(Disclaimer: due to very badly timed exams we were unable to
attend any of the Friday events, and had to leave early on the Sunday
night, as such none of that stuff will be in this review).
City based festivals are the best of both worlds; a huge variety of
music/events within easy reach for the simple price of a wristband, and a
solid excuse to drink in the early afternoon but without any of the
camping or mud. Leicester is a funny city, a huge percentage of it is
beautiful, well maintained green spaces, but there’s also some really
ugly concrete buildings, sitting right next to ye olde architecture and
cosy narrow streets filled with boutiques and pubs. It feels deceptively
small and suburban, but has a thriving music scene, thanks in no small
part to the efforts of venue Firebug.
Saturday:
We start off the weekend by heading to Bishop Street Methodist Church to see
Katie Malco.
Her gentle but powerful vocals and charming between-song-chat are the
perfect companion to the late afternoon sun that sneaks in through the
church’s high windows. It’s an extremely engaging and impressive
performance, she mentions that the next song she’ll play is a cover of a
friend’s song that “he sometimes lets me play”. The song turns out to
be a cover of the solo efforts of a member of
Tellison.
The high quality musical company she keeps is obviously doing no harm
to her wonderful blend of laid-back yet highly emotive sound.
After a short break we head over to Firebug (only a wander away,
there’s definitely something to be said for how easy to find and close
the venues are). Upstairs the cheery sound of
My First Tooth booms
out, they’re slick and charming and a joy to watch. Then it’s another
short walk to the People’s Photographic Studio to see
We Were Promised Jetpacks.
They’ve gathered quite a crowd and their gloomy yet commanding and
distinctive sound is a nice contrast to the light-hearted efforts of the
previous bands.
Johnny Foreigner are the final band of the night, we
leave We Were Promised Jetpacks slightly early to ensure we’ll get into
Firebug as the upstairs is not a big space. The Birmingham quartet are
(as usual) huge fun. They begin the show by wandering in and out of the
crowd singing ‘Johnny Foreigner VS You’ entirely a capella, a trick they
used
last time they played here
but it’s such a touching and wonderful technique there’s no reason for
them not to repeat it. The next forty minutes or so fly by and there’s a
lovely moment of calm between the angstier tracks when
Riff Glitchard
echoes out. It’s perhaps not the tightest song of the evening, but it’s
so beautiful on record that doesn’t matter, and Johnny Foreigner’s
charm has always come somewhat from their occasionally shambolic, but
always enthusiastic and enjoyable performances.
Sunday:
Due to total exhaustion from a busy day yesterday we don’t make it to any of the venues until
Sky Larkin at Firebug, which means we’ve missed
The Handmade Cinema
as well as a few other bands. Sky Larkin are fun to watch, they make
good music and admittedly it’s perhaps a little samey live, but they’re
all extremely talented and seem to throw out each track with utter
nonchalance belying the complexity, and it might just be the way they
refuse to pause (even for applause) between each track that makes
everything feel a bit blurred together.
It’s unfortunate that we’ve not had much opportunity to see new
bands, something that’s always an exciting prospect at festival
(entirely my own fault, there’s plenty on here) but we make it over to
The Guildhall in time to catch most of
We Three and the Death Rattle.
It’s obvious almost immediately that this is something special, the
lead singer’s powerful stage presence is almost impossible to tear your
eyes away from and the aggressive and rhythmic yet melodic sound echoes
around the slightly incongruous setting (The Guildhall is a listed
building and looks like
this inside). They’ve got the swagger of
Sleigh Bells and an unusual habit of playing the Theremin, which as a friend of mine remarks “is interesting, but never sounds nice”.
Back over to Firebug for the wonderful
Tall Ships
who are on their usual top form. We sneak out just as they finish what
is possibly their most popular song ‘Ode To Ancestors’, in what is such
excellent timing it might well have been planned.
The reason for our early exit is to catch another group representing the fantastic Scottish music scene,
The Twilight Sad. Playing
in The Guildhall seems the most natural thing in the world for them,
it’s wonderfully creepy and the atmosphere is something no one in that
room is likely to forget any time soon.
Handmade Festival is only in its first year but it’s
the most organised and relaxed festival I’ve ever been to, the
atmosphere is also the most friendly of any gig or festival I’ve seen in
a while. It’s clear that the people putting this on are doing it out of
love for these bands and this city,I can only hope that there will be
many more years of this to come. It makes Leicester feel a very exciting
place to be.
