Great Escape 09
Great
Escape Festival 2009 PREVIEW
May 14th – 15th – 16th
Looking at the current line-up for this year’s Great Escape Festival is almost like looking at my own fantasy festival roster (sadly I don’t think Marvin Gaye or Jeff Buckley are available for bookings anymore).
Top of my must see list is Ben Kweller, the curly haired American has slowly and steadily been building up an impressive catalogue of songs beginning with his quirky indie-pop debut record ‘Sha Sha’ with the gorgeous song ‘In Other Words’ and slacker-anthem ‘Wasted & Ready’ being particular standouts, through his alt-country new record ‘Changing Horses’; Kweller has ear-marked himself as a considerable talent.
Elsewhere there’s the almighty Holy Fuck, praised by many including Radiohead, they are an act truly worthy of the hype, creating Earth-shaking instrumental cacophonies that sound like insanely well-produced, remixes but are, in fact, played entirely live. Songs such as ‘Casio Bossa Nova’ and ‘Lovely Allan’ are gloriously exuberant and guaranteed to prompt moshing, dancing and general grinning.
There’s meaty rock in the form of Kasabian and Future of the Left, the latter of which delivered a blistering set at last year’s Swn Festival in Cardiff, which saw me pogoing incessantly to pretty much every song they played. Their debut album ‘Curses’ is a classic of Welsh rawk and the follow-up should be on its way soon.
Some great folk acts can be found in the shape of Woodpigeon, who were a definite highlight when I first heard them at End of the Road in 2008, and are gathering quite a reputation for themselves of late. Meanwhile there’s Liam Finn whose recent album ‘I’ll Be Lightening’ saw the singer-songwriter coming on in leaps and bounds. Also highly recommended is Lightspeed Champion, the baroque new guise of ex-Test Icicles member Devonte Hynes, his debut album ‘Falling Off The Lavender Bridge’ prompted the NME to name Hynes the 20th ‘coolest person in rock’.
There’s also shouty, 80s-teen-movie punk-pop from Fight Like Apes (brilliant at Green Man last summer), experimental electro from The Mae Shi, avant-garde surreal pop brilliance from New Zealand’s Conan Mockasin (check out this live session I recorded with him in the back of a transit van: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3AreTg0jXg ), and I could also harp on about The Veils, Metronomy, Casiokids, The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, British Sea Power and Bell X1 but I don’t want to spoil it all for you… there’s so much crammed into this 3 day, 300 band, 34 venue event that part of the fun is discovering some amazing new acts for yourself! I’m already having dilemmas about who to see.
The festival begins on the 14th of May, and all the info you need can be discovered online at: http://www.escapegreat.com
See you there!
Tags: Beachdownwriter
