Post by stesync on Sept 2, 2007 21:27:34 GMT
V Festival Weston Park Staffordshire
Saturday 18th August 2007
Featuring - The Killers, The Manic Street Preachers, James, McFly, The Cribs, Mutya Buena, Passenger, and The Dodgems
Review & Pics by Steve Sync
Spur of the moment thing this year, only thought about coming to V a couple of weeks before. Fairziff also decided to show a very rare appearance, so we looked into buying Saturday day tickets on eBay which were going for around £100 - £150 each. Luckily, Fairziff managed to buy face value tickets from a well known online ticket company which were selling returns a couple of days before the event so we were sorted. I’d been checking the weather reports for Saturday all week to see if the bad weather was going to miss Stafford, but unfortunately it was in for the weekend across the whole country.
Khagooled up, Fairziff and myself set off on our journey and this time, I decided to travel on the more scenic A5 route, ignoring my new sat-navs advice (pic above). The weather on the journey to V got worse and worse as we drove, though if you’ve got the right kit, you’ve nothing to worry about!
Once there, we collected the tickets and entered the arena. As it was just past midday, there weren’t a lot of people around so we were able to stroll around the arena to get our bearings. As we were walking over to the Bacardi tent to meet the Fatman Clan (don’t worry, he wasn’t on Bacardi) my walking trajectory was intercepted by a tall, well dressed blonde bird (fanny magnet!) as we did that embarrassing “You go first, no you go first” dance, I noticed she looked very familiar. As she walked away, I asked Fairziff if he recognised her and he confirmed my thoughts that it was in fact Courtney Love! There’s one for Cruds Namedropping claim to fame list – Danced in a field with Courtney Love.
It was raining hard and Fairziff had come prepared with a (non laminated) print out band/time schedule so once we’d ordered breakfast (Carling), we decided which band to go and see first based purely on their name as we‘d never heard of any of the early starters (playing in a tent was also a bonus for us). The Dodgems were chosen as we reckoned that sounded like a punk/ska type band name. We arrived half way through their set, and they certainly weren’t punk/ska in fact the song they were playing when we arrived was a slow ballad and I thought "Oh Fuck!, what am I doing here" but things got better and they were really well received by the good sized audience they'd attracted. The Dodgems hail from Sheffield and are fronted by the brothers Goodwin (guitar/vocals and organ) again, I know nothing about this band but they appear to be one of the many indie pop acts doing the rounds at the moment hoping to be the next Arctic’s or Editors; good luck!
Passenger are a band from Brighton fronted by Mike Rosenberg (vocals and rhythm guitar). We were tipped off to go see them by Fatman as he’d heard good reports about them in the music press. I’m out of touch on what ‘The Kids’ like today, but bands like this really get on my tits! Two (count them) fucking acoustic guitars, musicians who put that pained expression on their faces when they’re wanking their instruments, and thoughtful lyrics about the fucking Community Centre! Aaaahhhhrrrr, in fact it was when they played their encore ‘Community Centre’ that we noticed how fucking high pitched this guys voice was, it was kind of like Joe Pasquale on helium! But again, they had a decent size audience appreciating them so it must be me! Fairziff on the other hand agreed they had a severe image problem but thought their last song was fantastic.
We could see and hear the Goo Goo Dolls on the main stage in the distance but it’s amazing how your musical taste can change depending on weather conditions. This was our excuse for witnessing Mutya Buena formerly of The Sugababes inside the JJB Puma Arena (I know, have a fucking dig if you like, but we were dry!) Even though Mutyas style of music and her singing couldn’t be further away from my musical tastes, you can’t take away the fact that this girl can sing. After seeing her it’s obvious that she clearly was the voice of the Sugababes. Highlights (ahem) included her old bands hit single ‘Ugly’ and also a cover version of The Kooks ‘Naive’.
It was now time for lunch (Carling & Chips) and I could hear the boring drones of James Morrison coming from the main stage which was upsetting my digestion so we moved to the C4 stage just in time for The Cribs. Having seen The Cribs a month earlier playing at Godiva Festival in Coventry and downloading their album, I’ve become quite fond of a few of their songs. A huge crowd turned out to see the Wakefield trio who kicked off with 'Our Bovine Public' which instantly got the crowd going. Other favourites were 'Men's Needs', ‘Moving Pictures’ and 'Hey Scenesters'. At the end of their set, Ryan (vocals/guitar) and Gary (vocals/bass) crossed their guitars and had a sort of 10 string noise duel, Ryan then ripped off his t-shirt and dived into the crowd.
Given a choice between K T Tunstall in the rain (yawn), and teeny bopper chart twats McFly in a tent, we went for the latter, at least we’d subconsciously know half their set! They came on stage and the whole packed out JJB Puma Arena went bananas. These little guys looked rather jaded at first in front of their first full scale ‘adult’ festival audience, but they soon snapped out of it as soon as they realised they had the full respect of all watching (even us!). They acrobatically leaped and jumped their way through a half hour set of No1s including ‘Don‘t Stop Me Now‘ ‘All About You‘ and ended with ‘5 Colours In Her Hair’. They gave a very entertaining/cocky performance which I have to give them credit for, although I would still turn the TV over if they came on.
Shocked and confused that we’d seen both Mutya and McFly in one day, we headed back to the C4 stage to find Fatman and beer. Mark Ronson was coming to a climax ending with the great Smiths cover ‘Stop Me’. We stuck around for Guillemots to start, but buggered off to look around the festival stalls when we didn’t like the sound of them. As we walked back towards the main stage, The Fratellis were well under way but we got there just in time for ‘Chelsea Dagger’ which gave the crowds something to chant along with.
James were up next and as we stuffed noodles into our faces, they started with ‘Born Of Frustration’ which is the only chart song to my knowledge that ever used the “Woh Woh Woh Woh” Red Indian mouth slapping vocal. I was never a huge James fan when they were in their heyday but it was good to hear old songs like ‘Laid’ ‘Come Home’ and ‘Sit Down’. Singer Tim Booth made a special dedication to the late Factory Records legend Tony Wilson during new track 'Not So Strong'. The front man told the audience: "Tony Wilson died last week and he had his service in Manchester today. He gave us our first single. He was an amazing man. Manchester won't be the same without him." This got a well deserved ovation from the crowd.
We made our way back to the C4 stage to make sure we got a good viewing position for The Manics, though Lily Allen was still on and just started her ‘Smile’ song. At the end of the song she turned from the high pitched girly warble vocal to gutter language more accustomed to her father saying “Whoever just threw that fuckin beer at me, I’ll fuckin do you in when I see you, you cunt! I’ll fuckin murder you, you little shit” She was then apparently asked by organisers to finish her set a song early as she was running over time, she replied “Fuck off, I’m doing the last song, you can’t tell me what to do, you want The Manic Street Preachers to come on and do an hour of boring shit!” She really was making her mark and played ‘Alfie’ a song about her little brother “The little shit”.
Under normal circumstances, I would have liked to have seen Kasabian live for the first time even though I only like a select few of their songs. Unfortunately for Kasabian, they clashed with The Manic Street Preachers who I was a huge fan of and followed from their start in 1991. Having not seen them for almost 10 years they were a must see for myself and Fairziff so we got closer to the stage and waited eagerly for their appearance. They came on stage and blasted straight into ‘Australia’. It was great to see them playing live again, it was a real hairs on the back of your neck experience to hear songs like 'From Despair To Where', new song 'You're Love Alone Is Not Enough', and old classics like 'Motorcycle Emptiness', and 'Everything Must Go'. Their sound is much fuller live now with the addition of rhythm guitarist Wayne who was celebrating his 19th birthday today. James started to sing Happy Birthday when he announced this before playing the opening riff to 'Motown Junk'. The band also ironically played ‘Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head’ whilst it pissed it down and James Dean declared “We’re the weathermen of rock”. They didn’t play any songs off my favourite album ‘The Holy Bible’ although they still kept us satisfied with tracks like 'La Tristesse Durera' and 'You Stole The Sun From My Heart'. Before the band encored, James introduced Nicky Wire saying “Tonight, Breaking the record for wearing the shortest skirt he’s ever fucking worn”. They ended with as ever 'You Love Us' and 'A Design For Life' which was the icing on this very wet cake.
As headline bands go, they don’t get much bigger than The Killers these days. I’d wanted to see them live ever since Andy Fatman introduced me to their album ‘Hot Fuss’ back in early 2004 a year before their ‘Somebody Told Me’ single became a hit. After this they did get very big very quickly due to the quality of the songs and the style of sound (Indie/Alternative/Retro). They seem to be considered too big to be cool these days, though I disagree and think they are still releasing quality material which is always going to be compared and reflected against their earlier material, but still holds it's own. We got as close to the stage as possible but still viewed further away than any other band we’d seen today due to the huge volume of people. I expected great things from them live after watching their live performance’s at Glastonbury and The Brit Awards on TV earlier this year. They capture their audience and demand your full attention with their quality and sheer musicianship. Some of the guitar work is so complex and always note perfect, superb drumming, and a front man who can command the stage visually without missing a note. Set list tonight was - 'Sam's Town' 'Enterlude' 'When You Were Young' 'Bones' 'Somebody Told Me' 'Smile Like You Mean It' 'Uncle Jonny' 'Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine' 'The River Is Wild' 'Read My Mind' 'On Top' 'Bling (Confessions Of A King)' 'Mr Brightside' 'My List' 'Too Good To Be True'. They also paid tribute to Tony Wilson by playing a Joy Division cover 'Shadowplay' before encoring with 'For Reasons Unknown' and 'All These Things That I've Done' which had everyone in the arena singing “I’ve got soul but I’m not a soldier”. They exceeded my expectations and I was well pleased I’d finally got to see them. I hear they’re going into hiding now to write their 3rd album so this was the last we’ll see of them for a while.
Saturday 18th August 2007
Featuring - The Killers, The Manic Street Preachers, James, McFly, The Cribs, Mutya Buena, Passenger, and The Dodgems
Review & Pics by Steve Sync
Spur of the moment thing this year, only thought about coming to V a couple of weeks before. Fairziff also decided to show a very rare appearance, so we looked into buying Saturday day tickets on eBay which were going for around £100 - £150 each. Luckily, Fairziff managed to buy face value tickets from a well known online ticket company which were selling returns a couple of days before the event so we were sorted. I’d been checking the weather reports for Saturday all week to see if the bad weather was going to miss Stafford, but unfortunately it was in for the weekend across the whole country.
Khagooled up, Fairziff and myself set off on our journey and this time, I decided to travel on the more scenic A5 route, ignoring my new sat-navs advice (pic above). The weather on the journey to V got worse and worse as we drove, though if you’ve got the right kit, you’ve nothing to worry about!
Once there, we collected the tickets and entered the arena. As it was just past midday, there weren’t a lot of people around so we were able to stroll around the arena to get our bearings. As we were walking over to the Bacardi tent to meet the Fatman Clan (don’t worry, he wasn’t on Bacardi) my walking trajectory was intercepted by a tall, well dressed blonde bird (fanny magnet!) as we did that embarrassing “You go first, no you go first” dance, I noticed she looked very familiar. As she walked away, I asked Fairziff if he recognised her and he confirmed my thoughts that it was in fact Courtney Love! There’s one for Cruds Namedropping claim to fame list – Danced in a field with Courtney Love.
It was raining hard and Fairziff had come prepared with a (non laminated) print out band/time schedule so once we’d ordered breakfast (Carling), we decided which band to go and see first based purely on their name as we‘d never heard of any of the early starters (playing in a tent was also a bonus for us). The Dodgems were chosen as we reckoned that sounded like a punk/ska type band name. We arrived half way through their set, and they certainly weren’t punk/ska in fact the song they were playing when we arrived was a slow ballad and I thought "Oh Fuck!, what am I doing here" but things got better and they were really well received by the good sized audience they'd attracted. The Dodgems hail from Sheffield and are fronted by the brothers Goodwin (guitar/vocals and organ) again, I know nothing about this band but they appear to be one of the many indie pop acts doing the rounds at the moment hoping to be the next Arctic’s or Editors; good luck!
Passenger are a band from Brighton fronted by Mike Rosenberg (vocals and rhythm guitar). We were tipped off to go see them by Fatman as he’d heard good reports about them in the music press. I’m out of touch on what ‘The Kids’ like today, but bands like this really get on my tits! Two (count them) fucking acoustic guitars, musicians who put that pained expression on their faces when they’re wanking their instruments, and thoughtful lyrics about the fucking Community Centre! Aaaahhhhrrrr, in fact it was when they played their encore ‘Community Centre’ that we noticed how fucking high pitched this guys voice was, it was kind of like Joe Pasquale on helium! But again, they had a decent size audience appreciating them so it must be me! Fairziff on the other hand agreed they had a severe image problem but thought their last song was fantastic.
We could see and hear the Goo Goo Dolls on the main stage in the distance but it’s amazing how your musical taste can change depending on weather conditions. This was our excuse for witnessing Mutya Buena formerly of The Sugababes inside the JJB Puma Arena (I know, have a fucking dig if you like, but we were dry!) Even though Mutyas style of music and her singing couldn’t be further away from my musical tastes, you can’t take away the fact that this girl can sing. After seeing her it’s obvious that she clearly was the voice of the Sugababes. Highlights (ahem) included her old bands hit single ‘Ugly’ and also a cover version of The Kooks ‘Naive’.
It was now time for lunch (Carling & Chips) and I could hear the boring drones of James Morrison coming from the main stage which was upsetting my digestion so we moved to the C4 stage just in time for The Cribs. Having seen The Cribs a month earlier playing at Godiva Festival in Coventry and downloading their album, I’ve become quite fond of a few of their songs. A huge crowd turned out to see the Wakefield trio who kicked off with 'Our Bovine Public' which instantly got the crowd going. Other favourites were 'Men's Needs', ‘Moving Pictures’ and 'Hey Scenesters'. At the end of their set, Ryan (vocals/guitar) and Gary (vocals/bass) crossed their guitars and had a sort of 10 string noise duel, Ryan then ripped off his t-shirt and dived into the crowd.
Given a choice between K T Tunstall in the rain (yawn), and teeny bopper chart twats McFly in a tent, we went for the latter, at least we’d subconsciously know half their set! They came on stage and the whole packed out JJB Puma Arena went bananas. These little guys looked rather jaded at first in front of their first full scale ‘adult’ festival audience, but they soon snapped out of it as soon as they realised they had the full respect of all watching (even us!). They acrobatically leaped and jumped their way through a half hour set of No1s including ‘Don‘t Stop Me Now‘ ‘All About You‘ and ended with ‘5 Colours In Her Hair’. They gave a very entertaining/cocky performance which I have to give them credit for, although I would still turn the TV over if they came on.
Shocked and confused that we’d seen both Mutya and McFly in one day, we headed back to the C4 stage to find Fatman and beer. Mark Ronson was coming to a climax ending with the great Smiths cover ‘Stop Me’. We stuck around for Guillemots to start, but buggered off to look around the festival stalls when we didn’t like the sound of them. As we walked back towards the main stage, The Fratellis were well under way but we got there just in time for ‘Chelsea Dagger’ which gave the crowds something to chant along with.
James were up next and as we stuffed noodles into our faces, they started with ‘Born Of Frustration’ which is the only chart song to my knowledge that ever used the “Woh Woh Woh Woh” Red Indian mouth slapping vocal. I was never a huge James fan when they were in their heyday but it was good to hear old songs like ‘Laid’ ‘Come Home’ and ‘Sit Down’. Singer Tim Booth made a special dedication to the late Factory Records legend Tony Wilson during new track 'Not So Strong'. The front man told the audience: "Tony Wilson died last week and he had his service in Manchester today. He gave us our first single. He was an amazing man. Manchester won't be the same without him." This got a well deserved ovation from the crowd.
We made our way back to the C4 stage to make sure we got a good viewing position for The Manics, though Lily Allen was still on and just started her ‘Smile’ song. At the end of the song she turned from the high pitched girly warble vocal to gutter language more accustomed to her father saying “Whoever just threw that fuckin beer at me, I’ll fuckin do you in when I see you, you cunt! I’ll fuckin murder you, you little shit” She was then apparently asked by organisers to finish her set a song early as she was running over time, she replied “Fuck off, I’m doing the last song, you can’t tell me what to do, you want The Manic Street Preachers to come on and do an hour of boring shit!” She really was making her mark and played ‘Alfie’ a song about her little brother “The little shit”.
Under normal circumstances, I would have liked to have seen Kasabian live for the first time even though I only like a select few of their songs. Unfortunately for Kasabian, they clashed with The Manic Street Preachers who I was a huge fan of and followed from their start in 1991. Having not seen them for almost 10 years they were a must see for myself and Fairziff so we got closer to the stage and waited eagerly for their appearance. They came on stage and blasted straight into ‘Australia’. It was great to see them playing live again, it was a real hairs on the back of your neck experience to hear songs like 'From Despair To Where', new song 'You're Love Alone Is Not Enough', and old classics like 'Motorcycle Emptiness', and 'Everything Must Go'. Their sound is much fuller live now with the addition of rhythm guitarist Wayne who was celebrating his 19th birthday today. James started to sing Happy Birthday when he announced this before playing the opening riff to 'Motown Junk'. The band also ironically played ‘Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head’ whilst it pissed it down and James Dean declared “We’re the weathermen of rock”. They didn’t play any songs off my favourite album ‘The Holy Bible’ although they still kept us satisfied with tracks like 'La Tristesse Durera' and 'You Stole The Sun From My Heart'. Before the band encored, James introduced Nicky Wire saying “Tonight, Breaking the record for wearing the shortest skirt he’s ever fucking worn”. They ended with as ever 'You Love Us' and 'A Design For Life' which was the icing on this very wet cake.
As headline bands go, they don’t get much bigger than The Killers these days. I’d wanted to see them live ever since Andy Fatman introduced me to their album ‘Hot Fuss’ back in early 2004 a year before their ‘Somebody Told Me’ single became a hit. After this they did get very big very quickly due to the quality of the songs and the style of sound (Indie/Alternative/Retro). They seem to be considered too big to be cool these days, though I disagree and think they are still releasing quality material which is always going to be compared and reflected against their earlier material, but still holds it's own. We got as close to the stage as possible but still viewed further away than any other band we’d seen today due to the huge volume of people. I expected great things from them live after watching their live performance’s at Glastonbury and The Brit Awards on TV earlier this year. They capture their audience and demand your full attention with their quality and sheer musicianship. Some of the guitar work is so complex and always note perfect, superb drumming, and a front man who can command the stage visually without missing a note. Set list tonight was - 'Sam's Town' 'Enterlude' 'When You Were Young' 'Bones' 'Somebody Told Me' 'Smile Like You Mean It' 'Uncle Jonny' 'Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine' 'The River Is Wild' 'Read My Mind' 'On Top' 'Bling (Confessions Of A King)' 'Mr Brightside' 'My List' 'Too Good To Be True'. They also paid tribute to Tony Wilson by playing a Joy Division cover 'Shadowplay' before encoring with 'For Reasons Unknown' and 'All These Things That I've Done' which had everyone in the arena singing “I’ve got soul but I’m not a soldier”. They exceeded my expectations and I was well pleased I’d finally got to see them. I hear they’re going into hiding now to write their 3rd album so this was the last we’ll see of them for a while.