The Kids Are Alright

Whew! I'm on the ol' train wifi again, only this time considerably more tired and deaf. The Reading Festival was a genius way to blow away the cobwebs of my old life as a lab slave. Although there were plenty of great things at the fest, the music was by far the most exciting thing about it so here's my highlights in terms of the bands:

Friday

Blood Red Shoes

Wow. Probably surprise of the festival - I'd listened to their album a couple of times but never really 'got it'. I'm now a total convert after witnessing what I can only describe as a perfect set of simple, high octane pop songs. They have that 'how do two people make that noise' thing that Death From Above had but are even tighter players. Only the second band of the festival and the bar was set very high.

Friendly Fires - Despite having much in common with Klaxons, these guys seem to have escaped the hideous 'nu-rave' title and the twattish trappings that come with it. They were clearly very comfortable playing to a packed-out stage and made the fun they were having contagious. They won me over by having a fuckload of cowbells and some of the most danceable indie-rock I've heard since The Rapture. Most bands would seem like pretentious World Music bores by ending their set with a 5 minute samba breakdown but these guys pulled it off by just making it part of the party. I hope they become huge.

Rage Against The Machine

All anyome spoke about during Friday was how amazing Rage were going to be. After their set everyone croaked about how great they were, and with good reason. Every word, every note played with the utmost of conviction and ferocity. Not a single wasted note. And their music really does matter - looking back I realise what an effect they had on my political views as a teenager. Basically as close to perfect as a rock gig can be.

Saturday

We Are Scientists - It's great watching performers who are so comfortable with themselves. No attempts to wow the crowd with gimmickry, just some great songs and some superb banter between songs. I tried to sing along but it came out as a croak.

Seasick Steve

A great big beard, a great big smile and a viking on drums. He proved that you don't need your youth, a correctly functioning inner-ear or even all the strings on your guitar to rock the fuck out of a crowd.

Foals - I was actually a bit to crushed in the crowd to see what was going on, but I've since watched it on the BBC website and they were indeed great. The thing that got me was that it was by far the biggest crowd I'd seen in the NME/R1 tent - packed to the rafters with hyper youngsters. And they were dancing to Math Rock. Mull that over in your mind for a while. If there ever need be a sign that the future is in safe hands, it's several thousand teenagers frugging in 7/8 time.

Sunday

Adam Green - I have to admit that I wasn't keen on the idea of seeing Adam as in my ignorance I thought it would be fairly dull folky noodling. What I actually got was some goood ol' rocknroll complete with a couple of backing singers and a superbly drunk frontman. Amy Winehouse could learn a thing or two from Adam about being completely wasted but still keeping your dignity. "It's only one in the afternoon. Shit, now I feel guilty about drinking that bottle of whiskey. This is another song about crack".

Holy Fuck

Listening to HF on record gives you a bit of an idea what they sound like live, but to actually see is something quite special. Drums, bass and a couple of guys playing what looks like a series of mangled cereal boxes with wires coming out of them. Each song seemed to require completely rebuilding their equipment while playing it. And they fucking rocked too. They managed to get my heavily hungover frame bouncing along, and even solicited a tear of joy during Lovely Allen. Amazing.

CSS - Lovefoxxxx dressed as a jester. Singalongs about coughing up furballs. Glitter cannons. Music is My Hot Hot Sex. I love you CSS.

Right. Now I need to give up drinking forever and let my hearing heal itself.