Body&Soul 2018 Festival Review.

Ballinlough Castle, Clonmellon, County Westmeath, Ireland June 22nd – 24th.

Thursday 21st June.

Its only just a week ago but man, what a weekend.  Maireroisin picked me up from the Nox Hotel in Galway not far from my college and two other girls, Sandra and Doireann, excitement was abound and I couldn’t have had better travelling companions, well that’s a lie, Kevin Keehan among others have been perfect hosts too, but the girls were so excited and we all had a story to tell of previous festivals and shenanigans.  Maireroisin and one of the other girls were working in an area called The Sanctuary and two of us were going to be working with Clare O’Connor for the weekend.  This was a bit of a departure for me from doing the usual pre-event work like coming down the Monday or Sunday before the festival, this time I couldn’t do this as I was on a full time education course with the ETB and would’ve been too costly to do the week set up so I was doing weekend volunteering for the first time since 2012.

We all got registered in and I got my rota for the weekend which had been changed around a small bit due to some volunteers not showing up for the weekend so the festival had to spread out the volunteers who had shown up to a different schedule.

That night I went exploring the woods which I hadn’t done for a year with my little boogie box in tow, saw a few familiar faces and exchanged greetings and happily supped a few tins of lager.  I didn’t have to start till 12 PM the following day but instead of working the main campsite like in the original roster it was switched to wristbanding at the main entrance.  Did I mention the weather, the weather was absolutely fantastic, the sun cracking the stones but, man, it was baltic at night and I’m glad I brought my hoodie and leather jacket.  In fact I emptied most of my rucksack over myself onto the sleeping bag to keep warm.

The floodlit woods at night.

A beautiful decoration across the front of the Woodlands Stage.

Floodlit Woods.

Friday 22nd June.

I rose early enough about 9.30 as would have to report to volunteer HQ for 11.30, waking up in a zipped tent can be a ghastly experience sometimes and requires a quick unzipping for that instant relief of a rush of air.  At the HQ there was about twelve of us who were taken in to vans to the wristbanding area, when we saw the crowd waiting it was a daunting looking task.  I was handed a scanner to scan the printouts and tickets but it turned out to be a faulty one and was never given another one so I became a wristbander.  I wish I had a Gopro camera strapped to my head filming the wristbanding process, wrists of all shapes and sizes, hairy men ones and the long manicured fingernails of the ladies.  It would make an interesting video of the wristbanding process.

It was so busy that the time had flown in real fast.  One of the star attractions for me at the festival was all the classy beautiful girls adorned in amazing psychedelic colourful clothing that complimented the heatwave.  When the shift finished I got a text from Kevin about 6.30 PM to say he had arrived and was needing a hand to set up.  Well I had been on my feet for the last six hours and he would just have to wait as I needed a sit down for a while and a good shower to refresh before i took that 1 or 2 kilometre trek to the main entrance.

My apologies to Kevin, I took longer than I thought by the time I reached him at about 8.30, all he had to do now was trundle back to his car and pick up the booze, as the Body&Soul rules state that you can only bring the booze in the first time round when you get wristbanded, so I helped him with the camping gear.  Well now it was Kevin’s turn to take his time, basically he couldn’t remember where he had parked the car.  After numerous texts to him saying ‘Sake where the hell are ya.’ He finally showed up with the booze about over an hour later.  I went with him to sort out a pitch in the main campsite and then we headed for the crew camp, security not even looking at Kevin’s Us and You wristband.  I stocked up with beers and cameras and tried to by the time salvage the start of the Fever Ray set on the main stage.

Fever Ray – Main Stage 11.00 PM  – 12 .15 AM.

It looked like we had missed the first few numbers of the set and we eventually found somewhere about 6 or seven rows back from the main stage, the area was absolutely thronged and Karin and the girls were giving it serious stick on stage.

Kudos to the sound crew, they had a top notch sound which was crystal clear where I was, oddly enough I never seen any Vikings or Handmaids for that matter in the audience but everyone seemed to be enjoying the gig.  Old tracks like When I Grow Up and Concrete Walls got a new drum N Bass work over, which suited the tempo of the current album Plunge, equally tracks like To the Moon and Back set a really exciting tone to the gig with the ‘Pussy’ lyric getting a roar from the lads in the audience.

The old spellbinding Fever Ray came back with Red Trails which was too strong for my camera mic and Keep the Streets Empty which was anything but, with the wild throng around me but still a masterpiece although I wish Karin had retained some of the guitar parts and the high pitched beat that segmented the whole track from the original, still I loved it, I love her actually.  One of the most interesting individual female artists to emerge since Kate Bush and Bjork, for me anyway.  When the sonorous bass drone of the Vikings TV intro kicked off, there was the loudest roar from the audience and an intense euphoria .  Please forgive my terrible singing when I sang along a little bit with If I had a Heart I couldn’t help it.  The band finally finished with what I think might be an Echoes (Yes, Floyd’s Echoes) sounding key in Plunge’s closing number Mama’s Hand, just the intro like as it picks up pace to a more upbeat number.  A very excellent gig by a gorgeous looking band in visual splendour and sound.

 

 

We sat about the main arena for a while up at some tables and chairs whilst Olof Dreijer kicked off his DJ set, it sounded promising, lots of conga drum samples, Knifey type sounds, pretty good visuals on the backdrop too, but then he mixes in the most dreadful auto tune chart hit and that was just a No!  I got Kevin to look at the timetable, our quest to move to the Midnight Arena and possibly the Reckless in Love Stage, was trying to remember if Neil Flynn was at that stage, which Kevin confirmed, so we set off there.

Neil Flynn – Reckless in Love Stage.  12.30 – 2.00 AM.

Having caught Neil Flynn before at the Earthship Stage, Body&Soul Village at Electric Picnic 2015, right after Blur if I remember.  Our sole intention (Me and Kevin) was to see Donal Dineen who was on after, but Flynn just blew us away, seriously sparkly techno. We managed to catch him again tonight and he still makes some serious sounds, beautiful and dreamy but with a lovely crunch, he gathered a nice crowd tonight who seemed to be cruising just nicely to the beats.  In the second clip it sounds like he’s sampled a tom tom or maybe a bodhran solo and mixed into a nice techno thump.  A lovely gig.

Visuals on the Reckless in Love Backdrop.

Neil Flynn at the Reckless in Love Stage on Friday night.

 

Went for a wander to have a look at the Walled Garden and ended up at Natasha’s Kitchen where Kevin was talking to some of his friends who had been working at the Soul Kid’s this year, there was a sense of sadness amongst the joviality and that everyone loved Gavin Pedersen and missed him badly, he died tragically last November.  Condolences to Sandra and family.

We stopped at the Woodlands Stage and watched a bit of the SHIPS set, they were making a lively sound and very upbeat, ambient wandering synthesizers, soundscapes behind a steady beat.

I called it a day in the end as I wanted to try and get some sleep as I would have to be at volunteer HQ at 9.30 the following morning to find out what post I would be doing.

Saturday 23rd June.

Thankfully Kev’s Kitchen was open this morning so managed to procure one of their lovely cups of coffee which I needed before heading into the HQ, today my shift was changed from 10 AM to 4 PM to 6 PM to midnight and that I would be doing stop and go with three other girls.  Stop and go is two way radio duty where your job is to prevent collisions with festival and production traffic.

So here I had seven hours to kill and it was just too bloody warm to actually move and explore the place, it was a matter of finding where is the best shade.  First thing first, get to the ATM and withdraw funds as I only had seven Euros in my pocket.  I joined the queue at the Midnight arena which didn’t seem too big, but we didn’t seem to move.  I think I said this last year too, the queue builds up before you because sly devious feckers spot their mates in the queue and join them there.  This is not fair and should be regulated, security should be there to tell people to queue properly.  Anyways two hours was at least waited in that bloody queue and one of the machines breaking down didn’t help.  Eventually when I got my funds, next thing on my list was to get something to eat some soakage for the few tins of beer I had drunk.  I have a rule that I’m allowed a few tins of beer before a shift but the stopping point is at least two hours before, and maybe a strong coffee or two and a meal.  Whilst in the queue I enjoyed the sounds coming from the Absolut Bar, lovely obscure reggae and some amazing soul, blues and bebop courtesy of either Jack Thompson or Calvin James.

Whilst looking through the food stalls I immediately recognised one from Scrobarnach festival two years ago, Home Fries. chips with a difference, real potato with a luscious garlic sauce, a nice portion for five Euros which sorted me for the afternoon.

Home Fries: Delicious potato snacks.

I mainly went into the wood as it was the most shaded of all areas and listened to some of the talks going on courtesy of the Irish Times at the Woodlands Stage.  Interesting in particular here was Delete Your Account hosted by Patrick Freyne, Gavin Sheridan and Alison Spittle about how we’ve turned into a zombie generation constantly looking at our smart phones and social media.  I met Kevin here and we went wandering through the Walled Garden to Natasha’s and eventually to the Wonderlust Stage where there was another talk going on, an interview with Louise O’Neill which we didn’t stay too long at as time was pressing for me by then.  On my way back to the crew camp we stopped briefly at the Arbutus Yarns area, there was an open mic session going on and we caught an impromptu performance by I think a man called Gerry Grainey who gave some lovely folk ballads to a nice applause.  I headed off to get a shower at 4 and refresh myself for the upcoming shift, but alas there was a water shortage and only two shower cubicles going with a very large queue of crew waiting, so made do with a wet wipe wash instead and a fresh tee shirt.

Delete Your Account with Patrick Freyne, Gavin Sheridan and Alison Spittle among others.

Louise O’Neill at the Wonderlust Tent.

 

At 6 PM I was stationed with another girl on the narrow road strip that leads to the top of the Walled Garden and the Midnight and Main arenas coming directly from the farmhouse and boneyard.  It was busy enough to keep us going with an abundance of music floating from various stages, I thought I could hear the Abandoman set from the Bulmers Stage amongst other things, but the two way radio stop and go was easy enough work and lively enough.

Finally back to HQ to sign out for the night meeting Kevin on the way, we headed to the crew area where I stocked up on booze and necessary shenanigans and eventually made it to Jon Hopkins main stage set.

Jon Hopkins – Main Stage  00.45 – 1.45 AM.

This is my fourth time seeing this amazing artist and he just keeps getting better and better, cinema widescreen soundscape ambient techno with a beautiful scrunch and glitches, Singularity is an amazing album and he played a lot of it on this set.  Gorgeous tunes such as Neon Pattern Drum and Everything Connected bringing me into another sphere, the backdrop visuals were stunning and his dancers with the lighting sticks were absolutely brilliant in their choreography of light.  Although I find the track Emerald Rush to be a bit mixed up. it doesn’t seem to know what exactly it is but the audience seemed to love it.

The old Immunity classics, the thundering motorised melody of Open Eye Signal with new graphics added of skateboard guy sends a pounding through the ground, you could actually feel the whole place vibrate from all the dancing going on.  And then on to my favourite, of panted breath, Collider which seems to have a reworking, the bpm speed has been increased slightly and Hopkins has crafted it to end in the mouth sound you hear uttered at the starting of the studio version, very subtle stuff utterly amazing.

He plays another from Singularity, the amazing Luminous Beings, one of the constants being played on my ipod recently, this track has such a lovely luscious bass line, its so, so good.

For closing this set he played Lorde featuring Disclosure – Magnets and an extra encore of Two Dancers – Wild Beasts  – Jon Hopkins Remix which he doesn’t seemed to have done on previous setlists this year, so this makes this a very special Body & Soul set and what a dissbuster to go out on, a magnificent set.

And here I have to commend Kevin, he made the inspired choice, maybe we should go to the Living Lab Tent at the main campsite as there might be reggae, at first I thought it would be too messy with loads of pissed folks but that was quickly diminished when I realised Cian Finn was doing a DJ set of some really cool reggae which was a joy to hear and which I missed last year apart from the Songhoy Blues replacement of The Beat and Will Softly at Natasha’s.  The Living Lab Tent had the same kind of vibe as the Riddim Shack at Townlands Carnival in Macroom Cork.  Mikey Joyride Soro from Worries Outernational took over and kept the reggae vibes going strong for the night and a great closer for our nights entertainment.  I was talking to Mikey afterwards and he said that this stage has a potential for next years edition, so hopefully maybe a new Port Royal area.

Sunday 24th June.

Woke up and headed to the HQ after a wet wipe wash and had a few cups of coffee, today I was doing the 10 AM to 4 PM shift and working at Castle Camping, this is the area where the production crew stay for the duration of the festival, its a lovely part of the site, you have the Ballinlough Castle, the lake and the camping/campervan area.  My job to guard entrances into the area and make sure no scruff got in.  Half way through the shift I could feel my scalp practically melting it was that hot.  I had my ipod and boogie box playing sounds, which some appreciated and some didn’t, well, the late risers anyway.  One of the lads with a cool old school Volkswagen Camper in purple and white came through with a chilled can of coke for me and a camping chair, to which I replied ‘Your are a god amongst men.’  This is where I got the picture of the buggy adorned with flowers, I thought it was a lovely touch.  I was working at the point where artists playing the festival were accredited there, so these buggies would be sent there to pick up the artist if they were walking on foot or the buggies would lead the artists vehicle to the designated stage area.

Buggies which brought the artists to the stages.

Ballinlough Castle.

The shift went in fairly quickly and I received a text from Dagmara Zolty, the girl I have been doing work experience with recently saying that Jimmy Penguin and Mati of Community Skratch Music who host scratching workshops at 1984 Miracles in Galway were playing a set in the Garden Stage of the Walled Garden from 5 PM onwards.  But as a matter of urgency first I wanted to get that all important shower, of which was ice cold, perfect.

Community Skratch Music – Garden Stage at Walled Garden  5 – 6.30 PM.

By the time I got up there the lads had finished their set, but they turned on the system for a while again and Jimmy done a solo set of scratching to some of his own music, it was faster than techno and was a good buzzing sound, Jimmy is brilliant on these decks as is Mati, I was so glad to capture a bit of their sound.

Mati and Jimmy Penguin of Community Skratch Music at the Garden Stage.

 

Gymnastics in the Walled Garden.

I went for a wander and decided to see what Natasha’s was like and to my delight I heard a lovely trad session.  There was Eoghan O’Ceannabhain on concertina and sometimes banjo, Patrick Cummins on banjo and John Flynn on guitar, the lads normally play in groups around Dublin called OTWAK and Skipper’s Alley who I caught at one of the Electric Picnics at the Other Voices stage a few years back.  Anyway this was a delightful session and a pleasure to play in.  When I first heard the music I went up to the lads and asked how long they were playing for, Eoghan said about an hour so I said I would be back asap with my bodhran from the crew camp.  In all my six years attending Body & Soul I have brought my bodhran to every edition of the festival and I think I had a tune with Gerry Harrington at the 2013 festival so was delighted to be able to do my part time profession and join my second session at the festival.  Natasha gave us all gorgeous chocolate cakes afterwards which went down a treat.

https://soundcloud.com/curlewmusic

Myself and Kevin went back to the crew camp to chill for a while, I also caught up with Maireroisin and said hello, she was chilling in her cool camper, the weather being incredible now for most of the festival, there was some serious sunburn cases.

We trekked into the main stage arena to check out a bit of WhoMadeWho’s set, WhoMadeWho are from Copenhagen in Denmark and could’ve possibly been one of Karin Dreijer’s choices when she chose some of the lineup, anyway they made a cool Kraftwerky style pop music and their energetic front man was leaping from speaker stacks, they had a sizeable audience gathered and I’m glad they got to play Ireland in the end, seeing their gig at Bare in the Woods was cancelled last year.  Anyway they gave a suitable warm up for the Chronixx gig and hope to see them back in Ireland soon.

We basically hung about the main stage area and watched as some hardcore Chronixx rastafarian fans ran about the front of the stage waving a huge Jamaican flag about and beckoning the main stage audience to come forward for Chronixx.

Cian Finn and Will Softly opened a short set for Chronixx which went down a treat, Cian is a brilliant musician like his dad, Alec Finn, possibly one of the best if not the best traditional Irish bouzouki accompanists in Irish music today.  Cian does the same thing for the Irish reggae music and is a brilliant singer, toaster and fine selector of the tunes.

Chronixx – Main Stage  10.45 – 11.45 PM.

I was blown away by Chronixx’s set, Chronixx is a damn fine singer with bags of energy and a very tight backing band.  I didn’t know too much about him apart from the fact that Kevin would play a few of his tracks on his phone which seemed pretty good.  Its nice to see some young blood come out of Jamaica, along with Cian, Chronixx and the likes of Protoje, as the truth being told, most of the reggae artists I would be into would be in their sixties, seventies and eighties.  But what can I say, Chronixx delivered an impeccable set and in the perfect night weather you could ever wish for.  Now you hurry back again to Ireland, Chronixx, would like to see another few gigs by your good self.  A perfect close for the main stage proceedings.

We sat about for about half an hour in front of the main stage as the arena cleared, was glad to meet Craig Peggs and Robert Nesbitt where we had a great chat, security eventually came up and cleared us away, so myself, Robert,  Kevin and Craig headed for the woods.

Bon Voyage – Woodlands Stage  12.30  – 2.00 AM.

This is the moment where I followed the music with my heart, the sound emitting from the Woodlands stage was incredible, classic 1990s rave, sometimes with the Madchester sound and other stuff like SNAP, there was a man toasting or rapping along with the sound and I knew this would be my final blowout for the night.  The rapper from Brooklyn, Shamon Cassette was brilliant and kept us sweaty masses pumping with his brilliant DJs, two young DJs from Finglas in Dublin, The Supreme and Gucci Cortez who specialises in 1990s hip hop and house music.  An amazing end to an amazing festival for me.

https://nialler9.com/nialler9-mix-series-bon-voyage-have-a-nice-trip-mixtape/

Samsung Stage.

Samsung Stage.

Samsung Stage.

Well decided to go back to Kevin’s tent in the main campsite but it was just too warm in there plus the tent next to us was having a screaming contest, reminiscent to that Father Ted episode where they are trapped in the caves and Graham Norton’s character decides who can scream the loudest, this went on for about an hour and a half till I said I had enough.  I got out of the tent and made for the peace and solitude of the crew camp.

Monday 25th June.

After finally getting my phone charged and asking around the crew camp for possible lifts to Galway, Kevin got in touch to say he would give me a lift to Loughrea in County Galway and that I could get a connection there.  I just had the daunting task of carrying my camping equipment and rucksuck through the arid heat to the yellow car park.  Thankfully Benj who I met earlier at the festival gave me a much needed hand to the carpark area.  I also bumped into Robert Murray who was also looking for a lift to Galway and Kevin obliged so he was sorted in the end.

Many thanks to all the people I met and looked after me including Kevin, Clare O’Connor, Rob, Ross , the beautiful blonde girl and the English girl from the volunteer HQ team, Maireroisin and many, many others.

And now some suggestions for Avril to book next year for Body&Soul, how about Natasha Khan’s Bat for Lashes (Perfect B&S fodder), AIR, Aphex Twin (Of course), Max Cooper (An up and coming Jon Hopkins type producer from Belfast), Hawkwind for all the old trippers out there, Robin Williamson (Storyteller, harper and one of the former leaders of the Incredible String Band), The Afro Celt Soundsystem and Edith Frost (Who I think is fantastic). But they are just mere suggestions really, I’m sure there is a heap more stocked in my brain somewhere.  Anyway dudes Bon Voyage and I’ll see ya all at the next festival of the summer, here’s hoping the weather stays the same.  Love Niall xxxxxxx

 

Electric Picnic Festival 2013 Review

Sunday 25th August.

So here we are at the pre-festival for the final big camping music festival of the year in Ireland, the Electric Picnic has rolled around for another year with its first sell out in five years.  Preparations have begun, stages getting put together, tracks for the one way traffic system have been laid, its now up to us volunteers to direct this traffic and to prevent crashes at the many cross roads around the periphery of the festival.

On Sunday we arrived fairly late, most of the advanced volunteers had arrived in the afternoon and had been given temporary Festival Republic wristbands, but because we had arrived late we wouldn’t get ours till tomorrow.  Catherine told me to find Dan the crew camp supervisor and let him know we had arrived and we also made sure that the Scottish lads from Specialised Security had seen us while we were putting up our tents, this would come in handy later.  Louise who had been travelling down with myself and Kevin had friends in the Body & Soul area who had brought down her tent from Galway, so we went for a walk to explore the site and to help her get her tent.  All was well, we found the Body & Soul area, Louise got her tent, I said hello to Jelena Derk and we went to make our way back, but lost our bearings.  One of us thought we were taking a short cut but we ended up getting hopelessly lost, so we had to go out the main production entrance.

We met two security guards near the gate who laughed when we told them we were lost, another security guard drove up to us in a Land Rover, he appeared to be a boss and seemed to be quite hostile to us because we had not been wristbanded yet.  But honestly, why would three people, one with a tent try and scam into a festival that wasn’t going to start for five days through security.  The same guy drove down to the crew camp to check we weren’t trying to scam our way in, so it was just as well that the other security there recognised us.

Monday (26th) & Tuesday (27th) August.

I was stationed with a volunteer I think called Steven from Dublin, we were put at the first crossroads coming out of the festival site.  The weather was pretty reasonable and dry, but with that comes lots of dust and with heavy articulated lorries and JCBs travelling through we were required to were dust masks.  Sometimes there were hilarious situations where two enormous trucks were trying to go opposite ways, one lot was arguing that they were more important than the other lot and should have right of way, eventually this was resolved.  Our job over the two days was to keep our eyes peeled on all roads, to stop certain vehicles to allow the flow of the one-way system with other traffic.

Wednesday 28th August

Myself and Louise were sent to the festival distribution office to help out there for the day, Louise was sorting the lunch and dinner vouchers for the workers on the site, whilst I had to check through a list concerning how many two way radios were given out to security and festival staff.  We finished there quite early so I went off to help some lads move in refrigerators, for the riders requested by bands and musicians into the dressing room area.  I went out that night with a bunch of volunteers, some of the Cork lads, John and his daughters from Naas for a few pints.  This was the first time I had ever went out for a pint in Stradbally town.

Thursday 29th August

Today I was working under Dan’s command, my job was to prevent crew campers driving down the exit road into the camp site and car park, but to let the residents who lived on that road and beyond through there.  This was quite a busy day with the newly arriving Festival Republic weekend volunteers, Body & Soul weekend volunteers, food vendors, artists and campervans converging on the site. It could be quite stressful at times, one person was trying to find Gate 7 and I was trying to give directions, but a motorist started beeping a lot behind till I eventually shouted “Shut up” that is the only time I lost it a bit at the festival.  With the shifts over and with my new weekend wristband earned I was now free to enjoy the festival.  Mr Whippy provided the first festival sounds for the prefesters and weekend workers at Trenchtown, he whipped up a super reggae disco, myself, Kevin, Patrick Long (the brother of Kevin Long who myself and Kevin worked with at Life Festival 2012) and a few hundred others boogied about to the sounds till it closed down at 2am.

Friday 30th August

Having moved into the Hendrix camp site yesterday afternoon, I realised this morning that the Hendrix showers wouldn’t be up and running till the evening, so a quick trip down to the crew camp site sorted that as there was shower facilities there, so after a nice hot shower I was set up for the day.  Kevin had to work his final shift today, I set about exploring the area, I was trying to establish where the Rave in the woods / Red Bull stage was so I could keep it mind for later, Trenchtown linked most of the camping areas, which also linked to the Red Bull stage through the Oscar Wilde campsite and the Salty Dog stage the opposite way.  Whilst wandering through the Salty Dog area there was a really tight band on stage, funk wah wah guitar, cool dance beats and nice ambient keyboards, live drums and bass.  I have no idea who they were as the clashfinder I have only lists bands from 6pm onwards at the Salty Dog and this was about 2pm in the afternoon.  I spent a while there with some girls I knew from the B&S decor area who I met at the Body & Soul festival.  I wandered over to Trenchtown again as I wanted to document the new expanded Trenchtown, now with three or four stages and a tented cafe venue, some of them set up as musical trade offs, like say. an mc toaster versus another toaster, well thats the impression I got anyway, I took some photos and videos.

Trenchtown

Trenchtown (2)

Trenchtown (3)

Trenchtown (4)

Trenchtown (5)

At the Hendrix camp site I spent sometime getting to know my neighbours, most of them were pre-event, FR & B&S weekend volunteers and wristband workers (working for Neil Dowling), I was surrounded by a whole County Cork contingency and my mate Kevin Keehan was the only Clare man amongst the lot camped next to me, so good banter to be had as the final was going to be a week next Sunday.

There wasn’t a mad mental plan of action for Friday really as the line up for Friday was fairly skimpy compared to previous years so it left room for a bit more exploring, I suppose matters were exacerbated a bit by the late cancellation of Giorgio Moroder for health reasons, so no music at all from the smaller Electric Arena, I mean, christ! they could have put a few Irish DJs or electronic acts on in there just to keep that part a bit lively.

Wu Tang Clan – Main Stage  7.15pm – 8.15pm

I made it a point to try and catch some of the Wu Tang Clan’s set, agreeing to meet Kevin at the left side of the mixing desk area.  The queue to get into the main arena from the camp site was plain nuts but I suppose the festival was only really starting to kick in by then. I wouldn’t be too informed on the hip hop scene, I’ve always been a lover of old school hip hop like the early Grandmaster Flash (The Message, White Lines), Public Enemy, NWA and even Pump the Volume by M.A.R.R.S, I’ve heard lots of people rave about the Wu’s though so I thought to give them a shot, even though I didn’t do my research on them.  They pushed a powerful punch with DJ Mathematics providing a solid crunch to the sound.  Mind you, there was lots of cursing in that imitable heavy hip hop style, I was thinking, hmmmm, the watershed hour is usually 9pm onwards, so loads of kids with their parents in the audience shouting “Yo Motha Fucka.”  Will definitely check more of these guys out, some weren’t happy though as apparently we got Team B of the Wu Tang Clan, some were saying that some of the key members of the group was missing.  Personally I really enjoyed it as it was my first time seeing them so I have nothing to compare them to.

Did I mention about the new look main stage, the stage is now flanked with large screens on each side and seating areas for families or those of feeble sore feet ( think of the Cure’s three and a half hour set from last year, that is a lot of standing.)  It makes the viewing from the distance much more pleasurable, although I can’t help thinking that since Festival Republic is now running the show, the screens signify a change towards a mainstream look.  Its certainly doesn’t seem to be any more rougher or hostile like the more commercial events, EP is still a seemingly an amazing buzz.

Went for a look around the Body & Soul area, Kevin wasn’t feeling too well, having been up very early this morning and working pretty hard at the Body & Soul Village, his tiredness had caught up with him.

The Torann Drummers – The Earthship Stage (Body&Soul Village) 8pm – 9pm

Caught the last twenty minutes of this act, they are like the Motorhead equivalent of a drumming group, such was the wild dynamic going on with a frenzied crowd egging on them to wilder extremes.  They made a tremendous sound that stopped you in your tracks and turned you into making a warrior dance, a great Friday evening vibe.

The Torann Drummers at the Earthship Stage

Went back to the camp site with Kevin as he wanted to lie down for a while, so we guzzled a few cans of beer, I had a nice wee case of Guinness so nice to have some stout.  I think Kevin was calling it a day as he wanted to have his energy together for the following two full days of music.

For the tenth anniversary EP had a fireworks display, I was in the camp site at the time so I ran to a clearing to take it all in, there was some beautiful big bangs with awe inspiring colours.

Fatboy Slim – Main Stage 10.30pm – 12am

I enjoyed bits and pieces of Fatboy’s set and at one point I heard the voice sample Push the Tempo and thought he was going to go into Ya Mama which I think is a blinder of a track, but no, he goes into a cheesy female vocal sample, which unfortunately a lot of his set consisted of.  His set like James Murphy’s at the Body & Soul festival was catering to the girly crowd, pop house, not my thing really, I wanted something rougher, something KLOCK.  The clip I caught of Fatboy, didn’t sound too bad, but later on I had to run away from the cheesy niggly source of sound.  The Spanish style hand clapping track really did no favours, especially when Norman was projected onto the big screens clapping his hands.  I heard his set at Rockness festival in Scotland was more aggressive, not so much at this one.  Ah, but I’ve seen him a few times now, so off to watch something different.

I went back to the camp site to pick up a few cans of Guinness and my eco cup and made for Trenchtown to catch a bit of DJ Kali’s set.

DJ Kali (Kelly Embleton) – Trenchtown Yard Stage 10.30pm – 12am

I was initially disappointed that it was more downbeat than her usual DnB/Dubstep set, but grew to like the laid back dub infused slow step thing she was doing, when I saw her at Body&Soul festival in 2012, she played an amazing jungle, DnB and dub step set, but nothing wrong with changing it around a bit, it keeps it fresh.  I was there for about 30 minutes so perhaps she upped the tempo afterward.  Off now to try and find the Red Bull stage now for the start of Klock’s set.

Ben Klock – Rave in the woods/Red Bull Stage  12am – 4am

Lasers through the trees

Ben Klock’s set was banging and pulled a huge crowd in over the next hour or so, I never made it to Rave in the woods last year, so why not on the early hours of Saturday.  Klock’s music was by far much more preferable to Fatboy Slims, he had some wicked beats but with just the right amount of simmering ambiance, his style is minimal techno, but its atmospheric enough not to be just a thud, thud, thud.  I lasted about two and a half hours eventually getting farther and farther from the stage going up the hill.  The lasers were absolutely stunning too, the way the lasers hit of the trees was mesmerising, creating milky ways and universes with its colours.

Ben Klock – Rave in the Woods

Back to the camp site to crash for the night, it was nice and quiet for a while as nearly everyone else was either in Body&Soul, Trenchtown, Salty Dog or Rave in the woods.

Saturday 31st August

Woke up about 11am and set about procuring a coffee, spotted the Espresso black stall and ordered up an Americano.  Selection of sounds in the dock ranged from Syd Barrett’s Wined and Dined, Jon Hopkins Immunity and the Boiler Room set (I was miffed he wasn’t playing the Picnic, as he was going to be playing Bestival the following Friday), my three hour festival Ipod mix among other things.  Some of the wristbanding girls were sitting around in a circle outside my tent and seeing that they were from Cork I decided to entertain them with a song on the bodhran, Johnny Jump Up, a Cork classic popularised by singer Jimmy Crowley, which went down a treat.  Kevin showed up just in time to catch the whole song.  We went over to Patrick and his friends, Kevin Long was there so I got to say hello to him too.

Kevin wanted to head to the crew camp site for a shower, so I went for one too.  Down at the camp site I met one of Kevin’s work mates, Mick from Cork.  Mick had just finished Friday evening and he was relating on how he was rushing to catch the My Bloody Valentine set on the main stage.  Just as he made it down comfortably to the front of the stage Kevin Shields stepped up to the microphone and said, “Thank you.” Then they departed the stage.  You know Mick, that has happened to me plenty of times, just catching the last few notes of an act, really frustrating.

After we were showered and had more cups of coffee, Mick picked out strains of music in the distance, it sounded like Hands off, she’s mine.  Yep, The Beat were starting of their set as Saturdays opening main stage act, damn!  I knew by the time we would get to the main stage the band would be finishing up.  Take the walk from crew camp through the hole in the wall staff entrance to near the Hendrix camp.  That takes fifteen to twenty minutes depending on your state, it then takes at least another twenty minutes to get through the security checkpoint into the main arena and then about five or ten minutes walking to the main stage, so any hope of catching the Beat’s set was written off.

Right finally we get into the arena and its time for a proper brunch or snack, we are stuck for choice in the food outlets, there is just so much to choose from, Thai, Indian, Japanese, Gourmet Sausage, Pieminister among others.  I settle for the old classic seen at every 5,000 to medium capacity festival, Charcoal Grill, who do classic steak burgers and hot dogs.  Its the smell of the place while your passing that drives you mad for a munch.  I settled for the large steak burger, yeh I know its a burger for breakfast but it is a festival and this isn’t just a mere burger, its a meal and a half for six euros.  Kevin settled for one of the hot dogs.  We then made our way to catch the next main stage act, Ocean Colour Scene.

Ocean Colour Scene – Main Stage  2.50pm – 3.55pm

Ocean Colour Scene is a band I’m not really familiar with I only really know the Thin Lizzy sounding track that they do, Hundred mile high city, this was more a band that Kevin was familiar with so I just went along for a look.  I thought they were a cracking afternoon type set, nice laid back rock and pop music with some nice guitar work going on.  The weather was fairly good, sunny spells with a bit of cloud so not so hot.  I was more amused at peoples antics to avoid the multitude of wasps that had invaded Stradbally.  Loads of people were standing with open pints and wasps just love beer, many having to put their pints down after finding wasps floating about in the liquid.

Kevin had to meet Mick at the Body&Soul Village so I trooped along, whilst hanging about the Earthship area I was quite taken by a traditional Irish group, Realta who were set up on the Earthship stage.

Realta – Earthship Stage  2pm – 2.30pm

Belfast band, Realta had a nice mix of Irish tunes, Breton tunes and songs to gather a nice crowd, there was a flautist, uilleann piper, guitarist and two fiddlers.  Some of their pieces had slow brooding marches kicking off which would go into lively reel sets.  Will be checking some more of Realta, thats for sure.  There was even a group of people dancing in front of the stage.

Realta on the Earthship Stage.

Dancers for Realta.

Realta

While wandering through the arena we met Tadgh from Galway and a friend of Cork Dave, the fellah we met up with last year, Dave was in the Rankin Woods Stage watching an English indie rock band called Clinic, so we went in for a meet up and a look.

Clinic – Rankin Woods Stage  5.45pm – 6.50pm

Clinic was a new discovery to me, they had an abrasive indie rock sound and were donned in clinical masks, they had touches of thrash like Sonic Youth, Butthole Surfers and even a wee bit of the Stooges in their sound, they certainly livened up proceedings for early Saturday evening.  I took a clip with myself, Kevin and Dave suitably larking about.

This took us nicely up to the start of Robert Plant and the Sensational Spaceshifters who were starting their set on the main stage.

Robert Plant and the Sensational Spaceshifters – Main Stage  7pm – 8.15pm

Having seen Robert Plant first nineteen years ago in 1984 at the Glasgow Apollo Theatre, I thought his set had improved amazingly.  Back in 1984 he was promoting his solo album Principle of Moments and his big hit Big Log, I was mad for Zeppelin at the time but not so much his solo stuff, he didn’t touch anything from his former band that year.  Although it was a buzz seeing the man in person I found the set to be rather dull, a good light show though.  This time round I was blown away, he now has nine Zeppelin numbers in his repertoire at stand alone shows, so the Picnic was lucky to get five or six of them.

What a great way to kick off a set, Babe, I’m gonna leave you, right down to the very last detail the Zeppelin classic was recreated and Plant’s voice is still in fine fettle, he has a very tight band backing, Liam ‘Skin’ Tyson and Justin Adams on guitars, Juldeh Calmara on Ritti (One-stringed violin) from Gambia in Africa, John Baggot & Billy Fuller (Portishead & Massive Attack) among others in the group.

The Enchanter definitely had that Massive Attack feel to it and seeing that there was two Massive Attack members in the group the sound fitted perfectly with Plant’s style, the expansive drum sound also reminded me of Zeppelin’s When the Levi Breaks.  Some of Plant’s solo stuff was kind of like Rock and Roll and Hot Dog from Zeppelin’s last proper album In Through the Out door and it was a stroke of genius to have Juldeh in the group with his one stringed fiddle playing wonderful Gambian sounds into the mix, evoking Page’s obsession with the fiddle bow and guitar.

Perhaps the most magical moment of all was when Plant dropped What should and should never be, never did something sound so like its Zeppelin II version, what a great moment for Electric Picnic history and what a coup to get someone like Robert Plant. I was looking at Plant’s gigography over the last year or two, he has only played Womad festival. a handful of festivals in the US and South America and a couple of dates in England, so if EP can attract the likes of Plant, maybe they can get David Gilmour for next year hint hint.

Right time for refreshing before Bjork’s set kicks off in an hour, so back to the camp site for a can of Guinness and to relax the feet.  When I was back in the arena I got a coffee and a lovely chocolate cake from the espresso stall.  Met up with Kevin and made for the main stage again.

Bjork – Main Stage  9pm – 10.10pm

Bjork on the Main Stage.

Bjork was very impressive and quite nuts, but delightfully nuts, she had an impressive group backing her, a super tight drummer, the electronic switch doctor guy with earth moving sonic sounds and what looked like a fourteen strong Icelandic female choir who also played an assortment of instruments, which I remember from her last EP performance in 2007.  She played many selections from her 2011 album Biophilia and other tracks from brilliant albums like Homoegenic, Volta.  I definitely recognised the Hunter with its tidal wave of beats and sub bass and new tracks to my ears such as Thunderbolt.  Don’t you just love the way Bjork pronounces her Rs, when she introduced Thunderbolt she added a few Rs to Miracles, so it was more like, mirrrrrracles, I was saying this all night in the camp site .

The heavenly universe visuals that accompanied Cosmogony was a sight to behold, I noticed that Bjork nor her band allowed themselves to be filmed for the side screens, a point of note I recall from reading the Bestival review of her show there in 2011.  A special mention needs to go to the animations and visuals projected on the screens they were breathtaking and when Bjork goes for fire explosion effects she does it in grand style with Nattura.  For the encore she goes back to EP 2007 for an scintillating version of Declare Independence, she has a thing for that DnB, must be something to do with Aphex Twin’s drill and bass when he supported her on one of her earlier tours.  I would like to see her on a standalone show as an hour and ten minutes is not enough to take it all in.

Bjork performing Nattura on the Main Stage.

We headed back to the camp site for a while to chjll and to get some cans of Guinness to bring into the arena for after 11pm, I was interested to see what Disclosure would be like.  When I got into the arena, myself and Kevin headed for the Body&Soul area, for some reason we were drawn to the Earthship area and the Earth Spirit area with the seating around the official campfire.  Sometimes sauntering to the Radio Shack which functioned like My House at the Body&Soul festival, playing classic funky hits.

Donal Dineen – Earthship Stage  11pm – 12.30am

Back at the Earthship stage I heard familiar strains of music that I heard at a much smaller festival a few weeks before called Sundown Gathering and it was unmistakeably Donal Dineen.  A favourite of the Body&Soul festival and of the Picnic, he had a demented crowd up for a party and he delivered his pumping ambient techno in spades.

Disclosure – Main Stage  12.30am – 1.45am

Disclosure had a good sound and even their sampled female vocals were mainly sounding like pretty decent black soul singers, it was very commercial dance music but a bit more easy on the ear than Friday night’s headliner Fatboy Slim, although his visuals were better.  They mainly played extended versions of their tracks from the new album Settle and possibly some tracks from their EPs and single releases preceding the album.  Although the music was quite good, visually they were quite boring, they are definitely not headliner status in Ireland so EP made a mistake here, the Saturday late night headliner is normally a tried and tested and is still very popular dance/rockish act crossover, what I mean is there is metal riffs in the dance, its more than just dance pop rubbish, it rocks you up with cool visuals.  Look at previous Saturday headliners, the Chemical Brothers (2007 & 2011), 2ManyDJs (2009), Orbital (2012), Leftfield (2010).  I’m not knocking Disclosure, they done their best but it wasn’t the usual kind of Saturday visual feast.  The bonus was that we met some girls at the gig who were very friendly, some of them from Clare and Wexford and we went for a walk up to the Body&Soul after the gig.

Disclosure on the Main Stage.

Kathy or Cathy from County Wexford, if you are reading this blog, come and say hi to me on Facebook, if I remember you work in a medical centre, I think in New Ross or near New Ross.  We spent a nice time in pleasant company around the Earth Spirit fire, well maybe two seats width from it, but it was a pretty mellow place.  At one point the girls had to go some where and were gone, vanished, damn!  This wouldn’t be the last time I said damn at the festival.  So it was back to the camp site at about 3.30pm to sit and blether with Kevin and a few others and have a few cans before hitting the sack.

Sunday 1st September

Got up at about 10am and straight to the coffee stand, drank coffee and had a roll up, hmmm, have to go to the toilet now.  Dashing back to the tent I retrieve my wet wipes and bog roll and race to the nearest loos, I was in for a shock, massive, massive queues and a forty minute wait for a portaloo, christ!  EP you need to put double the portaloos in all the areas next year.  Spent some time with Kevin’s buddies, I was asked to select sounds, Jon Hopkins cropped up again, select cuts from the Knife’s Silent Shout album, some mad Aphex Twin, the Butthole Surfers – John E. Smoke, Patrick was quite taken by this track and lyrics like these,” John was a small town crippled lesbian boy who stood ten feet tall with a knife.” And so on and so on, some of the mad crazy bands from the late 1980s and early 1990s, I even slipped in some GonG.  For some mad reason I think the time on my phone went back an hour by accident.  I saw on the Ticket EP listings that the reggae band Black Uhuru were playing on the main stage at 2.35 pm and finished at 3.45pm, but when myself and Kevin rushed into the arena we discovered it was 4pm, so we missed Black Uhuru, DAMN! (there, I said it again)  Ah well, might as well stay in the arena now and catch some live music.

We tried one of the Indian stalls for a bite to eat, I can’t remember the name of the place but Kevin got the meal deal, chicken curry with a nan bread and salad, I went for the chicken masala which was ok, nice enough, we bought some EP tee shirts at the merchandise stand and sat down on the grass in front of the main stage to watch some of Noah and the Whale.

Noah and the Whale – Main Stage  4.30pm – 5.30pm

Noah and the Whale were entertaining enough, they made a kind of folky/indie rock sound with guitars, bass and drums and some nice inventive fiddling from the fiddler player, two who sang vocals, I think.  It was quirky lively music and there was a few milling around watching and enjoying the buzz, a nice afternoon sound to keep the spirits up.  Kevin had to meet someone in Body&Soul so it was up to the Earthship area again.

Sabrina Dinan – Earthship Stage  5pm – 5.30pm

Sabrina Dinan is from County Clare but now resident in Galway city, she sings beautiful melancholic contemporary folk songs that incredibly came out loud and clear over the accompanying Body&Soul rumpus around, she has a strong resonant voice that reminded of the singing of Niamh Parsons, I think, another Clare woman who sang with the Galway group Arcady.  I will be checking out more of her work.

Sabrina Dinan at the Earthship Stage.

Myself and Kevin rushed over to the Electric Arena to catch the Johnny Marr set.

Johnny Marr – Electric Arena  5.30pm – 6.30pm

Johnny played a blinder of a set and proved that he is still a guitarist to be reckoned with as well as a pretty decent vocalist and sometimes, a stand up comedian with his funny lines.  He played some tracks from the new album The Messenger, opening with The right thing right and various other tracks, the whole band was incredibly tight and when Marr’s done the Smith’s numbers his voice was fairly similar to Morrisey’s.  He played some more of the new stuff such as The Messenger and Generate! Generate! which I’m not ashamed to say kicked ass.  But the excitement in the packed out Electric Arena went up a notch when he recreated the Smiths classics, Big Mouth Strikes Again and There is a Light that never goes out and also churning out an explosive version of I Fought the Law.  Myself, Kevin and a German lad I was talking to, Jonas stood and watched the concert from just outside the tent at the entrance, a most excellent gig.

Johnny Marr at the Electric Arena

The Eels – Main Stage  7.15pm – 8.15pm

The Eels all dressed in track suits made a strange and interesting racket, they were just launching into a rousing cover of the Peter Green Fleetwood Mac song, Oh Well, they made for heavy chopping riffs that would keep many a metal headbanger quite happy.  They aired some tracks from their new album released February last called Wonderful, Glorious, including the title track, a brilliant Peach Blossom and Kinda of Fuzzy as well as selection culled from their previous nine albums.  This is the first time I’ve saw the Eels and I was well impressed, I had to leave before the end of the set to plan my move to catch David Byrne and St Vincent.

A quick trip back to the camp site, I wanted to get my jacket as it could be chilly sometimes when a gust came about and Kevin wanted me to get a jacket from his tent too.

David Byrne and St Vincent – Electric Arena  8.30pm – 10pm

To say that this was one of the most amazing highlights would have been an understatement, Byrne and Clark have an amazing energy and with a super tight and I must say, fit brass section of at least five players and guitar, drums and keyboard.  This is my second time seeing St Vincent and she really has some nice numbers in there, a nice selection from the collaborative album Love This Giant was played and a selection of Talking Heads classics like Burning Down the House and Wild Wild Life.  Annie Clark shone in tracks like Cheerleader, Northern Lights and cruel.  Byrne gave an amazing version of Lazy that was as good, if not better than the original single.  To top off such a good show, we got a brilliant version of Road to Nowhere in which Byrne had the whole band running around in circles and in time to the music, while still holding all the notes together, absolutely brilliant.

David Byrne & St Vincent at the Electric Arena

The Knife – Electric Arena  10.30pm – 12am

We just hung around the Electric Arena as I wanted a good spot at the front of the stage for the Knife’s Shaking the Habitual set, the excitement for this show was impalpable, the first performances since 2006 and the Knife’s first Irish gig.   The Pre-Knife Aerobics work out was a real gas, initially I thought the bearded bloke roaring was Karen Drejer as she sometimes likes to dress up as a man for some of their backdrop videos,  the aerobics guy was mental and created a mad atmosphere getting everyone psyched up for the show.

When the Knife came on, instruments were revealed on stage that looked like they came from another time or planet, strange harps covered in day glow paint, large rectangular instruments that looked like it was a keyboard, but was then turned around to function as a drum and the Knife, all in hoods and robes.  The music for the first ten minutes was dark, atmospheric and eerily ambient, bassy drums eventually came into the mix and finally to some strange songs from Shaking the Habitual like Wrap your arms around me, the brooding Ready to Loose and the trippy Full of Fire with the whole hooded troop standing at the one spot in the stage, motionless while the track played, really strange stuff.

When the dancing started it livened up with the dub steppy One Hit from Silent Shout, this was a pretty amazing dance routine by the group, there was comedic moments such as when the lyrics mentioned ‘family’ all the group would be sitting like a family posing and smiling as if for a photograph, mad stuff indeed.  On one track some of the band strolled on with a large picture frame, which turned out to be a video screen, this is where we see the bearded Karen Drejer singing.

The Knife closed with Silent Shout, but it wasn’t the usual intro from the 2006 shows, basically we just got a barrage of techno beats until you could hear out the recognisable keyboard sequence and some powerful spotlights coming up through the dancers.  It sounds like Olof changed the original keyboard sound and added melodic metallic drums into the mix playing the same notes.  When Karen sang the spotlights became one with Karen outlined in a brilliant silhouette.  What an amazing show to build up so much energy, a sit down was required after all that.

The Knife at the Electric Arena.

The Knife at the Electric Arena (2)

For the final four hours a quick trip back to the camp site was in order for more beers and a sit down, on the way out of the main stage area I took the opportunity to film the lighted cube entrance as it reminded me of the Cubatron light box from EP 2008, someone remarked on Youtube that these were the same light boxes that were used at the Algorhythm Stage (Rave in the Woods) from last year so its nice that EP is recycling the old stuff.

Lighted cube entrance to the Main Stage area.

Lighted cube entrance to Main Stage (2)

It was off to the Salty Dog stage at one point where we caught a bit of the Hot Sprockets set, Kevin thought it was the Mighty Stef, they actually sound quite similar, but a lively rock band anyways.

I always had the niggle that I hadn’t met up with my friends from Dublin, Salim and Aminah Dastan, having checked Trenchtown a few times through the weekend.  So we went up to the Trenchtown area for a look.  I think Revelation Sound System was pumping out the sounds on one stage and after not spotting my friends, myself and Kevin was about to head off to Body & Soul, when I bumped into Aminah at last and she told me that Salim was performing on the other Trenchtown stage with Glaswegian singer and toaster Soom T.  Boy, I was glad to manage to catch the last ten minutes of their set.  Soom had a nice rootsy voice that absolutely complimented the dub she was singing over.

Soom T with Salim Dastan at Trenchtown

We sauntered about the Body&Soul Village for the rest of the duration, soaking up the atmosphere for the the final night.  The Earthship area seemed to be the attraction for lots of people digging the pumping sounds.

Mothers DJs – Earthship Stage  1am – 4am

These lads were a bit like Radio Shack and My house (Body&Soul Festival) playing classic hits and mixing in cosmic house sounds. Lipps Inc’s Funky Town, Talking heads Psycho Killer and some classic 1990s techno.

The area near the Earthship Stage.

Gorgeous pods and baubles in the trees near Earthship Stage.

The final hour was spent at the Body&Soul main stage, I regret to say that I neglected this main stage for the whole festival so now I was making up for it by catching the final act before EP had closed its curtain.

Tourist – Body&Soul Main Stage  3am – 4am

Tourist had a bit of a Jon Hopkins buzz about his music, a bit more ambient but with some tasty mellow DnB, the beats ranging from techno, electronic rock, very chilled but thumping at the same time.  The ambient stuff was a similar buzz to Dineen’s sound and there was a nice wee throng at the front, whilst a lot, like ourselves sat on the hill in the amphitheatre to watch.  But alas the set ended and about ten minutes later security asked us to leave, I said to one of them: “Can we not just sit here for a while, soak up the lights and have a quiet chat.” He replied: “No.”  Ah well, better go then.

I was a bit awestruck by the change in the main stage, gone were the hundreds of globes from the top of the stage that used to have visuals projected over them and replaced by a rather elaborate flower shaped design that looked almost like a tripped out gramophone.  The lights to the side had a smoke machine attached so this created what looked light-smoke lasers, a really cool effect.  It also looked like a similar image of the projections on the Mr Screen in Pink Floyd’s comeback tour 1987 -1990.

Tourist on the Body&Soul Main Stage.

The light with smoke machine attached.

The video clip unfortunately is quite short as my battery ran out only leaving an eight second video clip.

We stumbled into Natasha’s Kitchen tent for some reason and stumbled out of it again, there was no music just a lot of people standing chatting, so back to the camp site to chill there.  A few cans later Kevin went to crash, so off to my own tent where I just lay about not falling asleep till about 7am.

Monday 2nd September

The aftermath of the Picnic, well I had a fantastic festival as per usual, EP tops again for consistent choices that reflect the original integrity of the festival, ok, there was some Oxegen acts in the bill such as Two Door Cinema, Arctic Monkeys and Ellie Goulding and a younger crowd at times for some of the main stage acts, but I still got a universal good vibe from everyone I met.

The death of Phil McConnell changed the atmosphere at the Picnic and it was a sad occasion and sympathies to the family, its just unfortunate but these things can happen at large scale events sometimes.

Security issued warnings over all the PA systems of the stages warning about the taking of ecstasy pills called Blue Ghosts.  These are apparently very strong and can be lethal in double doses.  I had friends at the festival who had taken them, but they were quite sensible and would only take a half at a time until it wore off and then maybe another half later on.  The same happened in Scotland over the last year with the warnings about fake ecstasy tablets called Green Rolex which claimed the lifes of seven people, although these drugs were thought to contain a few dangerous chemicals.  Warnings were issued at the T in the Park festival, Oxegen festival and Rockness festivals over the last few years to be aware of what you are taking.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/jul/10/fake-ecstasy-warning-die-scotland

Some people in the know say that the effect of the Blue Ghosts can take up to an hour and a half to kick in and that they can be rough on the stomach.  They have heard of cases where someone believes they are not getting a hit from the pill quick enough and will take another one, this can lead them to be hospitalised as the double dose can be too much.  If you are going to take them, make sure you know what your taking, even if it means going to the Bluelight forum to find out the analysis of them.

Well I had a great Picnic and I hope you did too, love and respect and I’ll see you next year.

Review Body & Soul Festival 2013 June 21st – 23rd

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How Does It Feel To Be Lost In The Woods

Like the psychedelic poet and musician Syd Barrett said, “How does it feel to be lost in the Woods…” At Body & Soul you just do not want to be found.  And so begins another pre-fest journey for the summer watching the festival get pieced together, stages getting put up and the lights getting switched on and by Friday morning the sound systems booming up, for us pre-festers this was exciting as we had finished our work and had time to take it all in.

Pre-Festival

Monday 17th June

We arrived down for 9 am at the Bone Yard (Production Office Area) so that Kevin could register and sign in for his shifts, throughout the day I met Jelena, Megan and some of the pre-event volunteers.  I met some charming girls who were working in the Decor team in the big barn and we talked about the excitement of the oncoming festival.  I put up Kevin’s and my own tent to the pumping soundtrack of Jon Hopkins Boiler Room set from earlier this June, one of the sets of the weekend I was most looking forward to.

Tuesday 18th June

Met the volunteer team I was going to be working with over the next few days and they are some of the soundest dudes around, I mean you cannot go wrong with a music taste of Gong, Floyd and Aphex Twin, soul buddies we are.  Matt, Taro and Sam, it’s actually very, very rare to find other people who love Gong the band as much as I do.  To most straight folk, Gong (Daevid Allens Gong) would sound completely loopy and druggy, but to Gong fans they are one of the tightest craziest bands in existence who turned psychedelia into a comedic art form, but who also done incredible ambient pieces.  I hung about with the lads in the adjoining crew camp site for the remainder of the day blasting them with my media library and my bodhran.  The tasks for the day was that we were posted on the route leading to the Boneyard, we had to make sure the traffic knew where it was going.  Me and Matt were put at the gate leading to the boneyard, it was easy enough work but with it being dry, it was very dusty with all the articulated lorries arriving.

After having not ate much the day before, I was determined to hitch to one of the nearby towns after my shift to get some food supplies as there was no way in the world I was going to pay the twelve euro asked for an evening meal at the crew restaurant.  I mean come on, why do festivals think volunteers are here, it’s because they cannot afford to normally go to the festival, they might be on the dole or be a student with a very, very tight budget.  I’m  not asking for a breakfast and evening meal like most of the rest of the crew camp with the voucher system but maybe a sandwich per shift like at Life Festival.  And I guarantee that, that incentive works wonders for a volunteers morale.  It was quite dehumanising in some ways to be in that crew cafe when others were eating (not their fault) and myself with my silly pot noodle.  Thankfully Brian, our site supervisor kept us hydrated with free bottles of water during our shifts.

I hot footed it to Athboy, all of the eight kilometres and bought bread, butter, ham and cheese and helped myself to a Donner kebab.

Taro, Sam & Matt

Wednesday 19th June

Today we got a bit of physical work instead of just directing traffic, Brian took myself and Matt up to the carpark area where we helped him map the lanes with traffic cones, later on we were given the job of erecting fencing around the golf flag areas, to prevent cars from driving up on the more delicately trimmed grass.  My shift ended with a small job sitting by the roadside with Taro, making sure that traffic aimed for the Boneyard got to the Boneyard or that people due accredition were parked up on the grass verge.

When we went to get the wristbands I met Neil Dowling who I worked with at Liss Ard festival last year, he was doing the wristbands for Body & Soul too.  It was a nice exhilarating feeling to be finished our shifts, I played Matt, Taro and Sam their first time hearing a proper live Gong album, the album in question was Gong Est Mort, Vive Gong, the last proper PHP show organised by the French fans of the group in Paris, 1977.  The lads were suitably impressed.  Kevin came to join us in the tent, he had just finished the third of his four shifts.

Kevin, Sam, Matt and Taro

Thursday 20th June

Today was spent locating the crew showers and taking in some of the visual scenery that was starting to appear throughout the woods.

A simple but effective piece of art, destroyed later on through the weekend

I met Andy in afternoon who I worked with during the pre-fest for Electric Picnic last year, he was also involved with this one.

Andy.

I went with Matt and co to Clonmellon as this town was only three kilometres away from the festival site, so we took a leisurely walk to get more supplies, Taro for his breakfast roll and me for a decent Americano coffee and filled roll, the lads wanted to top up on tobacco too.

later on at night time we wandered aimlessly about the festival site, myself with the ipod dock blasting out Aphex Twin from the Forbidden Fruit festival 2011.   Whilst passing the barn with the decor people, they were blasting out Syd Barrett’s second album, Barrett to my pleasant surprise.

I posed the question to the lads about what Body & Soul meant to them or what they hoped for and filmed it.

I also took the opportunity to interview the person behind the Gameltron installation, while he was setting it up.

Friday 21st June

Opening Day, get yer wristband.

Friday morning was spent stuffing my face with cheese and ham sandwiches and eating peanuts, as it was still a while away till the main food vendors opened up, the biggest gripe was coffee, still no espresso machine on site.

I had a blether with some of my camping neighbours, some of the weekend volunteers who were either doing shifts today or tomorrow.  Charlie Smith with his didge, Aoiffe Rafferty, Simon Outram and James Fahy were in all good spirits and looking forward to the fun and festivities.

Charlie, Aoife, Simon and James.

Wandering through the main arena, some of the tents started testing the sound systems and the festival hadn’t opened to the public yet , while I was marvelling at the size of the Midnight Circus tent, one of the sound engineers slipped on Windowlicker by Aphex Twin on the sound system, boy, I was in my element giving it serious moves.  The only thing though was I was the only one freaking to the music, everyone else was working away.  I went up to the Wonderlust Stage to talk to Toss, a friend of Kevin’s who worked at stage set ups for Electric Picnic/Body&Soul, the Wonderlust stage was formely known as the Bamboo Stage from last years Picnic.  The lads were busy screwing parts of the roof and sides of the stage together.

getting the Wonderlust Stage together.

The Wonderlust Stage.

Matt, Taro and Sam wanted to move into the main camp site as their significant others would not be permitted into the crew camp because of their wristbands so I set out to find them later on in the afternoon.

I waited with Matt at the main entrance for his Chinese/Irish girlfriend Aimée, so I took an opportunity to snap the wristbanders and security dealing with the arriving festival public.

There wasnt a hell of a lot on the agenda music wise, a few notable DJ sets, I was more keen for Donal Dineen in the Midnight Circus Tent, that is until I met Aminah and Salim Dastan and their friends, the music scope had just widened considerably, dub and blues mixed with some of the finest shimmering world and Arabic music.  The Fusion tent was a paradise I would discover very soon.

Right; Aminah, Salim and friends

I managed to direct Aminah and Salim to the Fusion tent so that they could set up later for the gig, I took a short film of the tent to the soundtrack of the Congos Fisherman.

The Fusion Stage / Tent

It’s a gorgeous venue with coffees, teas and delicious vegetarian food on offer.  I wondered if indeed it was the same tent that was used at Life festival for the Lectrosoul Chill out tent, a very characteristic white cottage looking tent.

Seeing that I was in a suitable reggae mood after my visit to the Fusion tent I thought I would check out the Port Royal Jamaican Village.  This time I wanted to get a good chunk of the area on video rather than just the dancing area, the idea is to eventually to lead to the source of sound, so its like a little journey rather than just being there, I’m working as a pair of eyes just floating slowly between the stages.

My House and the Reckless in Love Stages in the woods had sizable portions of people going mad to the music.  My House was like a classic hits thing or like the Vintage TV Channel, except that the DJ would put an extra fuzz tone on the sound making it heavier than normal.  Whilst the Reckless in Love stage had live acts most of the time but also DJs too.

Shane Mannion (Dissonance) – Midnight Circus 7.30 pm – 9 pm

I caught a bit of Shane Mannion’s set, his set ranged from minimal techno to ambient techno, he had a nice pace going with a few throwing shapes on the floor.  Its nice to see some Irish DJs in amongst the international calibre for weekend and giving it socks too.

http://www.lowerstate.ie/tag/shane-mannion/

Myself, Matt and Aimée went for a lark in the woods, to take some photos of the floodlit trees and strange items and installations dotted throughout.

Aimee delightly lost in the woods

Aimee & me

Some random people traipsing through the floodlit woods

At some point with Matt I stumbled across a cute hippy clothes stall called Inspired Earth in the Walled Garden area that had the most adorable teapot hats, I was going to save my funds for a Body & Soul t-shirt, but I was not impressed with the new ones after last years lovely design, so the teapot hat became my Body & Soul souvenir, plus they gave me a reduction because we were volunteers.

http://www.inspired-earth.com/splash2.html

I also took it upon myself to pay tribute to the group Gong and their album from 1972 called Flying teapot by singing a verse of the PHP Song to the bewilderment and amusement of the stall holder with Matt providing a fake saxaphone solo.

James Murphy – Midnight Circus 10 pm – 12 am

Having seen the LCD Soundsystem three times at various Picnics and numerous clips of the James Murphy set, I was looking forward to his set.  Oncoming heavy rain showers guaranteed a fairly wedged tent, it was fairly stifling in there.   I thought the set would be cool ambient electronica techno like I had seen on previous clips of his Picnic set, but it was nothing spectacular I’m afraid, it was quite generic techno with a bit of funk and Madonna remixes, whats a punk doing playing Madonna, where is the hard ass stuff like Loosing my Edge.  His set did not really do anything for me, although he was keeping the masses bopping but catering more for a girly crowd.

http://lcdsoundsystem.com/main/

All Tribes vs Dubble Up – The Fusion Tent  12 am – 3 am

Now this was a lot more exciting this was Salim Dastan and friends doing a three-hour set.  There was Arabica/World music mixed with the deadliest dub reggae and dubstep to help wash the memory of these Madonna remixes away in one of the most gorgeous tents of the festival.  Salim loves his roots reggae and world music and he weaved his beautiful magic to an earth pounding bass, yes, this was more like the Body & Soul I love.

http://madumusic.bandcamp.com/album/from-the-elders-yard

Donal Dineen – Midnight Circus  12.30 am – 3 am

Donal Dineen is a true master of the electronica world, he makes beautifully blissful ambient techno but he can set you on fire in an instant with his drops, he is the perfect big tent closer and the lovely Aminah Dastan joined him on vocals for a few tracks.  Dineen is a reliable Body & Soul favourite who will always have a huge fan base, where ever he plays he will have you stomping.

https://www.facebook.com/DonalDineen

It was back to the Fusion tent with Kevin until it closed down at 3am as it was lashing down outside, we headed off to the wood to spend some time at My House and relax on the sofas there.  On the way back to crew camp we spotted a lovely sitting and chill out area with a camp fire, this was called Earth Spirit and reminded me of what Glastonbury festival goers refer to as the Stone Circle area, a place to unwind and talk with complete randomers into the small hours.  Of course security came and spoiled it by telling everyone to go home at 4 am but I suppose the Earth Spirit people wanted to get some shut eye, so what can you do.  We retired ourselves, a day and night fully spent.

Saturday 22nd June

Got up about 11 am and with Kevin already awake we set off for some decent coffee and a bite, the weather was fairly iffy at times hot burning sunny spells, followed by lots of clouds and drizzly to heavy rain, add the occasional gust of wind and you get the picture. This didn’t bother us too much as you could find shelter in the woods or the Midnight Circus tent and of course, the Fusion tent the first venue for us today.  Aminah was singing vocals with Salim’s dub reggae sounds, so effectively one half of the Madu band was present without the brass section.  There was Aminah’s blues/soul vocals mixed with what sounded to be like an Eastern stringed instrument mixed with the dub, a bit like the Buddha Bar or the Thievery Corporation’s Mirror Conspiracy.

I went for a wander up to the holistic area, Green Crafts was there this year, last year they were opposite Mandala Nature near the crew camp.  Anyway I wanted to take as many video clips as possible of different parts to the festival, here is one of Green Crafts, very much an eco friendly and recycling arts craft community.

http://www.greencrafts.ie/home.html

Overhead, the Albatross – Body & Soul Stage  2.30 pm – 3.15 pm.

I don’t know if Overhead are Pink Floyd fans but you would certainly get that impression with the band’s  name, which is the opening lyric to Floyd’s Echoes.  But lets leave that comparison aside, Overhead make a nice indie rock sound with a serious rhythm section, in fact nothing like the Floyd but good catchy indie pop rock.  This opening band for the B&S main stage pulled in a decent enough number despite the horrible downpours that occurred throughout the set.

http://overheadthealbatross.bandcamp.com/

http://overheadthealbatross.com/

I had my bodhran with me and I was hoping to have a tune with fiddler Gerry Harrington, he was one of the resident musicians hired to play at the intimate Mended Drum Stage which was next to the My House stage, although I think he ran the place with some other people and a charming Scottish girl.  I found sometimes that there was a serious noise bleed from the My House stage.  I got talking to the person running the venue on Thursday where he explained to me that the stage and venue itself was made mostly of recycled trampolines, absolutely fasinating stuff.

The Mended Drum Stage.

Anyway myself and Kevin went up to the Mended Drum to see if there was a session up there, but only a play on stage instead which was fairly interesting nonetheless, that I filmed a short piece.

RSAG – Midnight Circus    8 pm – 8.45 pm

This is my second time seeing Rarely Seen Above Ground, the first time I caught him was at Castle Palooza festival in 2008 and back then he was easily one of the highlights that year.  Five years later he is even better and has a fine crowd transfixed with his show.  RSAG is a multi-instrumentalist, he plays guitar, keyboards, bass and especially drums, wait! you say, so does he play them all at the same time, well, sort of.  He records all the individual instruments in separate tracks, films videos close up of fingers playing strings and keys and incorporates them all into his software, videos beamed on a huge screen behind while he plays the drum kit like a man possessed and sings a mighty fine vocal.  I really hope RSAG becomes huge as he is immensely talented and deserves to succeed.  How would you describe the music, well, pretty rocky but with funky dance overtones, he is very entertaining to look at, he uses so much energy in his performance that you cannot fail to be impressed.

http://www.rarelyseenaboveground.com/

Charles Bradley – B&S Stage   9.15 pm – 10.15 pm

Caught a little bit of Charles Bradley’s set, Bradley has a fine set of lungs and can sing the blues and soul effortlessly and he had a fine backing band right up behind him.  He also pulled a sizable crowd to the gig despite again the unpredictable weather situation.

http://thecharlesbradley.com/

Mmoths – Midnight Circus – 10.30 pm – 11.30 pm

I checked out one of the most talked about musicians playing all the Irish electronic festivals, Mmoths, this was the first time apparently that the producer/DJ had teamed up with a band.  The music was like a swirly ambient shoe gaze sound, a kind of softer more ambient Death in Vegas sound.  It didn’t seem to be Kevin’s type of music, so we went wandering after a few numbers.

http://mmothsmusic.com/

I havent talked about food yet, but was feeling a little peckish for something to eat before we settled down to the main stage for Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds.  Kevin loved the chicken wings from the Chicken Wing stall just near the Midnight Circus tent, I thought they made the best chips I have ever tasted and for three euros you got a nice box of them which is extremely good value for a festival.  A special mention too for the Steakhouse burger and hot dog stall in the bottom of the Walled Garden area, a great satisfying bite.

Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds – B&S Stage   11.00 pm – 12.30 am

Nick Cave is an out and out entertainer with a voice that can seriously rock, this was my fourth time seeing him, he has come a long way since I saw him first back in 1983 with his first band the Birthday Party and a serious bunch of hench men backing him with a nasty gritty sound.  He gave us generous selections from his recently released album Push the Sky Away as well as some classics spanning his career.  Alice Glass from Crystal Castles should take note, Cave did not require to drink a bottle of Jack Daniels before climbing over the audience and security never cut his set short as he is a seasoned pro who has stage dived and crowd surfed over a thousand times or more and handles it with startling aplomb. Yep, Cave definitely earned that headline spot.

http://www.nickcave.com/

George Fitzgerald – Midnight Circus   12 am – 1.30 am

I caught the last 30 minutes of Fitzgerald’s set and, man, could he make the audience move, Fitzgerald was playin some tasty house and garage music with a nice understanding of dubstep and techno beats.  The weather had improved since Cave’s set but the bulk of the crowd remained in the tent as the music was so good.  I only discovered Fitzgerald today so will be looking out for stuff from this guy, he is worth checking out.

http://www.residentadvisor.net/dj/georgefitzgerald

Iron Curtis – Midnight Circus   1.30 am – 3 am

Like Fitzgerald I had no idea who Iron Curtis was but he played some electrifying dance music, he covered many ranges, minimal techno, house, ambient stuff and some bass heavy grooves to keep us on our toes, to tell you the truth though I was ready to flop down any minute and Kevin wasn’t too far behind me, but we managed to stay till the last note and then headed for the soft seats at My House.

http://www.residentadvisor.net/dj/ironcurtis

We just sat there soaking up the sounds, Pump up the Volume by M.A.R.R.S was playing and a suitable crowd going loopy.  It seemed nice to end the night again at the Earth Spirit fire, even a more chiller out space than the chill spaces we just come from.  I was talking to Jeff O’ Riordan about his mandala installation and how I wanted to inteview him about his involvement with Body & Soul and other festivals he was workin with, so we arranged an interview for Sunday.  This was another action packed day for the curious music journalist, myself and Kevin called it a day and hit the sack preparing for day 3.

Sunday 23rd June

Sunday morning or afternoon I can’t remember, but I remember playing Jon Hopkins Boiler Room set from earlier in June for about the twenty-fifth time along with Nicolas Jaar’s Sonar festival set from last year, two of the most anticipated artists to see in my list.  I seeked out one of these black coffee espresso stalls for my caffeine fix and sat down to drink it at the main camp site with the lads, Taro, Sam & Matt with their girlfriends.  I entertained them with a few songs on the bodhran, Erin Go Bragh and I think Johnny Jump up among others.

Playing the bodhran and singing for the lads & lassies.

I met Kevin later and we took a stroll to the Earth Spirit area, finally I was there for the proper daylight so decided to take some pictures.  The one with the spiral I’m especially pleased with as I got a glimmer of the sunlight in the middle.

The Earth Spirit Area.

The Earth Spirit Area.

I also heard a session in the area, I picked out wood wind instruments and tin whistles, of course, I didnt have my bodhran at the time but there was already a bodhran player there, so I snuck up beside them and filmed a bit then I withdrew from the area slowly to take in a bit of the seating area and fire.

Armada or Pirate theme. I cannot remember.

The woods, glorious woods.

Natasha’s Kitchen

Ryan Vail – Midnight Circus  5.30 pm – 6.30 pm

Ryan Vail had a pleasant sound, they are from Northern Ireland, Derry I think, the duo of Ryan Vail DJ / Producer & Katie Cosgrove on flutes and guitars.  Their sound could be described as a pastoral ambient sound scape held together by a selection of electronic synths and break beats.  It was an unusual combination but it worked, pastoral ambient techno music for the future.  Hoping to catch this group again.

http://www.ryanvail.com/

Went to the Fusion tent for a bite to eat, I wanted to set myself up proper before the Congo’s set on the B&S main stage.  I went for the Japanese vegetable curry which was absolutely gorgeous, not too hot and spicy but not too weak either.

Fish Go Deep featuring Tracey K – Midnght Circus   6.30 pm – 9pm

Cork based DJs Fish Go Deep had a nice buzz going in the circus tent, I caught a bit with Kevin, they were playing some pounding house music and they had a fine crowd keeping up with them too.  I wanted to catch the start of the Congo’s set, so Kevin remained with another buddy to watch the end of the Fish Go Deep set.

http://www.fishgodeep.com/

The Congo’s – B&S Stage  8.15 pm – 9.15 pm

When I came down to the main stage some of the members of the Congo’s were sound checking and already there was a barmy army of Irish fans gathering in their finest Rastafari colours at the front of the stage.  This was my second time seeing the Congo’s, the first time was at Electric Picnic where they were supposed to do an hour set, but for delays or whatever they only managed to play a 25 minute set.

When the set kicked off it was just the instrumental players, the cool Jamaican hatted guitarist, the younger bassist, drummer and keyboard player.  The idea was that they warm up with the sound, they were joined by four vocalists of varying ages later, elder statesmen from the mid 1970s Jamaican music scene.  Grey beards and grey dreadlocks, having seen Max Romeo and Lee Scratch Perry last year, all of the older reggae generation seem to be making a popular comeback and they all still have voices like velvet.

I only have the Congo’s Fisherman EP in my collection, so a lot of the material covered I had no idea off.  What I do know was that the Congo’s were vastly entertaining with a very tight band backing.  Sometimes there was false starts to their tracks but this was done like a comedy routine, signified by the main lead singer waving his arm in a Pete Townsend motion, this was the signal for the drummer to clash the drums and to restart the beat, this was evident in their final track Fisherman.  What can I say about the Congo’s though, they put on a terrific show, their voices are still in glorious form despite their age and they were very funny and their music remains timeless.  My only qualm was that they missed out in the Congoman Chant song which they ran through briefly in the sound check beforehand.

https://myspace.com/congoscongos

I took a trip back to the woods to relax at the Earth Spirit area and met Jeff O Riordan there, seeing that the daylight was fading slightly I decided to do the interview with Jeff because if I didn’t do it now I was never going to do it otherwise.  The film is a little dark but Youtube helped make it more visible.

He explained that he and his collective liked to put their love for geometry into their chill out area.  I posed the question to him about the Body & Soul festival, asking him what it was like to be working as part of this cool little festival.   He explained that there was a lot of people involved, he put it simply that when you set up the installation its nice to say hello to your neighbour.  That the atmosphere was so much better as everyone got on well with each other and often greeting each other with, “Hey whats the craic?”  He added that there was a lot of effort put in that the regular festival punter does not see.  Jeff was explaining that he was still working on the mandala designs whilst the festival was filling up on Friday so that people could see that it was still an on going process.

I asked him if he was working at other festivals for the summer.  Jeff: “Knockanstockan, that’s basically part of the planning at the start, we are going to do a nice chill out spot in the main camp site area with live interesting alternative musics, it will go on to about 1.30 am and after that it will become a chill out spot and a place to relax.  We will have some people over from England doing live AV sets, like DJ and live visuals at the same time.”

Jeff explained that the most important aspect of their mandala installation was, “The whole point about the mandala, the stones on the table is that nothing is permanent.” He explained that during the duration of the festival some of the installations will eventually get damaged, so his point was that they didn’t really care if people came and messed up their work as the point was that it wasn’t supposed to be permanent anyway.”

He talked about some of the reactions from people to their installation. “The reactions from some people are so different, some people go up and touch it and feel like they got zapped by electricity, some people walk up to it and say that’s a Satan symbol, whats that all about, some people just want to jump on it like it was a trampoline.  He added lastly that some guy walking by the installation the previous day shouted over to him, “If you are jumping up and down on your bed eating pizza you are living the American dream.”

https://plus.google.com/photos/116055169065025667393/albums?banner=pwa

The Lucent Dossier Experience – Midnight Circus   11.15 – 11.45pm

I had lost Kevin for the moment so I decided to make for the big circus tent to get a good spot near the front of the stage for the Jon Hopkins set, in the process I managed to catch one of the half hour sets from the amazing circus art collective the Lucent Dossier Experience.  What a show it was, they are sorely missed from the Picnic since they split a few years ago.  There was death-defying gymnastics, tight rope walking and one of the most unbelievable displays of fire-breathing and juggling I have ever seen.  They are quite different from a normal circus troupe, they are camp, punky, burlesque, very hedonistic in art and costume and very rock and roll to say the least.  Well lets just say there was liberal doses of edgy dubstep in their soundtrack, this is an act not to be missed.

http://www.lucentdossier.com/

Jon Hopkins – Midnight Circus    11.45 pm – 1 am

How do you describe the Jon Hopkins sound, you see there is a difference between DJing and being a producer, if you are a dance producer it means you have served your time as a DJ and you can put your hand at any type of dance music.  Multi-tasking so to speak, the likes of Aphex Twin, Boards of Canada, Seth Troxler, Amon Tobin or Modeselektor can drop from house or techno straight into drum n bass, dubstep or to the softest shimmering ambient sound effortlessly,  Jon Hopkins comes from this same school of thought, he is making proper emotional new dance music with the crisp understanding of rhythm and glitch.

From the opening notes into Breathe This Air from his new album Immunity there was a collective sigh of relief in the audience, here was the moment that we have all listened to on that Boiler Room set and having it transferred to the majesty of the Midnight Circus sound system, bombastic and delicious.  Hopkins is a glitchtronic genius, simple sounds such as the opening of a lock, opening a safe door, changing the clutch in the car or even the sound your waterproofs make when you are walking.  These sounds (or the sounds I am imagining anyway) were built up layer upon layer to make cool clanky rhythms.  During the start of Collider you can hear this at first, what sounds like African rhythms using marakas.  The clanky sound made me imagine a bunch of fellahs with a large bag of spanners each, all shaking them in precise time to the sound.  Of course, when the bass boom kicks in it becomes a different animal, Hopkins builds up the reverberations and backward loops into a lovely chord sequence that always effortlessly bounces right back onto the main bass groove.  And thats what dance music should be or should do, to be mysterious, unpredictable, surprising and ecstatic.

When he dropped Open Eye Signal it was like one collective volt of electricity going through the audience.  That motor car synth changed the face of music since ZZ Top’s Eliminator came out in 1983 and Hopkins has turned this sound into a bass propellent for this track, the way he works through these three bass notes by the time he is about to hit the lowest note he twists the sound to make it sound more organic.   I can imagine this track cropping up on the soundtrack of BBC’s Top Gear sometime.

That is also the thing with Hopkins, he does use a lot of technology but it by no means cold, he uses very warm ambient synths and piano textures to his music that reminds me of the Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works Vol 1 and Brian Eno & Harold Budd.  Take the opener Breathe This Air, the first part builds up frenetically and suddenly it changes to a treated tinkly piano until it builds up subtly to storm force again.  Another thing about Hopkins was that he was no slouch bag sitting behind his laptop pressing play and talking to his mates on Facebook, he acted out to his glitches, at sound effects he would jump up and you could really tell that he enjoyed the performance looking like he was a busy robot jumping about the place.

I could spend all night talking about this gig, I will leave it short and tasteful, check this guy out if you get the chance, maybe he will do a few more festivals for the summer.

http://www.jonhopkins.co.uk/

Kevin had located me at the Hopkins gig thanks to my teapot hat, so we made a beeline for the B&S stage to catch the last hour of Nicolas Jaar.

Nicolas Jaar – B&S Stage    1 am – 2 am

This was my second time catching him, he was with a guitarist and saxophonist last year at Liss Ard festival and he was doing much slower and ambient stuff.  This time it was just himself and the beats were more uptempo, there was a massive crowd gathered and everyone seemed to be pulsing to the sound and, man, the sound system had a killer bass.  Considering that we had just come from Hopkins, Jaar delivered in spades and kept the momentum going strong.  Jaar still had some nice ambient phases in the set, but he was very tight on the drops, the bass absolutely pummeling us.

http://www.nicolasjaar.net/

After that we went to the circus tent to watch a bit of the Michael Mayer set, but I was very much pummelled by then and so was Kevin.  It would have been hard to top Hopkins or Jaars sets, but Mayer and Kompakt Cologne had a determined crowd wanting to keep the party going and they were delivering high octane dance music.  I think we stayed till the end, but I must have looked like a zombie by that stage, I had a sore back anyway from all the standing and dancing.

http://www.kompakt.fm/artists/michael_mayer

Alas the night was drawing near to an end, myself and Kevin headed up to the favourite, My House, I kind of wished I had taken a photo of the area.  Anyway, the sofa chairs were a little wet tonight but I was past caring and flopped down on one content to watch the world go by me whilst nodding my head to the cool sounds.  It was on from there then that the last pit stop before bed was to go to the Earth Spirit campfire area to have some banter.  I cant remember any conversations that transpired after that but I do remember Kevin saying that we should hit the sack and that was about ten minutes to 4 am, duly we did and that was the end of Body & Soul festival 2013.

Monday 24th June

We woke up and I headed to the volunteers office while Kevin went to the production office to get our bonds back, but unfortunately we were going to have to wait a week or two before we got them.  Thankfully there was a coffee stall nearby as all the ones near crew camp and in the woods had their generators shut down.  Once we were sorted with the caffeine fix it was offsky out of Ballinlough for another year.

Roll on 2014.

If there is someone good at windows movie maker maybe they can download the video below and possibly add a segment of Jon Hopkins Collider, I think that would be a fitting way to end the B&S 2013 review.