Saturday witnesses the emergence of an army of Friar Tucks (largely barring bowl cuts) as sandy robes and naff plastic crosses outnumber bows, arrows and leafy tunics for the weekend's requisite fancy dress day, this time around of a Medieval persuasion. Whilst high-spiritedness remains all-pervasive for the duration, perhaps the merriest of men encountered while down towards the Dorset coast is
Howard Marks, who takes full advantage of an early evening vetoing of live music for the sake of a local church service. Delivering warped takes on children's classics from Little Red Riding Hood to Alice in Wonderland, he hauls fiction further into the far-fetched, as expletive-laden, risque adaptations emanate from his senescent lips.
The Bandstand is gradually invaded by overeager, deeply engaged youth, the majority of whom have unquestionably spent less time on this earth than Marks has spent inside the Terre Haute Penitentiary, as all and sundry voice their dislike of various vegetables. If Marks inadvertently became Mr. Nice following one of his many identity thefts, today he certainly validates the moniker.
"Just like Pearl Jam" and very much "still alive" are
House Of Pain, whose Celtic-tinged East Coast vibe sparks off innumerable circle pits as they open with an atmospheric, tremolo-drenched cover of The Shadows' Apache, before tearing through the back catalogue with the vehemence of a Guinness-deficient Dublin ne'er-do-well. Danny Boy, Danny Boy, cuss-blotched Put On Your Shit Kickers and inevitable outro of Jump Around induce rapture, and seemingly rage within curator Rob da Bank who at one point intervenes to exchange furious words with Danny Boy. Nonchalance never looked quite so insolent, although the "hit" never sounded quite so potent either.
Later Mark Ronson of proportionately insubstantial
Mark Ronson & The Business Intl. fame professes to having endured a "pretty shitty week" following the unfortunate yet somewhat foreseeable demise of a rather notorious crony, and unfortunately his set is equally contemptible as endless covers overshadow without ever even vaguely outshining the likes of a regrettably Boy George-less (yet still emotive) Somebody To Love Me and a formidable Bang Bang Bang, again without the indispensable aid of one of its voices, Q-Tip. The latter is overplayed, even within a single set as the quiffed brass aficionado first takes to the decks to futilely recreate a knowingly grotty New York house club aesthetic, soundtracked by his own tracks, before MNDR returns to regurgitate its incomprehensible, nonsensical chorus in the closing moments. Valerie too is churned out twice, first up with an inexplicably azure-faced Dave McCabe and subsequently, foolishly, with the perpetually bedraggled Kyle Falconer. In the interim, Alex Greenwald lurks onstage, outstaying his welcome for an irrevocably contrived run-through of grotesque The O.C. theme tune California, whilst a limp synth-led butchering of Miike Snow's Animal perplexes similarly. On the plus side, somebody seems to have finally fessed up to having heard him butcher The Smiths previously as Stop Me is notably absent from tonight's setlist.
Far more cogent are
Groove Armada, who find themselves in the shadow of Lulworth Castle to present their Red Light (or somewhat less ambiguously, their DJ turn). They too drop the same song multiple times (said song being their very own dub-drenched Superstylin') although it sinks without trace into a relentless set that hurtles through energetic contemporary sound, sat complimentarily at least once abreast of the tropical wistfulness of Jamie xx' Far Nearer. Unashamedly repetitive visuals assist in the continual crescendoing of Andy Cato and Tom Findlay's set that intermittently dunks into coexistent LP Black Light, as more and more moulded crucifixes are gradually, justifiably, thrust skywards. If Damage were still plaguing the charts, they'd presumably have tapped into the uncontainable splurge of dubstep-tainted gunk that's clogged the mainstream, and they'd probably wind up sounding a little like
Breakage, aka James Boyle. Boyle's D'n'B uniformity is propped up by the distressingly articulate nattering of Youngman MC and by the sexually suggestive Jess Mills who seems to mime throughout the excruciating Fighting Fire before retiring without a syllable. Quite a feat to make Magnetic Man appear wholly passable, yet it's a feat effortlessly executed by Breakage.
Following a hurried evacuation and ensuing human restocking of the Big Top, Rob da Bank takes to the turntables, manning the green channel of Saturday night's Silent Disco. Having the decency not to drop the usual Zane Lowe-endorsed wireless headphone fodder of Mr. Brightside, No One Knows etc., da Bank is the ideal knight in shining tinfoil to trail into the early morning.
