 22.30 PM – 12.00 AM.
Rudimental had a huge crowd at their set and they were making the appropriate sounds that a Saturday headliner would make, but they didn’t really grab me. Its interesting that they were using a drum and bass element in their music, but I felt they were too UP if that makes any sense, there was just too much going on. I don’t know maybe just too glitzy for me, a wannabe Groove Armada or something like that. But saying that they had the audience in the palm of their hands and the very same band is headlining one of the nights in the West Holts stage in Glastonbury, so they probably don’t give a fiddlers what I think so fair play to them.
Who thought out the toilet system for this festival are you trying to create an equal balance of needy toilet people both males and females. Where is the urinals like all other festivals, did you actually see the queues for both sets of toilets at the main stage and the food court it was ridiculous. Its like inviting anyone with a willy to pee against a fence or any dark corner of the festival. I just hope for the following year that you have bit more luck with securing some decent headliners for next year, not that I’m criticising this one but there was noticeable gaps at times and certain acts missing from the initial line up, where were the Friendly Fires, did they actually play? And the Sunday guest? Although Jenny done a nice job closing out the Oak stage. I know it was unfortunate that John Digweed cancelled but these things can happen.
Anyways back to the grind so to speak with some grinding techno from Chantel Kavanagh and Cailin, both with packed fields where the ground bounced to the beat, both DJ’s gave some lovely squelchy acid bits to the music too. I found Cailin’s industrial type techno similar to Aphex Twin’s Caustic Window.
https://www.facebook.com/chantelkavavanaghDJ/
https://ra.co/dj/cailin/biography
So here we are in a sea of beats and everything is alright, then myself and Kevin looked at each other and thought, maybe we’ll go somewhere different to end the night, yep even deadly techno can become wearisome so off we trotted to the church to see what was on there.
Humours of Ay – The Church 1.00 – 2.00 AM.
Now this is confusing wasn’t the Humours of Ay supposed to be closing the Wild West stage, but here they were closing the the Church stage. Anyway met my cousin Patricia Haran’s daughters Ashling and Christina and her husband Patrick at the church but over our patter I heard the band announcing the final number, so ran back to stage the catch final clip for Saturday night. The band was a mixture of members from groups Jiggy and The Bonny Men as well as others and they were playing classic Bothy Band standards such as Julia Delaney among others.
So back to Kevin’s camper for the night and a few tins and some blether.
Sunday 4th June.
Sunday seemed to be even hotter again, possibly about 27 degrees in the peak, having asked Aaron about a good time to go to the church to find a live session and he said to go up to the church about 12.30 onward. So myself and Kevin headed into the arena with my bodhran. When we arrived there was no music so we just sat in the shade of the church for a while. I was a bit disappointed there was no open sessions to join in with. Still I took some nice photos of the church and on what only dawned on me was a tribute to Bear, Dara Aherne Clark, a much loved festival character who would dress up in a bear costume and who died tragically a few months ago, it was a loving touch to his memory.
Erin and The Lens – Wild West Stage 14.15 – 15.15 PM.
Erin and the Lens are a nice laidback bluesy rock and pop vibe perfect for that balmy weather in the early afternoon. The band has a fine female singer in the making with a beautiful soaring voice and the perfect group for that time of day.
https://www.facebook.com/OfficialErinandTheLens/
This time I caught the Toxic Dogs unleashing their shenanigans on the unsuspecting festival public, much like Loosey Smokes do at Body & Soul entertaining the festival punter.
Amble – The Church 15.00 – 16.00 PM.
Finally the church roared into life for the Sunday with an acoustic three piece called Amble, a vocal harmony group that reminded at times of Sweeny’s Men perhaps, but pleasant melodic songs and nice singing tenor. Breaking Tunes sites influences such as John Prine, Ye Vagabonds and Talos among others.
https://www.breakingtunes.com/amble
We headed back to the camping area as there was a wee get together at the volunteer tent, quite a bunch showed up and some picked up litter, I didn’t by this stage as I could barely walk five yards without fawning for shade. Perhaps that pint of Guinness and the bourbon and ginger with lime I had earlier maybe didn’t help as I had a headache seemingly from dehydration even though I was hydrating, then it dawned on me I never had a coffee this morning which I have daily, so that must be it. So a can of coke was suffice and helped.
We headed back into the arena and in for a geek again at the church.
Moya Fitzgerald & Friends – The Church 19.30 – 21.00 PM.
Now I’ve no idea where Moya’s from but she was the central fiddle player for the set and it seems she had guests that would wander into the set and do various things. When we arrived she had a female guest who sang the Galway Shawl. She was later joined by another fiddler who was also a Garda working at the festival. There’s no info about Moya online, perhaps she wants to keep it that way but if she happens to be reading this feel free to throw me a link in the comment box below and I’ll put it in. Edit: Some of the volunteers messaged me on WhatsApp with more info about Moya and I discovered she’s a Clare lass living in Cork and her surname is Fitzgerald.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/moya-fitzgerald-70305a79/?originalSubdomain=ie
Ailbhe Reddy – Wild West Stage 20.15 – 21.15 PM.
Ailbhe Reddy put in a nice late evening performance with her alternative folk ditties, to my ears anyway she reminded me of the wonderful Northern Irish bands Dark Tropics and Roe. She has a wonderful singing tenor and was the perfect antidote to the cooling of the hot day with a nice mix from her albums Personal History and Endless Affair.
Another minor quibble about the festival, the price of drink at the bar, a whopping 7.50 for a pint of Guinness or lager, I returned a beer cup expecting to pay 6.50 for me beer, no way Hosier. Maybe implicate a refundable recyclable solution next year where if you return the beer cup you will receive a Euro reduction to your pint otherwise its an invitation to litter if the beer cup isn’t worth anything also it would make it less of a job for our wonderful volunteer litter pickers.
Jiggy – The Main Stage 20.45 – 21.45 PM.
Jiggy put in a fantastic performance that reminded me of the exuberance of the Afro Celt Sound System with the electronica removed from the sound. Two flautists, a piper, Robbie Harris on bodhran (no better a man), a fiddler among others and a brilliant Indian musician tabla player, singer and drum talker that blended beautifully to the Irish folk sound. As far as I know, Jiggy had been playing around the festival all weekend, turning up in the Humours of Ay and various other gigs, power to them and I hope to see them at another festival soon.
Jenny Greene – Main Stage 10.30 PM – 12.00 AM.
Jenny turned out to be a great main stage closer, her selection of happy funk house music was the perfect closer for the stage and a very nice remix of New Order’s Blue Monday to boot, was supposed to meet other volunteers here at left side of the stage, but no doubt they all poured down to the front of the stage.
https://www.facebook.com/djjennygreene/
When Jenny recommended that we all go to the Wild West stage for some Ejeca (who was supposed to close District 23 but switched) Kevin said he had enough, I agreed and headed back to the camper with him. Listening to Ejeca’s gig from the camper his style was very similar to Jenny’s set anyway, funky happy house music. Both of us went out like a light within half an hour of getting back to the camper.
Monday 5th June.
Because I wasn’t really boozing last night I felt not too bad this morning, I said my goodbyes to some of the staff, it would be impossible to remember everyone I met but you know who you are and I shall see you at next festival hopefully. Kevin the legend drove me all the way back to my house in Oranmore, thank you for looking after me all weekend and feeding and watering me. Till the next one. 🙂
Niallmcquaid's Blog 
Great review as always. Reposted on our social media. Looking forward to the next one.