Monday 20 August 2007

Buckland Beer Festival


Ivan won a couple of free tickets to the Buckland Beer Fest on Sat so at about 4.00 in the afternoon we booked Gill's taxi and headed off for a look. They were unlucky with the weather again (nobody's actually been lucky with the weather this year) but the site is well set up and will be more successful year by year if it keeps going.

The first band we saw were Electric Ladyland and they showed some real promise. Nice and noisy they performed with real confidence - i'd watch them again. They keep their telecasters polished, shiny and clean so extra marks for that.

Next up were a two piece country act named Lincoln County after a shaky start they warmed up a bit and the sax player went for a walk into the field with his radio mike. I don't think they can have been going long but they kept us occupied as we began to sample the ale.

Neo-Geek were the next band on and i liked them a lot. They were spikey and melodic with interesting songs and lots of good ideas. They had a sound of their own and weren't too over the top on stage. Visit them here http://www.myspace.com/neogeekspace .

For some reason there was a gap in the entertainment at this point which was used as an opportunity to purchase junk food and sample more ale. I'd review some of the beers only i can't tell the difference between them half the time i certainly can't detect "a soupcon of barbed wire and angel's tears with nuances of rusty stinging nettles" the only one i wished i'd remembered was the one i had to chuck away 'cos it tasted like nasty cough mixture (even Ivan couldn't drink it and i offered it to him for free!).

I didn't catch the name of the next ensemble but they were very well turned out and played a mixture of western swing , country, and gospel - good! + some jazz - bad!
I had great hopes for the Jerichova skiffle band but they were a bit poor on the night. The sound was bad - couldn't hear the singing - reasonable choice of covers but no real oomph.

The Operation were up next and proved to be the most popular act of the evening. They were confidant and forceful on stage with the plus that they have a couple of good tunes in their locker. The show was slick and energetic one of the best of the young local bands around at the moment. One minor criticism they reminded me of the Stereophonics on a couple of occasions and i can't stand the bloody Stereophonics (like everyone else i only liked the drummer and they sacked him).

The final band i saw - there were more but we went home - were Crescent Shoreline. Despite having the whole of the Operation's set to get their gear ready they still took another half an hour to get ready to play and frankly it wasn't worth the wait. I suppose they think they are being avant garde by having no discernable tune and not being able to keep time but they're not. Just a messy, muddy, shouty racket. We left them to it as did most of the remaining crowd.
And so, as Samuel Pepys would say, to bed.

No comments: