MaW’s Blog

So, day two of the Folk Festival. Today I went for the start of performances at two, and saw Hayseed Dixie, who I missed last night. They were okay, but I wouldn’t seek them out again. Then it was The Cat Empire, an Australian group who had some very strange load of reggae and ska thrown in. Talented, but I wouldn’t seek them out either.

Then The Bills, who I also saw yesterday. I didn’t pay much attention to their performance, except to enjoy the first song, which was the one I liked most last night (last night they didn’t do it first though).

Fourth band of the afternoon (this is all on stage one, very conveniently, although I did wander around the festival during the intervals and less interesting groups as well, for food if nothing else!) were the marvellous and amazing Kathryn Tickell Band. One of the main reasons I bothered to go the festival at all, they completely failed to disappoint in every possible way. Although their first number (Herd, from the album Air Dancing) had some sound glitches, by the end of it they’d got it all sorted out and stormed their way through an excellent set, gaining the most positive audience reaction of the afternoon. A couple of good new tracks in there as well as fantastic older ones, so things bode well for their next album. They finished their set with a rendition of Peter Man, which can also be found on Air Dancing, but extended and considerably faster at the end, getting almost the entire tent to their feet and stamping and clapping and dancing along. Fantastic.

They were followed by The Unusual Suspects, a 22-piece folk big band from Scotland including four singers (who also play assorted instruments), a pianist, a harpist, three pipers (Scottish bagpipes of course, quite a startling sound after the much mellower Northumbrian smallpipes played by Kathryn Tickell), a horn section, a strings section, percussionist and drummer, and a few other people too. At least part of their closing number appeared to be the same basic melody as part of Peter Man, except their version was considerably louder, due in part to the horn section and the advantage of numbers (Unusual Suspects 22, Kathryn Tickell Band 4).

Then we had KT Turnstall. Nominated for the Mercury Music Prize this year, she made me think that she’s probably what you’d get if you got Katie Melua and added about half a folk singer and a Scottish accent. She garnered a response from the audience which topped Kathryn Tickell’s although I don’t personally think she was as good. It’s all down to taste of course, she was easily the second best of the day.

I didn’t see the final two acts (Mavis Staples and the Proclaimers) because I left, being quite tired and having not much interest in Staples’ gospel/soul music, or the enough in the Proclaimers to stick around while Mavis Staples did her set.

Tomorrow I’m off to x3ja’s wedding, so back at the folk festival on Sunday for Karine Polwart, Kate Rusby and Blazin’ Fiddles.