Live
< Summer Sundae at De Montfort Hall, Leicester
words by Reef Younis
Screaming toddlers scamper between comatose mounds of twentysomethings, sun-bathing parents cast a half-baked eye to track their careering kids - the other firmly planted on their pint of hearty real ale - while hordes of neon painted teens triumphantly share a solitary can of Fosters. Despite being at the arse end of British summer (rain, sunshine, rain anyone?), Summer Sundae’s cute as a button setup caters for every demographic. Set just outside Leicester City Centre, it commandeers part of Victoria Park and permeates an almost sickening sense of family feel good. Not many festivals boast a 2,000 capacity indoor amphitheatre (De Montfort Hall), and while it might grate on the festival purists, having the option to nip into town to top up on the store of Red Stripe reminds that you were never exactly rural anyway.
It’s ‘Honey, I shrunk the festival’ with the camping areas barely a minute from the main stage, which in turn is a stones throw from the indoor stage, which…well you get the idea. It’s compact, wonderfully organised and is three days of unencumbered pleasantness, an atmosphere embraced by an equally amiable Friday night line up. With traffic conspiring to make us horribly late, we arrive to see The Coral push their ‘acoustic set’ tag to its un-amplified limit before being submissively drawn to the Howling Bells and Juanita Stein’s mesmerising, sultry siren call. Not as aesthetically alluring, Gaz Coombes and co. throw us back to a time of youthful, carefree abandon, shifting through a Supergrass set bubbling with hits that brings back a heady sense of nostalgia that booms out across the festival.
With a curt 11pm curfew, we trawl through the handful of stalls and vendors en route to the campsite where it’s quiet…too quiet. Still, a bellyful of cider, and numerous bouts of inter-tent wrestling later, we succumb to a content, albeit aching, drunken slumber.
Surfacing in the PM, we brave the battering wind and downpour just long enough to scuttle to the sturdier shelter of the indoor stage where Zombie Zombie are doing their best to wake the dead. Surrounded by gear that’d boggle Steven Hawking, Etienne Jaumet’s elaborate fiddles with his boys toys are usurped by CosmicNeman in both name and performance; the restless drummer’s incessant yelping, impromptu maraca dances and whip-cracking drumbeats, a constant source of entertainment in the day-glo decorated Zombie Zombie cave. Despite the odd drawn out over-indulgence we’re grateful to escape the ZZ wrath, stumbling out with our brains just about intact.
A considerable hiatus later, and we’re back at the indoor stage for Whitest Boy Alive’s amiable, laid back funk. Although they might look like Napoleon Dynamite’s extended family, they radiate a sense of blasé cool; front man Erlend Øye’s gentle, matter-of-fact vocal complimenting the crisp, clinical musical backdrop. Drawing on material from 2006’s ‘Dreams’, it’s not a set big on beats, but more on casual grooves that entice movement as opposed to demanding it.
Sunday sees a slight line-up re-shuffle in light of Mystery Jets unfortunate cancellation. Taking full advantage of a stage bump up, The Agnostic Mountain Gospel Choir bring a healthy dose of straight up blues and ragged gospel to an increasingly sunny Sundae. Led by the gruff, bearded, banjo-pluckin’ Judd Palmer, their easy going, rootsy lilt sits well with those sunning off the excess of the night before…only to have their sinuses cleared by Wild Beasts and their wildly precocious front man Hayden Thorpe. With a vocal that could stir the entire animal kingdom, it’s not wasted on human ears as they stampede through a set of ostentatious dramatics and quirky literacy that give the Summer Sundae a vibrant, operatic twist. José Gonzaléz numbs the tempo, lulling the crowd with an easy set of acoustic meanderings and the odd downbeat cover before Cold War Kids remind us what 2006 sounded like. Having failed to deliver on their early promise, it’s a set that only serves to highlight that they’re still four unkempt indie boys ploughing the same musical furrow. Nathan Willett’s striking vocal is still a strong feature, but now, as then, for all their interesting arrangements and vocal potency, they simply haven’t got the big numbers to pull it off. Their sets likeable and engaging but never threatens to exceed more than a casual interest.…
…something Of Montreal just don’t do. Ridiculous, adventurous and at times crazily incoherent, they foster a carnival atmosphere with luminous face paint, glitter ball gimps, duelling wolves, a fondness for shrubbery not seen since BSP, and numerous other elements of wacky, off-the-wall distractions that make up their psych-pop party. Warped imagery is beamed onto the back wall; glitter balloons and giant party poppers shower confetti on those brave enough to loiter at the front, while varying band members switch instruments for whatever purpose they deem fit. A world away from their vaguely regulated on record persona, the Of Montreal live show is a spectacle not to be missed. Explore.
A few real ales later and we settle into an enigmatic set from Joan As Police Woman. Buzzing with all the personality of you’d expect of a New Yorker, Joan Wasser is sassy, wired and ready to wail, instantly commanding respectful silence as she waxes lyrical about hats, jetlag and bad outfits. Her pet peeves aside, she effortlessly slides between piano and guitar in a mesmerizing 45 minutes of smouldering observation and introspection, complete with a cover of Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Fire’ so sexually charged, it’s almost explicit. It’s a cocoon of comfort we don’t really want to leave, but leave we must, because Simian Mobile Disco are poised to bring the noise.
Remember those cute little toddlers playfully weaving their way the human debris of the main stage? They should be in bed. They’re not. Mummy and daddy want to party, so the nice man in the sombrero will look after you for a little while. Where these kids were once lovingly cradled, they’re now trapped in backpacks tied to bins or being exchanged for glow sticks and garish face paint. So some of this isn’t true, but creative license aside, Simian Mobile Disco provide the thumping electro contrast the weekend craved; the grand finale for the deprived party people to create a ruckus. And that they do.
Wholeheartedly rejecting the opportunity to keep it vaguely family friendly, SMD crash their way through a set more in keeping with a gathering under an M6 crossover than a laser guided finale to a little festival. Utilising material from the ‘Sample and Hold’ version of their debut ‘Attack, Decay, Sustain’ it’s hard, rolling and heavy: the two James’s (Shaw and Ford) synchronically bob between blazing flashes of strobe, animatedly working like crazed professors. The slow burn of ‘Sleep Deprivation’ sounds the death knell as it’s thrust into a re-rubbed set incorporating ‘It’s the Beat’, a warped reworking of breakthrough track ‘Hustler’, and any number of quaking bass rhythms. In a perfect world, acts like SMD would have been the soundtrack to Summer Sundae’s AM hours, and licensing gripes aside, Summer Sundae’s a real treat.
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