Latitude 2010: Sunday

Want to know what this year's festival 'thing' might be? Bubbles. All over the place, they were. Especially kids with big wands that make huge bubbles.

Some however had different, more left field ideas of the perfect festival combination.



Having got out of the habit of needing to obsessively know who and what each new artist at a festival is in favour of letting chance rule early in the day, we don't know what we'd have assumed a local act called Cevanne would be like. Fair bet, though, that 'obtuse skank' would have been somewhere down the list.



Cevanne Horrocks-Hopayian, in fact, restlessly dancing across the stage to an equally jazz reggae melange made out of double bass, trumpet, cello, drums and Cevanne's own command of that typical ska instrument, the harp. There's a great sense of the theatrical in what she does, allied to lyrics both politicised and fantastical. It's always surprised us, being regular viewers of the skanking chaos whenever Summer Sundae puts ska on, that this sort of thing isn't more valued by more mainstream festivals, as it always slowly draws a keen crowd, especially when it's this energetic and undeniable.

Last year's surprise Mercury nominees Sweet Billy Pilgrim got an Obelisk slot and failed to do that much with it - you can see their influences - Peter Gabriel, Talk Talk - but what they make of it, lush art-folk, veered too near the superior Leisure Society's range. After a couple of songs Spectrals by the Lake seemed more appealing - not a band/person (given it's Louis Jones alone on record) we've been particularly keen on the recorded output of, but again divorced from their stretch for a lo-fi aura their adherence to rock'n'roll and surf with psychedelic tinges and maybe a little Teenage Fanclub lurking somewhere makes more sense when you can hear properly the work that's gone into putting it together underneath.

Downwind, especially from the comedy tent where Mark Watson drops in a Pavement lyric causing audible surprise around us in doing so (not really sure why, it's not as if people who've been on telly are banned from listening to alternative music), Mumford & Sons are being treated like homecoming heroes by the weekend's only real capacity crowd in the Obelisk arena, so much so there seems hardly anyone elsewhere on site. Especially not watching The Agitator, the current vehicle through which Derek Meins gets to shout at an audience. It's not as if he isn't putting the effort in either, hollering his injustice charged rhythmic stanzas all over the shop and across the syllables backed by ex-Maccabees sticksman Robert Dylan Thomas' athletically charging drums, occasionally launching into shaker action or essaying a crab dance across the stage. Frankly, we're not sure whether this is really good or what. We don't think anyone else is either.



At 4.30pm, we were faced with a horrible four-way clash. Dirty Projectors, Kristin Hersh, Jesca Hoop and Mitchell Museum, two supported well by us, one an unmissable live experience, one a great of her craft. Three of whom we've also seen before, which is why we started out in Sunrise with Jesca Hoop. With the current vogue for away-with-the-fairies female singers of all types we can see why some may shy away from her high register-testing skittishness, daffy between song chat and songs about nature and dreaming, but there's little twee about it in the end, quirky maybe but grounded by a certain leftfield inventiveness. Not nearly as inventive as Dirty Projectors, however, as we make our excuses halfway through to watch Dave Longstreth pluck all sorts of wheedling, labyrinthine Afro-guitar magic out of the air against gymnastic polyrhythms and an astonishingly tight band, not to mention the intricacy of the harmonies. Something so individually opaque does feel a little lost playing out on the big stage to an audience who seem mostly to be sitting or laying down, but then Stillness Is The Move kicks in and reaches for the sky as much as Amber Coffman's vocal does, and everywhere pockets of resistance are falling to some approximation of dancing.

Much more of that was going on at Yeasayer, probably the most packed the Word Arena got all weekend bar The XX on Saturday and possibly The National. Maybe it's down to their more dance-friendly direction, plenty of delay and retro synth suggesting a good founding in rave but with plenty, perhaps too much at times, going on beyond the surface. If things don't totally take off despite the size and willingness of the crowd until ONE turns up as the penultimate song, by the time they finish with Ambling Alp everyone esconsed in the centre seems to be singing along.

You'll not get anything like that with These New Puritans, but they too have advanced the sound they emerged with with the aid of special black boxes, just in a completely different direction. A three-strong woodwind section and dual drumkit provide the light and, more commonly, heavy shade while keyboards and effects fill in the sound effects, taiko drums, orchestral sections, sub-bass and general deep disquiet around the textures of dancehall tribal conflict Hidden suggests, Jack Barnett up front like a paranoid preacher. Of course an album that great in scope isn't going to be entirely replicated well on stage, especially not in the open air in the middle of a glade, but the ambition is highly appreciated. More sub-bass filled the Word Arena in the approximation of an MRI machine as sampled on Charlotte Gainsbourg's similarly titled album. Gainsbourg makes for a fine frontwoman, as logically she should, and is in good voice but seems much more comfortable reinterpreting her father's work than relaying her own.

Back to Sunrise, and to a full tent, and one really going for it at the front. The secret must have got out about The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart. You wouldn't think their scuzzy, lively, C86-y sound would suit these conditions as well as they do, but there's a warmth and inclusivity about it, not to mention two just as good new songs, that doesn't so much demand attention as suggest you join in the congregation admiring the strychnine laced floss of Kip and Peggy's harmonies and Kip's claim that as it's the first date of their European tour we're catching them at their happiest. (Hope not, they're popping up again in our presence this weekend) It's in this ordinary magic that they thrive.

You can tell a lot from a Robyn Hitchcock festival audience, even one as small as that he played to. Playing a short set in the literary tent at Robin Ince's invitation, and watched by Adam Buxton, it's worth keeping an eye on those baffled by the lyrics and gnomic between song announcements and those who converted long ago but still probably couldn't place all the set in his sprawling discography. Over on the Lake Stage headlining slot things are changing for Beth Jeans Houghton. No big wig, no unlikely headwear, just a brown beehive, leopard print top and skintight leggings as her only concessions to previous sartorial oddness. Also gone is an acoustic guitar, switching between electric and banjo for a set of songs that while for the most part are still indebted to folk and rolling country take some unlikely deviations. A rockabilly and proud cover of Elvis' Devil In Disguise, for one. For another, a sweary cowpunk song dedicated to the band's tour manager for fishing Beth's sunglasses out of a toilet after she'd managed to both drop them in and then urinate on them. When the bass player's daughter comes on to dance to I Will Return I Promise the audience is putty in their collective hands.



A little time spent with Jake tribute act The Fake Thackrays in the poetry tent, notable for one of the two singers neither attempting to replicate Thackray's baritone nor accent - that's how it works! - the festival for us finished not with headliners Vampire Weekend but back in The Word Arena with four men across the front of the stage, each dramatically spotlit like Samuel Beckett stage directing Kraftwerk. This was Grizzly Bear, for what they said would be their last European gig for quite some time, and it's not even the best lighting we've seen them in after the flashing lights in jars of their spring UK tour. Such concerns aside, they remain as special and spectral a live band as they were on that last occasion, the four part harmonies floating, towering and mysterious while always spot on, the interplay natural honed from a year on the road and however long playing together intuitively before that. Describing it somehow feels wrong, as if you were giving away trade secrets, when all it is is beautifully textured songs delivered to their optimum standard by four talented and inventive musicians, and sometimes music reviewing can only boil down to that. Furthermore, for a festival that had so much bad vibe around and which didn't start by pulling up any trees, it seemed it had come good over time.

More photos from the weekend, at least for the bits we could get within range of or when our camera was working, on Flickr

Latitude 2010: Saturday

You can't help thinking there's only one place where Robin Ince could introduce a guest with the words "he's a doctor..." and find the locale cheering. Dr Ben Goldacre, of course, running through the whole McKeith farrago, and an acceptable way to spend a few minutes in the knowledge that the queue to see Daniel Kitson in the theatre tent stretches back an impressive distance. Otherwise we're thrust into the audible space of more Lake Stage opening locals, The Cads, who have some interesting ideas momentarily making themselves known but are far too quick to stick to post-punk revival by rote, all hi-hat and standard indie disco rough guitar.

You could argue that in their own way School Of Seven Bells are not stretching much of a boundary - shoegaze isn't exactly out of favour at the moment - but listen deeper and there seems a greater depth to their approach that belies the moments when Benjamin Curtis lets loose with an airy, atmospheric tidal wave of guitar noise. We'd venture, actually, that this is if you want to be picky more of a utalitarian air of coldwave, the continental sub-genre that values loops and minimalist structures forming a Martin Hannett inspired all encompassing sound. What stops it from icing over is the sonic wash that makes early Lush or Slowdive come to mind allied to the spectral harmony of the Deheza twins, lead vocalist Alejandra forceful when needs be, more often making like spaced out synthpop with the synths played down.

John Grant on the Obelisk has a keen knot of followers who know the song titles down the front. You can see why given what has gone into his songs, and despite really performing to an audience that's half sat down trying not to tan too much despite the blazing hot circumstances (like that all weekend, actually, bar a couple of Saturday morning showers) he's doubtless won more followers with his wracked, lightly acerbic lyrics, heavy on emotional drag, capable of switching from wry to down in an instant, against Americana that just about steers clear of politeness.



The indiepop hordes here for Belle & Sebastian get to descend on the Lake Stage for a fine example of where we are with this sort of thing now. Standard Fare are very slowly picking up a following for the simple things they do well. They may be a tiny bit ramshackle and untutored, and they seem a trifle nervous - Emma Kupa forgets the lyrics at one point, claiming afterwards they were playing the song so well she thought she was listening to the CD - but there's something at their core that rings true, likeable and above all else smart, hook laden and with a melodic ease counteracting the conflicted love of the lyrics. They sneak in a new song, seemingly faster than most of their output and on first listen equally as good. Meanwhile on the big rig Frank Turner is completing his transformation into an AOR fist raiser of sloganeering and self-regard, a long and uncomfortable way from where he started. And he doesn't finish with The Ballad Of Me And My Friends.

Stephen Black, AKA Sweet Baboo, has a rather more downhome approach to translating his songs to the stage. The banter may be as long as the songs, but it's of that rare type where it's properly entertaining rather than making you want to point out how long his slot is. Similarly endearing are his countrified songs, hinting at all sorts of dark subject matter - he claims on playing his mother one song she replied "that's nice, is it about suicide?" - but with an odd and optimistic centre. Next, while James are on the Obelisk pretty much having to have the hits and songs people know forced out of them at least early on, over in the woods is Julie Campbell, the working name of Lonelady, all sharp haircut and artful disinterest. And all Manchester 1980 too, in an early Factory Records way, all nervy clipped guitar and punchily dark post-punk keyboards. Not something that'll leap out at the undiscerning, but worthy of further investigation. Meanwhile back at the sort of places where people willingly go The Maccabees are giving their album tracks a thorough run through with no great engagement, almost sapping what energy was there out of Wall Of Arms.



They might be playing every second festival this summer, or thereabouts, but given headline status on the Lake stage Frankie and the Heartstrings - was that really Paul Heaton introducing them? - are up for the challenge. Given the civic pride we feel having been told that we were the first people to write about them way back when, there's been a lot of disquiet about their rise among people we otherwise trust. Well, poo to them. It was as if an electric charge ran through Frankie Francis (someone, incidentally, we ended up standing near quite a few times during other bands' sets, although not nearly as often as we found Nestor from Sky Larkin in our vicinity), as he switched from effusive praise for his Wichita label bosses to careering across the stage and onto the monitors, a consummate showman in waiting in front of his band's Postcard Records-recalling proper indie.

But as we say, they're playing in our vicinity again this summer, and Archie Bronson Outfit aren't. At first notice, they seem to be wearing kaftans, or some sort of tribal smock. At second, the restricted sound levels really aren't doing justice to the kind of mania they can envelop an audience in. At third, it doesn't matter. It's still a full weapons grade attack that might flirt with the blues the band once lived alongside but, with an additional member adding noises over the top, prefers to cut into the air with serrated, occasionally disco dallying primordial propulsion in freakout clothing. That they offer a free T-shirt to the first person at the front willing to dance naked to Chunk is somehow fitting. That the one to take them up on it is a pasty bloke is unsurprising.

With just enough time to bump into Cardiff scene majordomo (and fellow The Line Of Best Fit contributor, and day's enthusiastic Lake Stage DJ) Jen Long and then watch Islet wrestle each other to the ground, so to our headliners, heroes, champions and returning conquerors - their first UK gig in six weeks short of four years - Belle and Sebastian. Having seen them at one of their last gigs we knew that Stuart Murdoch was far from the shy introvert painted as during the Sinister years, but his properly funny repartee and charismatic ease between songs strikes us as the sort of person who if not having lived up for this moment then has mastered how to talk to an audience as if it were a one to one, even if over-preparation meant Stars Of Track And Field had to be dropped from the set for time. Indeed, one of the set highlights came when Murdoch revealed a dream in which he'd laid a challenge down to Stevie Jackson, which resulted in this:



Fairly evident from the ending that they hadn't rehearsed that much.



With a full string section backing, it was as if they'd never been away, adding enough light and shade to the earlier songs to make them work on the big stage - Fox In The Snow, with lighters aloft at Stuart's suggestion (that's what that is above), and Judy And The Dream Of Horses were particular highlights, and at last we can say we've seen them do The State I Am In - and showcasing two new songs from a new album out some time in the autumn, both progressing from where they left off although where they fit in the band's great scheme of things remains open to question. What doesn't is their back catalogue strength and that of Murdoch as a writer, and the intricate inter-band knowledge and ability that gives the songs justice when headlining a festival of this size. Even Funny Little Frog sounded great. An excitable group of fans at the front are invited onstage to dance to The Boy With The Arab Strap. Down at ground level, everyone understood just how they felt.



All this, and the rare pleasure of seeing Ben Miller and David Cross duet on a version of Under Pressure. Who could resist?

Latitude 2010: Friday

There was an odd atmosphere around Latitude this year, their fifth and our second. Known as a Radio 4/Guardianista kind of experience with its arts side and green, family friendly credentials, this year seemed more populated than ever by the younger, Skins-ier demographic, maybe a sideline of the unspoken belief of Melvin Benn and the festival organisers that last year's event had been aimed at too old an audience and almost certainly encouraged by the ramping up of capacity without the main areas being made any bigger. There was of course the horrifying news of two reported rapes, but that only became apparent to most people on returning home. Added to which the Sunrise Arena was closed for some time after a central canopy support pole collapsed in high winds, the main stage timings on Saturday changed, bands were sometimes going on more than five minutes early and the route from arena to car park changed without any informative signs. In fairness, most people were still friendly and the music stages didn't seem that much more packed compared to last year, but whether culturally or economically something seemed to have slightly changed.

To be honest, we started our musical day at the Lake Stage with These Ghosts because we had them confused with Lonely Ghosts, the new project of one of Help She Can't Swim. These Ghosts, on the other hand, are locals who seem genuinely pleased and proud to be where they are more than lip service could ever cover. They brood in the style handed down from Buckley and Yorke through the first Muse album, filtered through second wave shoegaze and a mighty command of sonic theatrics aided by loops and synths. Aided by the handing out of DVDs of their new video, they get themselves a huge local hero response, which you can't deny even as you wonder if this sort of thing hasn't passed by in wider acceptance terms.



Rose Elinor Dougall isn't quite accorded the same fortune. Already saddled with an early 25 minute slot preceded by ten minutes' changeover, These Ghosts overrunning and the stage's desire to keep on schedule despite there being an impending half-hour gap means she gets cut off after five songs, most of which see her glorious voice often hidden in the mix and the keyboard that provides Another Version Of Pop Song's central hook inaudible. Not that her setlist helps her much, comprising only the first two singles and two songs so new they're not on next month's very fine debut album. The closer, seemingly chosen out of spite only after being given the signal, at least showcases her maven genre-splicing abilities, progressing from almost power ballad beginnings to stratospheric shoegaze over the course of seven minutes. Interesting times. Y Niwl suit the setting even if their guitarist wearing a beanie hat didn't; given a wide open space and a baking hot day their surf instrumentals, all Link Wray twang and Farfisa organ, put aside the suspicion that others do this sort of thing better, so right for this place it seems.



Scraped away from much of their own noise and distortion, Yuck prove to be the weekend's first pleasant surprise, not in reference to Daniel Blumberg bringing his sister on to sing backing vocals on Georgia, explaining that she'd spat water on the crotch of his jeans. On record they can come across as a less inspired take on Pains Of Being Pure At Heart distorted driving indiepop, but with the lo-fi fuzz less apparent other influences are allowed to breathe, most presently Yo La Tengo or Lou Barlow's contribution to Dinosaur Jr, proper melodies deliberately overworked and overdriven but somehow retaining a certain level of uplifting clarity.

Sarah McIntosh, who to all intents and purposes is The Good Natured, played Indietracks a couple of years ago as a sole Casio-touting bedroom keyboard delinquent. Now she leaves all that to a rhythm section and backing tape, preferring to prowl the stage, drop to her knees and generally make like a dark disco Florence in even smaller hot pants. It's better than it could have been, uncertainly straddling post-Marina pop availability, but at the same time the thought occurs that maybe we should come back to her in a couple of years when the femme-pop boom has washed away and she can find her own voice. Finding his own voice in the monitors seems to be a problem for a clearly far from happy Britt Daniel of Spoon, at one point resorting to taking over Rob Pope's mike after finding his backing vocals are often louder than Daniel's lead. Maybe it was this and what seem to be other small technical issues that led to a seemingly uninvolved set, one that drew heavily on Transference while still making room for a surprising The Ghost Of You Lingers, the smart rhythmic thrust often lost on all but those at the front

Maybe it was the aforementioned younger element at work, combined with the vertical takeoff of new folkies this year, but Laura Marling received a hero's welcome on the Obelisk. Her ascent from huddled communities to huge stages would be beyond a lot of people whose songs are so hushed and delicately arranged, but Marling pulled off the feat of keeping the passion and emotional charge of the sentiments when transferred to the big league, even when deigning to do a couple of songs without her backing band. As she has done recently her solo take of Night Terror featured a whistling solo where the violin previously went, with a closing glissando that proves every hit genre needs its own Roger Whittaker. Spectral stuff, but we couldn't stop...

...because over in The Word Arena that bit of Philip Glass-esque twinkly instrumental and monologue that Wild Beasts come on to was starting. Having seen them earlier in the year it's apparent that they've become something special live, a tight unit able to make a well oiled machine out of their arrythmic anti-funk interplay even before you've considered Hayden Thorpe's ridiculous, glorious vocal and the countertenor of Tom Fleming. They're increasingly resembling one of our most special bands, and people are responding with mass dancing in kind. But we couldn't stop...

...because a little way away from the Lake Stage, by the picnic tables and recycling bins, there's a bloke wandering around occasionally howling his head off to the heavens. Some might wonder whether the festival spirit has already overtaken some. A very few, us included, recognise that it's Mark Thomas from Islet, they're about to start, and as usual the line between genius and madness is about to be thoroughly steamrollered.

Most of the talk about them has been centred around their lack of online presence, which is unfair as it suggests that mystique is now a band's only point of entry, and besides they do now. No, what Islet do live with the live band basics (two drumkits, mind) is difficult to quantify in mere words without feeling you're stealing their surprise soul on some level. The music, that's nearly simple enough - no-wave/art-rock percussive Liquid Liquid/ESG/Gang Gang Dance propulsion like Grand Theft Auto motorik, bits of proper songs and melodies and words drifting in and out as much as group yells and moments where they just about pull it clear of total collapse. Switching instruments, pounding away on various drums in syncopation, Alex Williams chasing Mark over the barrier with tambourine in hand... eventually the stage security panic and decide that what was a 45 minute slot will now be half an hour after all. It goes down as well as you'd expect with the band, who after two more songs attempt to launch in the collateral drumming of We Shall Visit and attempt to carry on well after the DJ has put some loud drum'n'bass on and the stagehands are attempting to take the kits apart, half of the band deciding they might as well take one more dip into the steadily growing throng (including Adam *and* Joe, and Frankie & the Heartstrings arriving mob handed halfway through what proved to be the last song) wondering what exactly is happening up there. Peculiar greatness, that's what.

Which is some lead-in for Everything Everything to have to take up. They also do everything, albeit with a lot less manic presence but with a tendency to dip all over the place for their influences - synthpop here, R&B rhythms there, math close at hand, always room for a falsetto three part harmony amid those melodic moments that suddenly get swept away by an awkward moment of angularity. Like the XX, who we saw on this stage in similar conditions last year, it would probably make more sense with the wider knowledge of their forthcoming album, but their ADHD structurality demonstrates that it won't fall victim to safety first tendencies even if there's room for some form of odd crossover in it all.

Not too long after they finish, Billy Bragg, participant in a well observed debate on British identity earlier in the day, wanders past. We'd have said something to him, but it's difficult to know exactly what to say in the immediate circumstances.

Florence & the Machine were the day's headliners, but you pretty much know what that's going to be about and the gender of most of the people watching. This is a serious blog for slowly ageing men in dark back bedrooms, dammit. So, The National. It's well established that they've stealthily become one of the biggest guitar bands in the world without much of the world's music media noticing, but it's obvious that were he so minded Matt Berninger could round up any number of the people in the Word Arena, and doubtless thousands besides, into his own private army for nefarious purposes. It was like the rapture out there. Every break is greeted with a stadium-sized cheer, every song transmuted into an anthem, at times the community choir is louder than the not exactly restrictive guitar sound - Bloodbuzz Ohio and Mistaken For Strangers were particularly good for this. Buoyed on, the set overflowed with power and coiled spring tightness, confidence utmost, emotions on high. Berninger even broke out into the odd dance move, his baritone brooding and outbreaks of anguish somehow seeming more genuine than recorded output has ever managed, whether the heft of Slow Show or Fake Empire's insistent pull. In this situation, with this crowd, and with these songs, their imposing intensity makes all kinds of transcendent sense.