End of the Road Festival 2008 - Larmer Tree Gardens, Dorset

At around 3pm on the Friday, spirits were not as high as they could have been down Larmer Tree Gardens way. No sooner was the last tent peg in the ground, than the wall of rain that had been lurking in the distance made its way across the plains of North Dorset and did its business all over the End of the Road site. Anyone who had taken any notice of the previous week’s Bestival was well-prepared for this soggy start, but a trudge to the arena uncovered more bad news – no alcohol to be taken inside. This is of course standard festival practice, but the word on the muddy field was that part of the bliss of End of the Road 2007 was being able to do just that. As the skies cleared briefly, though, any residual negativity disappeared with the drizzle and it was on with the show.

As far as quality of music goes, End of the Road has to be up there with the likes of All Tomorrow’s Parties for hosting critically acclaimed acts (albeit rather less diverse) and any other festival you care to mention for sheer consistency. There are “must see” bands from first to last, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin to Calexico. There are the new (the winners of the Lucky Ten competition to play the festival, including The Accidental, Cats in Paris, Revenge of Shinobi) and well-worn (American Music Club, Billy Childish), the rising stars (Noah and the Whale, Laura Marling, Bon Iver) and old guard (Mercury Rev, Tindersticks), the cult heroes (Dirty Three, Low, Mountain Goats and many more) and Billboard hit-makers (Conor Oberst). And the true mark of consistency is that almost every band that plays over the three days is one that most in attendance would happily pay money to go and see.

So, having avoided most of the rain – and sadly a handful of the afternoon sets – it is with a fair amount of excitement and expectation at what my dirt cheap £105 ticket will bring me that I wander through the cluster of ethically sourced and fair trade stalls to the festival’s second stage, The Big Top, to catch the second half of Laura Marling’s nice-but-not-mind-blowing set. From here there is only one destination: to the main Garden Stage for Dirty Three. The Australian trio are in fine fettle, with frontman Warren Ellis on typically engaging form, ranting from somewhere behind his beard and supplementing his violin playing with an array of high kicks. In a folk-dominated weekend, the epic instrumentals they fit in to their 75 minute set (the long set times are a particularly welcome feature of the festival) are as powerful, fragile and absorbing as virtually anything that will be heard by Monday morning: a true weekend highlight before the first night’s even over.

There’s just time to pick up a hot and spicy cider from the Somerset Cider Bus (one of the hits of the weekend above all else) and it’s time for Conor Oberst’s headline slot with his Mystic Valley Band. The Bright Eyes man’s set is certainly entertaining, particularly to those familiar with the recent solo album, with evidence of the same feeling of freedom that comes through so strongly on that record. The rocking versions of ‘Danny Callahan’ and ‘I Don’t Want to Die (In the Hospital)’ and delicate solo renditions of ‘Lenders in the Temple’ and ‘Milk Thistle’ are musically great, but the performance is a little tarnished by the fact that Oberst himself gives off an air that he doesn’t fancy “End of the World” or any other festival appearance where he can see his breath in the chilly night air. Thankfully this has no particular bearing on what remained a thoroughly pleasing first day. Indeed, moments like this only stand out because of the amount of other performers – from Richard Hawley to Noah and the Whale, Bon Iver to Darren Hayman – that explicitly mention that out of all the festivals they’ve been to or played, End of the Road is up there with the best of them.

With Saturday comes sunshine and things are going so well that even the “No Alcohol” sign has disappeared and everyone is free to wander round with whatever cheap cans of lager they wish to. This sunny second day allows End of the Road’s crowning glory to come to the fore. The Garden Stage has to be the most idyllic setting in which I’ve ever watched music. Set in a clearing and surrounded by a line of trees on one side and hedges on the other, it is a natural amphitheatre, with antiquated buildings dotted around the edge to complete the Midsummer Night’s Dream feeling of the place, along with the almost surreal scene of peacocks (left) wandering amongst the people. On top of this, the sound on this main stage is as good as I’ve experienced at any outdoor show, something that makes such a difference given the different textures of the weekend’s performances.

The first one of the day is Absentee (left), who put their unique and deliciously lugubrious stamp on proceedings. Bowerbirds (below) then translate their bewitching songs to the Garden Stage, enrapturing the growing afternoon crowd with harmonious folk from debut album Hymns for a Dark Horse, while over in the Big Top, the slightly incongruous looking collective The Accidental do something rather similar. With talkative boy-girl vocalists Hannah Caughlin (also part of The Bicycle Thieves) and Liam Bailey flanked by elder statesmen Stephen Cracknell (The Memory Band) and Sam Genders (Tunng), they look a bit funny, but sound perfectly lovely. With the sun out, though, it is difficult to justify being inside and so its back outside to see the closest to current pop stars on show over the weekend, Noah & the Whale (below). Predictably, Charlie Fink and cohorts’ sunny folk-pop complements the weather perfectly, though, as with everyone who’s been near a radio for half an hour this year, (for good or bad) the ‘5 Years Time’ melody remained firmly lodged in the consciousness for many hours.

Late afternoon brings a multi-national three-way clash between Fins Seabear, Reading’s Pete & the Pirates and Bon Iver from across the pond. After catching the first couple from Seabear in a very sweaty Bimble Inn tent it’s fresh air time again and there’s really nowhere else to head but to get a decent spot for Bon Iver. One of many of the foreign acts who espouse from the stage about what a special place this is to play music, Justin Vernon and his band reprise their triumphant recent UK performances, playing For Emma, Forever Ago in its entirety along with an impressive new song and a Talk Talk cover. The crowd sing-along of ‘The Wolves (Parts I and II)’ is as powerful in a big field as it was in a St. Giles Church back in June, and from start to finish it is a mesmerising display. If everyone takes one musical memory of End of the Road 2008 away with them, the majority will probably take this one.

Following an entertaining set from British Sea Power, it is back to the Americans to provide the closing entertainment of the night. Low’s genre-defining slowcore can be intense at the best of times, but in the most controversial and unsettling moment of the weekend, singer/guitarist Alan Sparhawk seems to suffer a complete breakdown during the course of their set. Silent for the first part of the performance, he announces half way through “What a shitty day. Everyone I love told me they hate me today”. A mostly powerful but occasionally excruciating conclusion to the band’s show culminates in a moment of utter madness as Sparhawk flings his guitar full pelt into the front row of the audience. It’s a shame that he is having a bad day, but it’s pretty dangerous. Luckily, no harm is done, but a few humble apologies from the remainder of the band don’t wash away the nasty taste left in the mouth by an incident so out of keeping with the amiable atmosphere of the rest of the festival. All this puts a slight dampener on Mercury Rev’s grandiose headline gig, which makes for the perfect opportunity to explore the rest of the site.

A trip into the woods, or “Enchanted Forest” to give it its proper – and quite apt – name, brings some idyllic discoveries. With all completely lit by fairy lights, there is a “library” in one clearing, a public piano in another (ivories being tinkled by buskers throughout the evening – a drunken ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ sing-along symptomatic of the fun to be had), and an isolated tent with a light up dancefloor (left) in another (not to mention the “healing tent”). And these delightful touches are by no means the end of the bright ideas at End of the Road, with the Little White Lies film tent proving consistently popular, The Local and Bimble tents seemingly always full and even a small tent set up like your living room – complete with sofas, a record player and, remarkably, Trivial Pursuit. But back to Saturday night and after a lost while in the Enchanted Forest, a final stumble to the Big Top for Two Gallants is good fun, but the big tent sound unfortunately doesn’t really do justice to their undeniably great songs. That said, the duo still conjure up some crowd-pleasing moments, not least an absorbing ‘Despite What You’ve Been Told’ and rocking ‘Las Cruces Jail’. Spirits remain high for the remaining few hours of managing to stand up, with a variety of tents in which to dance and make further merry (walking into the Big Top to the sound of The Count Five’s ‘Psychotic Reaction’ is a lingering memory).

With Sunday comes more sun and the promise of a day of music to rival the first two excellent ones. If there’s any justice The Wave Pictures (above) will be a hell of a lot higher on the bill at next year’s End of the Road. Providing the perfect afternoon’s entertainment, the band sound even better than on record through a sparkling set that includes crowd requests alongside favourites from Instant Coffee Baby. They are without doubt a weekend highlight and whet the appetite for what’s to come. The band should also get some sort of medal for getting around as much as they do. Dave Watkins is clearly the most hard-working man of the festival, also reporting for duty with Darren Hayman and Jeffrey Lewis. Jason Molina’s set of Songs: Ohia and Magnolia Electric Co. songs is a serene affair, but a beautiful one nonetheless, Molina at once dapper and reserved. End of the Road Records’ own Woodpigeon are perfect to play the late afternoon set, the Canadians twee harmonies suiting the surroundings impeccably. A poignant note is provided in the Big Top, where indie godfather Darren Hayman admits that him and Jack probably won’t be playing too many more Darren and Jack Play Hefner Songs shows. A shame this would indeed be, but the all too brief set is a regressive delight, transporting many a viewer to a simpler time when John Peel was on the radio, Hefner were your favourite band and each of Hayman’s ‘Hymns’ (‘to the Alcohol’, ‘to the Cigarettes’, ‘to the Postal Service’ etc) took on almost religious significance. The set closes – perhaps for the last time – with the set culminating in a brilliant guitar duel between Darren, Jack and who else but Dave Watkins.

Here there is a disastrous gap in this writer’s weekend’s experience. One problem with so much music is that there is always going to be potential greatness missed. In my case, I manage to spectacularly avoid some of the things I was really looking forward to during the course of the weekend, including both of The Acorn’s two sets, Pete & the Pirates, Shearwater, Cats in Paris, David Thomas Broughton and Kurt Wagner to name a few. In this case, perhaps the biggest clash of the weekend – Jeffrey Lewis vs Tindersticks – results in me inexplicably missing both of them. However, my festival is brought to a fitting close by the wonderful Calexico, who are the perfect culmination to the weekend on the Garden Stage and outdo almost all that preceded them. The Tucsonites entertain all before them with their unique Mexi-Americana, getting everyone dancing to songs from the fantastic latest album Carried to Dust, as well as many a horn-filled tune from their back catalogue. It’s nothing less than a superb end to a superb weekend of music.

End of the Road 2008 was undoubtedly an absolute success, but of course no festival is perfect. The sound in the Big Top (like almost every festival tent I’ve been in) was not the best, with the likes of Two Gallants not having justice done to their performance. There’s quite a high proportion of families at the festival – something mildly positive or negative depending on which side of parenthood you sit – while the more neutral attendees might find that there’s not a huge amount of variety on offer at the festival: if you fancy a spot of math-rock, reggae or drum’n’bass, you’re probably going to be disappointed. Despite the likes of Dirty Three’s post-rock instrumentals, Let’s Wrestle’s DIY indie-punk and Zombie Zombie’s synth-fuelled weirdness, folk, anti-folk, Americana and associated genres are over-represented to say the least (though that is, of course, the point). And one profession that doesn’t need to worry about the credit crunch quite yet is the brass players of the world – there was more trumpets and horns on show at End of the Road 2008 than an elephant on rhinoceros sex party.

These are merely trifling matters, though, and in general I don’t think I can recommend End of the Road highly enough. The setting, the atmosphere, the organisation, the thought that went in to almost every detail, not least the music – from Calexico back to Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin – everything was nigh on perfect. With Early Bird tickets on sale already, I can’t travel down the road to September 2009 fast enough.

*****

First published on rockfeedback.com. See it here.

[All pictures copyright Chris Helsen 2008]

Bon Iver - For Emma [4AD single]

Despite the ubiquity of ‘Skinny Love’ earlier in the year, ‘For Emma’ – the half-title track of Bon Iver’s debut album – is actually the first official single to be released by the band. Not only does it provide fitting accompaniment to their first proper headline tour this side of the Atlantic, but such was the consistent brilliance of For Emma, Forever Ago, it is actually quite refreshing to take one of its many standout songs on its own and really give it a listen.

Despite the pervading misery of the messy break-up lyrics, it is actually one of Justin Vernon’s more positive songs, musically speaking. The trademark aching vocal is set against rhythmic acoustic guitar, with the opening horn section as warm and comforting as a Hovis advert. In contrast to the gentle melancholy of the music, the somewhat difficult to decipher lyrics are filled with tension and resentment directed towards the eponymous ex: “Go find yourself another lover…to string along”, sings Vernon, before launching into perhaps his most memorable chorus. Another delightful instrumental positively blooming with brass and slide guitar and the fleeting moment of a song disappears from whence it came.

The B-side comes in the form of ‘Wisconsin’, perhaps a paen to the secluded cabin in which the album was written. A more subdued, hymn-like affair, Vernon’s striking vocal is left to hang above the minimal atmospheric backing. In fact, it sounds more like it was recorded under water than its origins in the snowy wilderness. Recorded as part of the For Emma, Forever Ago sessions, it is no surprise that the song gives off the same air of gloomy despair as the rest of the band’s work: “That was Wisconsin, that was yesterday / Now I have nothing that I can keep / Cos any place I go I take another place with me”. It is undoubtedly a song that could feature on any album of worth, including For Emma, Forever Ago.

Just as the appearance of ‘Skinny Love’ and Vernon’s show-stealing Later… solo performance announced the arrival of Bon Iver’s falsetto Americana earlier in this most British of summers, so ‘For Emma’ serves as a timely reminder that there are a couple more seasons left for their music to soundtrack. One of the standout tracks on a memorable album, few finer songs will be heard this year.

*****

First published on rockfeedback.com. See it here.

Video of the Month #7: James Yuill - This Sweet Love [dir. Alex Emslie]

Moshi Moshi signed anti-folk man James Yuill releases his second single for the label on 6th October. 'This Sweet Love' is a gorgeous 3 and a half minutes of acoustic-electronica reminiscent of the Trembling Blue Stars and is taken from forthcoming debut album Turning Down Water For Air, out 2 weeks after the single. The equally lovely video involves a range of people doing something that they "love" and features the best use of a black censor strip since the FCC tried to censor life in Family Guy.

Check it out right here:


This Sweet Love - James Yuill from Alex Emslie on Vimeo.

Calexico - Carried to Dust [City Slang album]

For some it was on Hot Rail (2000) that John Convertino and Joey Burns’ Tex-Mex Americana vision reached its peak. Their, well, “Cal-exican” sound felt at once warm and familiar to fans of alt-country and Americana (and before that the likes of Love) but at the same time completely unique, with mariachi story-telling on tracks like ‘Ballad of Cable Hogue’ and ‘Service and Repair’ alongside brass-laden instrumentals fitting together as perfectly as nachos and guacamole. For many others it was 2003’s well-regarded follow up Feast of Wire, but either way, there have undoubtedly been patches of near-greatness for the Tucson duo and their many contributing friends throughout their 12 years. The decision to move in a more mainstream, brass-less, instrumental-less direction on 2006’s Garden Ruin, though, didn’t really reach the heights that might have been expected of it. So (if bands like Calexico actually worry about such things) sixth album Carried To Dust could be something of a pivotal release: returning to their desert roots (as the album’s title may imply) or carrying on down the shiny path to a potentially wider audience.

With that in mind, the opening ‘Victor Jara’s Hands’ seems like a statement of intent, containing each of the elements that first set the band apart from their contemporaries, from jubilant brass, to Spanish vocals, to the Latin American subject matter. It’s a bubbly start and has all the hallmarks of a live favourite, but for some reason there’s something that, at least at first, just doesn’t sit quite right about this re-introduction to the sounds of the dusty West – it ’s almost as if the band might be trying too hard to re-capture former glories. The hushed ‘Two Silver Trees’ is definitely heading in the right direction thanks to a dream-like chorus, but it still doesn’t quite excite as much as it could.

It takes until the gorgeous waltz ‘The News About William’, that builds from rattling drums and delicate strings to the closing soaring vocals, that Carried To Dust really settles into its groove. And from here it is some groove. The brief instrumental ‘Sarabande in Pencil Form’ is a strangely settling segue into ‘Writer’s Minor Holiday’ and ‘Man Made Lake’, songs that certainly confirm the growing suspicion: Calexico are back on form. In a big way. The road-trip rhythms, backing “ooohs” and “aaahs” and lyrics about “my Irish whiskey glass” of the former track, conjure up lofty literary allusions of a hard-drinking Kerouac or Bukowski, while the screeching guitars and dramatic tones of the latter picks up where ‘The News About William’ left off, showcasing the more impressive end of Joey Burns’ range compared with the whispered gruffness elsewhere.

Thankfully, the standard far from drops after this auspicious couplet and there are more and more signposts to the fact that this is Calexico on top of their game. The Latin sounds of the bouncy duet ‘Inspiracion’ provide a convenient time to practice your conversational Spanish, and this along with the likes of ‘House of Valparaiso’ (featuring old friend Iron &Wine’s Sam Beam) and the instrumental ‘El Gatillo (Trigger Revisited)’ recalls the finer mariachi moments of Calexico’s back catalogue. For the latter this is literally the case, it being a re-imagining of the Feast of Wire track ‘The Trigger’, but the initial concerns about the opening track being an attempt to recapture something lost are proven totally unfounded with each passing song. And in contrast to the it is perhaps the aching ballad ‘The Slowness’, steeped in pedal steel and lovely boy-girl harmonies is perhaps the most enrapturing moment, providing the soft centre to the album.

At 15 tracks Carried To Dust is a relatively long album (though not particularly by Calexican standards), but such is the consistency and vibrancy of almost every one of them that it seems to fly by, right up to the three suitably delightful compositions that wrap it up: a third and equally satisfying instrumental, ‘Falling From Sleeves’, the broody ‘Red Blooms’, and another triumphant collaboration, ‘Contention City’ with Tortoise’s Doug McCombs. Along with the other four fifths of the record, these tracks are filled with a whole range of textures – layers that get deeper and richer with every listen. To return to the original suggestion, it seems that rather than revert back entirely to their roots or continue down the road on which Garden Ruin seemed to be headed, Calexico have taken an entirely preferable route. For throughout the album the band perfectly bridge the gap between their unique Tex-Mex heritage and a more rounded sound.

If you were being overly critical you could say it is perhaps a little “lite” in a few places and lacks some of the menace of earlier works, but Calexico’s sixth long player is a real triumph, and at least as good as Feast of Wire, Hot Rail or anything they have put their name to thus far. The best thing is, the way it all clicks in to gear here makes for great excitement about Convertino and Burns’ future work – something you probably couldn’t have said if they had made a Garden Ruin Part 2. As it is, with Carried to Dust Calexico have hit the pinata squarely on the nose, and we are the lucky ones left to reap the candy they have left scattered beneath.

****

First published on rockfeedback.com. See it here.

Conor Oberst - Souled Out!!! [Wichita Single]

So 13 years since his last solo album (released when he was still just 15), Conor Oberst has decided to freshen things up a little, give Bright Eyes a bit of a breather and go back to basics with his fourth solo effort overall, Conor Oberst. Maybe he just felt he needed some Conor time. Whatever the reasons behind the return to singledom, thankfully (or not, depending on your point of view) very little seems to have altered musically in this new eponymous direction, with much of Conor Oberst – not least single ‘Souled Out!!!’ – continuing in a the same more polished vein as 2007’s Cassadaga and before that ‘I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning’.

On the evidence of ‘Souled Out!!!’ it does seem that being freed of the Bright Eyes moniker has left Oberst in a particularly relaxed frame of mind. Virtually everything about this free spirited single, from the carefree pun of the exclamatory title, to the regular background chatter and descent into laughter mid-verse, has a throwaway air to it. Fairly non-sensical lyrics about things like flying “to the moon in a soda can” fill the verses, while the euphoric chorus announces that “You won’t be getting in” because – there’s that pun again – it’s all “souled out in heaven”. Despite this un happy conclusion, Conor et al certainly sound like they are having fun and it all adds up to a breezy country rock sing-along that is by no means Oberst’s finest hour, but remains a perfectly agreeable listen.

There is actually something surprisingly Oasis-like about ‘Souled Out!!!’, with both the simple scale of the opening guitar solo and the chorus backing vocals sounding rather Noel-esque (not to mention the soul-related pun). If the Gallaghers had been more into the Stones than the Beatles and just spent the summer listening to Exile on Main Street, they might have come up with something bit like this. Taking on board this comparison, the ultra cynical might even think that, taken in isolation, this song bears all the hallmarks of a 3 and a half minute, written for radio single, and that his forays with the Mystic Valley Band may even be Oberst’s way of cashing in without damaging the Bright Eyes brand. This would be way too harsh on man who has already enjoyed the top two singles on the Billboard chart, though, and one who has been turning out albums full of alt-country gems for over 15 years. Especially when you take into account that Conor Oberst is another such record.

In reality, ‘Souled Out!!!’ is just a slightly more radio-friendly than usual taster of another very good album from Conor Oberst. Whether you think the man’s “souled out” or not, you can call it what you want: Conor Oberst, Bright Eyes, it’s all pretty much business as usual.

(For fans of US pop culture it’s worth noting that, as well as download, the single is available as a 7” featuring an etching by Grace McSorely comic creator Kaite Murphy.)

***

First published on rockfeedback.com. See it here.