Green Man - Glasnuck Park, Brecon Beacons - 17-19/8/07
4/5
By: Chris O'Toole
We're not in London anymore Dorothy. No skinny jeans down here boys and girls. Put away your neon haircuts and pull up your Wellingtons, take a stroll out into the mud. This is Wales now. Just over the border, but a hundred-thousand miles away. They even charge you £5.10 to get across the river; that dark stretch of water that separates the two nations.
Finally there on Thursday morning and having set-up camp, we are treated to a fly-past by the RAF to greet our arrival at the Green Man festival; two fighter jets split the sky as we struggle to the tofu stand. Three days of unadulterated folk rock, bands selected on talent and demographic, not zeitgeist or whim. A family affair, packed the rafters with high-tech camping gear, looking more like they are going to stay for a year than the requisite four nights.
Dominated by a polite, almost cordial atmosphere, Pimm's based good times, indeed it seemed the bands were a distraction to reading the Guardian wine-list at times, and stages were sometimes deserted due to a mass exodus to the baby-change facilities. This was thoroughly middle-class, middle-brow event; a crowd from London decamped to the Welsh valleys for the weekend. Not a sentence was spoken in Welsh to my knowledge and upper lips were thoroughly stiff.
This wasn't to the determent of the event though; there was fun to be had for the intrepid explorer. I made what can only be described as a heroic effort to conquer the nearby Sugar Loaf Mountain on the first night, only to be thwarted meters from the summit by the famous Welsh climate. It was that sort of occasion, Gore-Tex and sturdy boots rather than heels and mirrors.
Waking up on Friday morning I realised somebody had stolen all of my alcohol and that I had a terrible headache. Several scenes had been deleted of my memory of the evening before and I was unable to recollect the conversations and charming anecdotes I had shared with the total strangers. I seem to remember talking to a dragon at one point. Perhaps there was one there. There was a science tent, a cinema, and a crèche after all. Anything was possible.
Pete and the Pirates were the first band I managed to see. They shared a tiny bit of rock-a-billy raucousness with the crowd but didn't muster any rapture. Although their Clash influenced 'Your In Bed With The Wrong Girl' was well received, it was largely the wrong place at the wrong time for the boys from Reading. Playing to the pleasant smiles and polite applause on a lazy afternoon really wasn't their scene.
Rachel Unthank and the Winterset on the other-hand were ideally suited. Their classical folk was delivered with such verve and passion as to be mesmerising; hundreds of years in a voice, accompanied by high heel instrumentation, swing and glamour in the field. After years of rock-n-roll rations, the charm was indescribable. The sound was wonderful throughout the festival, especially on the main-stage which basked in a natural amphitheatre where it was amplified and enhanced, and Rachel Unthank really made the most of it.
(However, the slopes later became a death-trap for anybody brave enough to attempt them in the torrent of mud carrying three pints of cider...)
Findlay Brown was a welcome surprise, in the vein of Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie, wearing his influences on his sleeve with pride. He played the first song acoustic and managed to bring a degree of intimacy to hundreds of people. That was most of the crowd, as there were only six thousand people there for the whole thing. Children played at his feet, and he pretended he was talking to them, but I think he was speaking to us all, amongst the hubbub of the chattering classes. Joined by the rest of his band the effort seems a bit misplaced and his muse Marie seemed to be errant for the day.
Euros Child, a Welsh language rock band played next and revealed all songs in the Welsh language are about horses; then proceeded to sing songs about their boots, then the rain, then their boots, then the rain. Exciting times.
Over on the Folky-Dokey Stage (oh yes, it really was called that) Dead Meadow were livening things up a little. They played a style of slow-core rock 'n' roll where the bass is the trump card and everything else competes, insular yet engaging, melodic and tectonic; one of the best bands of the weekend.
Back on the main stage Bill Callahan was ever so insular, ever so morose, oh so difficult and misunderstood; and loved by all. His touring buddy and sometime soul mate Joanna Newsom headlined the evening. Taking largely from 'Ys', her set seemed a little austere and wrought for the occasion, lacking some of the quixotic charm that initially bought her to prominence, but her mercurial charm was evident in abundance and this partially saved the day. It will be interesting to see where her next album takes her; back towards her populist roots or further into uncharted territory.
Saturday morning was greeted by torrential rain. I mean real rain, the sort of stuff that comes at you sideways and makes you consider jumping ship and heading back towards the capital.
However, there was (limited) space in the Folky-Dokey stage to watch Thistletown. Originating in quaint Falmouth, they were perhaps the most traditional band of the weekend, with a seemingly endless slew of songs about cider. There two female lead-singers had the charm and sparkle to make the crowd forget the rain, but the event was marred by countless families spreading picnic blankets, taking up precious space, forcing others out into the rain and obstructing those of us who wished to storm the stage.
Having been forced out by such discourteous behaviour the main stage offered Clinic. In much the same way as the Beta Band, Clinic have been ploughing an unrewarded furrow for a number of years, turning out challenging, intricate records without receiving the exposure they truly deserve. Their loose and vigorous drummer set a direction of free expression and propelled the intuitive, spontaneous band in a hundred different directions as once; sounding as though they were singing from inside a washing machine. That gimmick of wearing masks that has followed them through their career was still in evidence.
Broken Family Band followed on the main stage, but they were pretty indistinguishable. At one point I swear I heard a Placebo song, that characteristic off-key whining about Vaseline or something of that nature and another track was a cover of 'Common People' by Pulp masquerading as an original track, quite shameless really, but their was enough shaggy, rag-tag charm to carry the weight of there influences.
Six Organs of Admittance on the Folky Dokey stage put on a good show, but seemed to lack a little zest. Now playing as a dextrous duo and ostensibly responsible for the founding of the neo-folk movement in the first place, they seem to have lost a little of their verve. There was a touch of drone, a touch of Sonic Youth's confrontation and a little too much emotion. Ben Chasny sang it like he meant it, whilst knocking back the beers, but his female accomplice was more style than substance. She threw some totally undeserved shapes; merely playing a single chord on the guitar does not warrant throwing your hair over your shoulder, falling to your knees and reaching for the heavens. A touch embarrassing.
Finally on that stage Battles provided a welcome break from all the anguished soul-searching and cider based ballads to deliver a frantic set to a loving audience. They literally came out of the walls for the gig, as anoraks were shed to reveal hipsters beneath. Jan Stanier on drums is the real centre-piece of the group, hammering out spell binding rhythms with incredible intensity. His relentless energy spikes the group into action and the air is filled with fizzing drones, voice samples jagged, humming guitar and all other imaginable noises. The crowd was rapt.
Over on the main stage, Robert Plant played 'Whole Lotta Love' to a very different demographic.
By Sunday morning the incessant rain, tofu and booze was starting to take hold of any reasonable person's sanity. Luckily Misty's Big Adventure were on hand to provide a welcome dose of fun. Their half crooner, half jazz, half swing-rock style was exactly what the crowd needed to be lifted out of the morning funk, and their comical edge was not lost on those who had chosen Green Man over more commercial festivals. At once insightful and entertaining the group really are one of the countries's best kept secrets. Best band of the weekend.
Malcolm Middleton followed but his macabre wit was somewhat lost on the mid afternoon faces. Alistair Roberts also somewhat failed to share his slow, pure Scottish-folk; his band distracting somewhat from intensity of his voice, which should have been the real star of the show.
Back to the Folky Dokey stage for Seasick Steve whowas one of the most intriguing acts of the weekend. The southern-blues man with the Three-String Trance Wonder (a three-string guitar), a one-string bow and the Mississippi drum-machine put on a show built around saying 'Its all good' over and over. This was an upbeat, sauntering sort of blues, the singin' and dancin' kind, and Steve proved himself to be a great showman telling stories about the old blues-men he has played with, and making light the seemingly endless stream of beatings and train journeys that have made up his life.
Back to the main stage for the weekend headliners; Devendra Banhart and Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks. Banhart started with a fifteen minute ode to a seahorse and it was all downhill from there. His style is slightly rockier than it used to be, but in his present incarnation he is the ringmaster of a rather mediocre jam band suffering from delusions of grandeur. Although the talent is still there, it is going to take some time to morph into a Frank Zappa entertainer; perhaps being a hippie legend wasn't so bad after all.
Malkmus steadfastly refused to play any of the hits and bought the weekend to somewhat of an anti-climax. Taking from his most recent 'Face the Truth' and 'Dark Wave' albums the group failed to make a real impression with their country tinged folk.
Green Man though was a resounding triumph, filled with good natured people enjoying a respectable time. It wasn't rock 'n' roll, but it wasn't meant to be. The ecological feel was present throughout, food was varied and top quality, prices were low, queues were short and even on the last day you could go into the toilets barefoot, if you so chose. Most pleasingly of all, the whole event was viewed through the prism of a bubble, as every child seemed to have been issued with a machine that made giant soapy bubbles at the drop of a hat. A wonderful weekend.
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