This was the first day of the 2012 edition of the Reading festival. This post will be about bands and acts that played on Friday the 24th of August.
I started my day with the first band to play the whole weekend, and it got off to a great start. Funeral Suits kicked off the weekend for me and it was one of the best performances I saw the whole day, the lads were all really energetic, captivating the crowd. They brought their Irish charm with them to the slightly glum faces of the drunken revellers and turned their frowns up-side-down. The highlight of the set for me was their stomper 'All Those People'
After I saw Funeral Suits I meandered around a few bands and found myself watching 'We Were Frontiers', they're a Folk band from Leeds, managing to bring the crowd in and gathering them from the passers by, they were a delight to listen to early in the day. We're going to keep an eye on them for sure!
The next two bands for us were just to fill in the time, 'Deaf Havana' are always going to be shit in my eyes, every song they played seemed to be the same, simple riffs, random shouting that slightly resembled singing. I spoke to some of their fans after the performance and even they said it was a weak by their standards, not even playing their good songs too. Shit is a word I'd like to describe them. Hadouken!, now, I was ONLY there so I could get close to the front for Friends (who were on next). Don't get me wrong, I liked 'Declaration of War', but the rest of the songs sound the same with the basslines and drum beats, YAWN
Friends and Spector both provided a nice break from the crap bands both putting in excellent performances to get my faith in music restored, the same goes for the youngest band to play the whole weekeend. The Park Bench Society, they were literally a band I stumbled upon walking to see Crystal Castles, the distorted vocals, the simplistic approach to their Acoustic/Ska influenced songs really got the crowd moving. Ok that may not seem a lot, but the crowd was the biggest I saw all weekend at the Introducing stage. A fantastic band we're keeping an eye on!
Crystal Castles were always going to be a big hit at the festival, yet I was wondering why most of the time, Alice seemed to be constantly on the floor almost crying due to her hair being a bit too pruple, but they still got the crowd moving especially when 'Not In Love' came on, as soon as it did, I went off to see Lucy Rose and Alt-J grace the Festval Republic Stage. They both played to a rammed tent with lots of people walking away after seeing it over-flowing, I managed to get a good position for both bands and I've even managed to take a couple of good pictures! Both acts proved to be worth the hype, especially Lucy Rose, who got a new fan in me!
After seeing Alt-J finish off their set I was a little late seeing Bombay Bicycle Club play the mainstage, but I managed to see them play a brand new song 'Carry On', still not officially out, but I loved the song as much as I loved 'How Can You Swallow So Much Sleep' when that was doing it's rounds before 'Flaws' came out.
I finished the day off watching The Courteeners, Foster The People and The Maccabees. Foster The People had the whole place bouncing and getting them warmed up for the impending arrival of The Maccabees. The band were showcasing songs off their latest album, and the performance was just amazing, the new songs sounded amazing live and the old stuff got the crowd singing along like no other band I saw the whole day. This was indeed a highlight of the day!
No comments:
Post a Comment