As we all know now the season of festivals is coming to an end and one of the highlights of the season is always the Leeds/Reading Festival weekend. Rock Industry Editor, Dave Massen and Photographer Amy Muir headed off to see what promised to be 3 days of intense amazing bands across 4 stages. Bring on Leeds!
Friday 24th August
As we just said 2 people 4 stages means like any festie, we don’t get to watch every band, so armed with running orders (Called so because it shows you the times where you have to run miles to catch bands!) we circled out a few known and unknown bands.
Our tent skills were given an added bonus of music as we rolled up to Gym Class Heroes (3) who’s set was great background music but not really enticing enough to put our tents up quicker. Billy Talent (8) were fantastic as usual showing the masses that they’re going places fast in the world so you better keep up. Next on the Main Stage were The Used (6) who really heated up the afternoon. Bert had great interaction and managed to get some vicious circle pits going in the midday sun. They played a collection of old songs with a few new ones, well worth checking out live! Next on the Main Stage was Funeral for a Friend (6) who got the crowd really heated up with again old songs but also a lot of the new album including a fantastic version of Oblivion. We were on a tight schedule and so we split at this point to cover more bands and indulge in more beer and £6 nachos (£6!! What the hell were we thinking!) On the Lock-Up stage Liam and the boys from the Cancer Bats (8) ran around like crazy and gave an absolute stunner of a performance, these are truly a great band to see live, whilst on the Main Stage, with Ian Watkins and a whole load of other people from the days line-up watching them, came Fall Out Boy (8). There was so much energy in that band you couldnt help but jump around with them. With mutual ‘High 5’s’ and a collection of old and new songs they really gave the crowd something to dehydrate about. They also played their own unique versions of ‘Ignition – R Kelly’ and ‘Beat It – Michael Jackson’ these guys never fail to perform live!
Ian Watkins must have thought Christmas had come early for him with the crowd now all whipped up fantastically and the Lost Prophets (8) didn’t fail to rise up to it either. With songs from way back like ‘Fake Sound of Progress’ and the catchy sing-along tracks of the new albums like ‘Town called Hypocrisy’ they put on a great show and one that as usual is different from any previous. Again our time was split then between Main and Lock-Up stage with From Autumn to Ashes (6) putting in a solid performance and Against Me (6) who have admirers from the days line up too. Following them were Gallows (9) who arguably in our eyes were the best band of the day with all manner of Rock ‘n’ Roll antics such as bringing your fellow singers onto stage to rock out with you to Frank jumping off the scaffolding into the crowd to get a reaction. Strangely enough the crowd went mental! The Lock-Up ended with New Found Glory (8) with a solid performance with the best quote of the performance being “Were not avenged sevenfold you know”……… hmmmm……
The Main stage ended with a very mixed bag, Trent Reznor and NIN (6) pulling in a crowd that obviously lost their voices with the earlier singsongs who miraculously after giving it an hour and a half rest had enough left in them to deafen Bramham Park when The Smashing Pumpkins (8) came on. With classics like ‘Today’, ‘Bullet with butterfly wings’ and ‘Tonight, tonight’ as well as new tracks from Zeitgeist, their 6th Album to date, and the crowd loved it. With rumours flying that D’Arcy and James were back in the fold we’re not sure anyone was disappointed that they weren’t, unfortunately the truth is Billy Corgan probably is The Smashing Pumpkins as not much of a noticeable difference could be heard on the old songs without James or D’Arcy.
Obviously in true Rock Industry fashion we went off to bed for cocoa and biscuits and to cuddle teddy to get some sleep……..
Saturday 25th August
Now Saturday was a whole different day, more indie than the things our readers would probably have been interested in, but you’d be wrong!
The day started with Aiden (8) who never fail to shock and stun people. Especially the security as Will announces “I have £10 here for anyone who can get up on this stage!” Security had pained looks on their face, but no one did get up on stage during that song. He then proceeded to get the crowd to salute the work the security team do and tried it again later on in the set! Next notable highlight was the first set that Jimmy Eat World (8) played on the Main Stage. Solid set which included a lot of oldies such as ‘Work’ with mass sing-along’s.
The band of the day were by far Kerrang’s ‘Best Live Act 2007’ Enter Shikari (9) who blew the NME/Radio1 stage well away. What a cracking live performance and to a tent that was so full it over spilled (note to Festival Republic, Main stage next year yeah?) With tracks like ‘Return to Energiser’, ‘Sorry you’re not a winner’ and ‘Jonny Sniper’ these guys held the crowd and could have held them for another hour. It was a privilege to be watching them except when Rou went into the crowd and nearly tripped up all the security and photographers with his mic wire (sore knees after that) RI editor, Dave, got chance to speak to the boys before they played… did his words of “You better be good later or ill find you and break your fingers” work? Who knows but the outcome was the same.
Again splitting between the stages we then had Kings of Leon (8) who played a lot of their new album ‘Because of the Times’ which went down well with the crowd. Next up were Brand New (6) on the NME/Radio 1 stage who again played a lot of the new album with Jesse Lacey going mental with his guitar, playing it with his teeth and everything. Throw into the day a sterling performance by Capdown (6) on the Lock-Up Stage and end the day with Ash (8) who pulled out all the well known classics like ‘Girl From Mars’ and ‘Oh Yeah’ as well as new stuff from ‘Twilight of the Innocents’.
*******Rock Industry got chance to catch up with Tim, Rick and Mark earlier on in the day to ask them about their decision to not produce any more albums. Tim stated that “With us there seems to be a natural 3 year gap with our albums and we wanted to release things as soon as we got a good track so rather than waiting 2 years after producing it we are going to release it straight away as a single only” These guys always do things differently, they were the first band to record a song for a computer game and also one of the first to play a tour of record shops around the country to promote their album. “It’s not something we set out to do it’s just the way we and our manager think, its different and this has helped keep us in the focus for such a long time.” Being veterans now of rock they do get new bands coming up and asking for autographs and tips on how to stay so long in the public eye. “We just do what we want, the last album took so long to come out because we decided to move to New York and build a studio there but now we have our own then tracks will come out quicker. The first track to be released will be one that didn’t make it in time for the album and that’s coming out in January” Tim wouldn’t divulge the name of the track but watch out for it in the New Year! *******
Sunday 26th August
So after another night of bed at 11pm after cocoa and biscuits…….. we set out to watch a whole number of bands. First up were one of RI’s favourite bands that have been coming through into the limelight for a while now, Paramore (8) on the Main stage. An absolute stunning response from a crowd which we suspect were bigger than when Angels and Airwaves (4) played later on that day. Hayley apologised for missing last year’s festival but certainly made up for it this year. Kids in Glass Houses (6) played a good set including the crowd favourite ‘Me, me, me’ on the Carling Stage and then for a while it was back to the Main stage for The Shins (8) who surprised a lot of people and gained a lot more fans that weekend. Then we got into the warzone that was Angles and Airwaves (4) who quite frankly produced one of the most boring sets ever, no wonder every time he said “How great are my band” he got bottled! Seriously Tom that band is not all about you and God……. So with that in mind and the fact that the previous day at Reading Panic! At the Disco (8) got bottled only one thing was going to happen on this performance…… Brendan, the veteran at dodging bottles by now, managed to come out unscathed with other bottles narrowly missing various band members. The unlucky people were the photographers who got hit by the crowd who were clearly too pissed to aim properly, including our own Amy who has a nice lump on her head now courtesy of some prick! Did all this stop a good performance? Did it fuck!
Now next up were a band that are amazing to watch, with so much going on onstage Arcade Fire (9) and so many instruments each person can play, they remind a lot of people of a hippy commune sort of band but play an absolute stunning set. Highlight of that would be ‘Rebellion (lies)’ which was amazing. So again split between different stages next up was Biffy Clyro (8) who played on the NME/Radio 1 stage, mostly playing new stuff from the album ‘Puzzle’, a great performance as always. A Rock Industry Favourite again were Shiny Toy Guns (8) who never fail to let anyone down with their performances and instrument swapping.
Next was We Are Scientists (6) who got a great reception to their classic favourites and then in mad running around fashion we cut that set short to get to The Academy Is… (8) to see a truly on form Will Beckett and the boys. They played classics from their first album ‘Almost here’ as well as new stuff from ‘Santi’ So then it was back to the Main Stage to watch the Red Hot Chili Peppers (6) practise session. Tis was nicknamed by some of the crowd that we caught up to because Anthony and the boys seemed to just interact with themselves and didn’t really speak much to the crowd. Had they not had songs like ‘Under the Bridge’ ‘Californication’ etc most people would have walked off after a few songs. Good job their songs are known! This was a flat performance which had interludes of 6-8 minutes and solos in between songs, with a back catalogue like theirs did they really have to piss about so much between songs? No but then do they care? They’re being paid thousands to be there. It wasn’t a rush at the end of the set to get out the car park that night……. Steady, staggered, exodus was the order of the night; Organisers must have been well pleased with the slow haemorrhaging of the crowd to get people off site. Had it not been for Unkle in the dance tent there would have been a small crowd in comparison that night. All in all though a fantastic weekend which catered for all and even possessed a secret set by local boys Kaiser Chiefs (8) that really did cause an angry mob with the security surroundings of their set. Like all good crowds it got stormed anyway! Roll on Next year!
Words and Pictures ; David Massen, Amy Muir