A mature festival like SXSW, running for the first time in London, has some serious expectations to meet. SXSW is unparalleled in size, using Austin’s big convention centre, numerous hotels, cinemas, and music venues, but with a remarkably compact footprint. You can overdose on music, films and interesting talks, without straying too far from the convention centre or hotel. Austin seems to have a density of music venues, probably unparalleled outside of Nashville.

London’s iteration announced that it was going to be based in Shoreditch. There are obvious synergies. The ‘New Media’ industries that based themselves in Shoreditch over the last 20 years, are always in attendance and Austin has clearly influenced Shoreditch over the last 20 years.

However, there are fundamental problems SXSW London needed to address and sadly, they go beyond there being no breakfast tacos. My first concern was simply that I’m not sure Shoreditch is capable of hosting a festival of SXSW Austin’s size. London as a whole is. It has the conference centres. It has more music venues than Austin. It has more cinema screens. But it is also a massive city compared to tiny Austin. Its conference centres are spread across the city. Its music venues sprout up in little creative hubs across the city and while say Leicester Square could handle the film festival, they would be too expensive and big for the festival to use and the smaller arthouse cinemas are spread across the city.

Another problem, unlike Austin, where it takes place over 10 days and Interactive finishes and music takes over, this festival was going take place over 6 days. The overlap between ‘interactive’ attendees and music has always been remarkably small, with the interactive attendees seemingly on company expenses, leaving at the start of music, so there’s no competition over venues. Clearly squashing everything into six days, across an unknown number of venues – with no conference centre in Shoreditch meant that the perceived value of conference badges was far less. You might therefore expect the badges to be cheaper. But they weren’t. The Platinum badge for London was more expensive than the last badge I bought in 2019. They even tried to pull a US trick that us in the UK aren’t used to. Quoting ticket prices excluding VAT.

Given all these unknowns. You would assume that SXSW London would try to cover them off to encourage ticket sales. With regular news about speakers, the venues they were using, featured films and artists playing the music festival, etc. Instead, it seemed their main approach was simply to offer discounts to previous SXSW attendees and to stay quiet about what we should expect for our money. There was no way I was purchasing a full badge for what was clearly going to be a second-class experience.

When they finally announced the list of artists. The lineup wasn’t what I was expecting. I was expecting it to be full of the best new indie talent from around the UK and Europe. Instead, there were slim pickings. I guess in an effort to reflect the more diverse music of London, there was much more R&B and rap. In fairness, this was the right thing to do, this diverse mix of music reflects London’s music scene. But to sell tickets, you need to provide something to entice the usual gig attendees. The lineup was so unappealing that none of my gig buddies bought tickets. These are the very people you would expect to jump at buying wristbands, people who gig across London most nights and attend festivals like the Great Escape. Their argument were that there was more than enough good stuff happening in London and with no clear draw, it was easier to do a normal gigging week.

I’m of the belief that London is crying out for a multi-day, multi-venue festival. Other UK cities have them. Many, like The Great Escape, seem to have modelled themselves on SXSW and I expected SXSW London to be in prime position to become the London multi-venue festival. However, after this first festival, they have a lot of work to do to make this happen.

A few weeks before the festival started, they finally announced venues and music wristbands. The wristbands were very reasonably priced. £100 for the six day music pass. The venues, were pretty much what I expected. XOYO, Village Underground, Old Blue Last, Rich Mix, Strong Room Bar, Jaguar Shoes, Colours. There were some surprises, such as Shoreditch Town Hall.

On the surface it didn’t look too bad. Not brilliant. But not bad. There seemed to be no late licenses. So venues would finish at 11pm meaning I could travel in each day and go home to my own bed.

However, in reality, there was a lot of walking for very slim pickings. At SXSW I can see 35 bands in a day jumping between venues on Reds and 6th Street. At SXSW London, I was seeing less than 10 bands a day. I see more at The Great Escape and I’ve spent years moaning about the venue density.

What surprised me most, was how little impact SXSW had on Shoreditch. On the first day, walking down from St Pancras, through Angel, down to Old Street, I didn’t see a single poster or sign. Even in Shoreditch, it wasn’t prominent. Most bars, shops, cafes and restaurants seemed oblivious to SXSW with no signs encouraging SXSW attendees into their establishments.

The second day, I got off at London Bridge as I wanted to visit WEX on Commercial Road. Walking up Brick Lane to the main conference hub at the Truman Brewery, you wouldn’t know anything was happening. Basically the first SXSW sign I saw was at the Brewery. This isn’t a SXSW I’m used to. You can’t move in Austin for SXSW branding. Austin breathes SXSW.

Despite some backing from Sadiq Khan, the festival was almost invisible. This isn’t unusual for London. Even big football matches can have little impact on the city. But you expect the local area to embrace the event. Shoreditch seemed oblivious the event was happening. This has to change for the festival to be successful. London needs to do better. Sadly, with some venues seeing really low footfall, they might have a problem convincing existing venues to participate next year.

During the week, the lack of venues proved problematic. Some had dual use. During the day they were conference venues, in the evening music venues. At times there were only half a dozen venues in use and given the diversity of music, it meant at times there wasn’t much to listen to. That isn’t to say I didn’t try other music genres, but none of it really excited me. At one point on Friday afternoon, there were only three venues with music on. That’s just not good enough.

One advantage of the low key first year was that despite there being few venues, most of the time it was easy to get into venues. This was a real positive. If I’m dragging myself 20 minutes across Shoreditch, I need to know I’m getting in. Other than one event, even the Village Underground was easy to get into – and with none of their usual security search shenanigans.

Hopefully, they can grow the venue density over the next year by enticing some of the pubs to host gigs while increasing the audience. If they just increase the audience, then there simply isn’t enough venues and everyone will be queuing.

One massive positive was that the British Music Embassy put in a short but welcome appearance. The BME is sponsored by industry and the DTI to promote the British music industry in the USA. So you wouldn’t expect them to be hosting a venue in the UK. I think there was a realisation that maybe SXSW London needed a bit of a helping hand and they spun this up at the last minute. Anyone who’s been to Austin knows that the British Embassy team are one of the best. Taking over Devonshire Square for two days, featuring some of the hottest bands who played their Austin venue, such as Gurriers, they provided a real showcase venue. Hopefully, they will be more involved next year.

Sadly, SXSW London hadn’t enticed any of the national groups who put on SXSW events in Austin. The Aussies are still taking their music to The Great Escape. SXSW London seemed to have missed a great opportunity to encourage the European music industry to bring their country’s artists over.

Not everything was within the control of SXSW. Unfortunately, like Austin last year, SXSW London experienced some controversy. Several artists signed up to SXSW without researching what SXSW is. Pulling out when they realised that the main conference featured talks from politicians and companies with connection to activities they didn’t agree with. Then the usual peer pressure caused artists to drop out at the last minute when they decided Tony Blair speaking at the conference, didn’t fit with their morals.

I don’t have an issue with artists pulling out of events when they are caught off guard or protesting when they don’t agree with something. Many argued SXSW Music told them that there wouldn’t be anyone controversial giving keynotes. There seemed to be a feeling that the different SXSW stands were keeping each other in the dark and that SXSW Music were unaware Blair was speaking. Personally, I don’t buy this. I don’t think SXSW perceived Blair as an issue and they are hardly going to tell bands that their big surprise was that they had arranged for ex-Prime Ministers to talk. It’s also hardly surprising that there might be individuals on panels who might have connections to things artists don’t like. I always feel artists should play and make it known that they disagree. But they shouldn’t don’t pull out due to peer pressure. In this case, many just look like idiots who had not bothered to research what SXSW does.

Rant over.

But it was annoying.

Some lineups were devastated, with massive gaps in the running order. When many of the stages had hand curated their lineups, trying to encourage representation. Artists pulling out denied opportunities to other who may have benefitted from the exposure. From my perspective, at times it meant very little music. Given most stages tried to be diverse, alongside numerous lineups that defaulted to diversity, such as two stages of South Asian music and several LGBTQ+ stages. There were points in each day when there were zero indie artists. Best way to illustrate the issue was Scottish music brought no indie artists. Probably fulfilling their arts funding, they brought a diverse selection of artists. But when everyone else was doing the same, it meant the lineup didn’t appeal to the average ‘6 Music’ gig goer.

Next year they need to tweak the formula. Increase the number of venues to get more of the normal traditional indie fare on the bill. They shouldn’t reduce the ratio of artists from the diverse musical and social backgrounds by increasing the indie representation by adding new venues. They need to keep the number of venues with none indie music as I think this could be SXSW’s key unique selling point compared to all the UK indie festivals. Maybe they need to encourage some of the notable indie venues around London and the UK to bring local lineups, so the traditional indie audience will buy tickets. Personally, I think it would also be good to get London-based Loud Women involved who seem to strike a good balance pushing inclusivity.

Musically, it could have been stronger. If this is the standard next year, The Great Escape will feel relieved. Many of the artists I saw, I had seen before. New artists that stood out were Bethia Beadman, August Charles, Cosmonaut, Uncle Junior, Karma Sheen, HMS Morris. But there were slim pickings. A weekender at the Windmill would have a stronger lineup.

There are some things the festival can’t fix, the main one being the weather. It wasn’t fun trekking between venues in the pouring rain. Maybe next year there needs to be SXSW branded umbrellas? It was most definitely not the Austin experience.

What was most disappointing, by the time Saturday came round I think the corporates were heading home. With heavy rain that day, I think people headed home and footfall was atrocious and by the end, Benefits, the last band of the day had maybe a dozen people watching them in an empty 93 East. With such poor turnout at these venues, SXSW may have a job convincing them to take part next year.

SXSW is definitely a ‘work in progress’. It felt like it was a pencil sketch of a potentially good idea. Apparently SXSW London operates as a franchise and has a multi-year contract. The talk at the festival was that there is a Berlin addition planned. If that’s the case, London needs to quickly turn its pencil sketch into a more realised version. Berlin sounds more attractive to me. My feeling after this year is that it has a long way to go to convince the UK that this is the default place to find new music. It may end up having to drop live music from the festival and accept it is simply an ideas festival.

Artists seen

Amelia Coburn, Anaiis, August Charles, Ava Joe, Baby Said, Benefits, Catrin Finch and Aoife Ni Bhrian, Beauty Sleep, Bethia Beadman, Charlie Austin, Christopher Clarke, Clara Serra Lopez, Cosmonaut, Cucamaras, Eden J Howells, Ella Jinks, Ellor, Enjoyable Listens, Florence Road, Gia Ford, GIFT, Girlband!, Gurriers, HMS Morris, Hollows, Hornet, Jay Chakravorty, Joviale, Kaoti, Karma Sheen, Kay Greyson, Korda Korder, Levitation Orchestra, L’Objectif, Lucky Iris, Orchards, MONO, Mystery Time, Nikitar, PRITT, Robinson’s Village, Samuel Sharp, Salvana, Sm*sher, Sol Paradise, Stay In Nothing, SUDS, Sunflower Thieves, Taliable, Tatyana, The White Gates Band, Thistle, Trisha Tan, Uncle Junior, Vegas Water Taxi, Vulva Voce, Wave Machine, Wildes, Yasmin Umay

While we can all speculate what happened during that tour. There is no denying that at their peak, the Civil Wars created some fantastic evenings. Oddly, I said at the time that the Roundhouse gig wasn’t one of them. The tension was clear to those who’d seen them before. There both were going through the motions. 

After the split. I think we can see the different attitudes. John Paul disappeared home keeping himself to himself.  Joy on the other hand seemed to be set on singing anything. Gone were the expertly crafted tunes for mainstream pop. So it was good to see John Paul finally return with material that wears its heart on its sleeve. 

Tonight’s gig at Bush Hall had a lot of the passion, emotion and dry wit I remember from the earlier Civil Wars gigs. Simple wellwritten songs full of emotion. It was great to have him back. 

This year, I’d dropped any such criteria and just concentrated on it being an enjoyable short break and from this perspective, it was definitely successful and I think this festival is now an essential fixture in my calendar.

This year was a good example of how my approach has changed. In all honesty, I didn’t feel the line-up was too inspiring. My first year, I would have found this frustrating. But I think like this year’s SXSW. We’re in a lull year. There wasn’t really a buzz around any new bands. But this year wearing a different hat, it didn’t bother my. The festival is so cheap that it’s still good value if you only catch two of three bands. With the early bird tickets, it works out at only £15 per day and at that price, you really can’t go wrong. So this year, I was just happy to bounce around and catch whoever I could find.

[youtube xB4ZMu297pk]

Day 1

Shark Dentist, Leif Erikson, Good Foxy, FRIGS, Cosmic Strip, Catholic Action, Anna Meredith, Crows, White Miles, Frankie Cosmos, Amy Von, Larkin Poe, Banff, Howling Owl, Wyldest, Cloves, Bleached, Anteros
(Bold – liked, italics – band I’ve never seen before)

As you can see from the list above. I concentrated on catching new bands. Starting the festival were Shark Dentist, a band I’d heard good things about. Sadly they didn’t do much for me.

Shark Dentist

Good Foxy

The first band who stood out were Canadian band FRIGS. They have a punky attitude led by their lead singer who growls into the mic. They were easily my band of the day.

Cosmic Strip

Cosmic Strip

Cosmic Strip

An enjoyable rocky set from Scottish band Catholic Action.

TGE was my first chance to catch Anna Meredith. I’m not sure a festival is the right place to catch her, as she mixes electronic music with cellos and brass. But the crowd were respectful and I enjoyed the set.

The always excellent CROWS bringing the performance to me, after I arrived late and was stuck at the back

I have a sneaky liking for the Hub. It’s a tiny tube-like venue in the sea wall. It’s got a claustrophobic feeling that works well with rock bands (although you do have to get to the front, otherwise you don’t see anything). So making my first visit of the trip, I accidentally stumbled upon a band I’d seen last year, White Miles. They’re a two piece with a lead singer with a lot of energy. They worked pretty well in this venue.

Frankie Cosmos

Amy Von

Larkin Poe

Banff

Howling Owl

Wyldest

Coves

Bleached

Bleached

Anteros

Day 2

Aldous Harding, Exmagician, Barbarella’s Bang Bang, Nadine Carina, REWS, Kim Churchill, PAUW, Ellie Ford, Dream Wife, Baba Naga, Inis Mor, Pleasure Beach, James Gruntz, Blush, Drones Club, Black Honey, The Anchoress

Starting Day 2 was the ever fantastic Aldous Harding. I think she’s a bit special. There’s something etherial about her performances that I just can’t get enough of. So it was a great way to start the day, but also a risky one. Starting the day on a big high means it can only go downhill. Luckily, there were a few bands playing who I thought could act as strong anchors. Dream Wife and Baba Naga around the middle of the day and Black Honey, to close the day. In all honesty, very little stood out during the rest of the day. But these acts were worth the admission alone.

Aldous Harding

REWS

Kim Churchill

PAUW

Ellie Ford

Dream Wife

Baba Naga

Inis Mor

One of the biggest draws at TGE this year was local band, Black Honey. I’m a bit of a fan of this band. Izzy the lead singer is pretty awesome. There’s a swagger about her that means this band is destined for big things. Obviously without the music it wouldn’t work and luckily they have some very catchy music. Izzy’s also brilliant to photograph as she always puts on a good show. Tonight they were playing Brighton Pier and I believe they closed the pier as the venue was at capacity. I suspect this is the last year they’ll be playing TGE as they’ll be too big next year.When I arrived there was a frankly awful band called Drone Club. I’d assumed that most people were there for Black Honey and was resigned to watch from afar. But oddly, it turned out, most people were there for Drone Club. As you can see from the photos and video. The crowd disappeared and I walked straight to the front. I guess that’s the great thing about music. What’s rubbish to one person is brilliant to another (though I’m sticking by Drone Club being the worst band I saw at TGE16)

Closing the evening was the Anchoress on the BBC Introducing stage. I quiet liked what I heard. But I have to admit, I’d done enough standing around and not enough drinking so I decided to call it a day and head off to find a pub.

Steve Lamacq introducing the Anchoress

Day 3

Joe Nolan, Coves, Pollyanna, Glass, Chastity, Post Heather, Beverly, Chastity Belt, Aldous Harding, Margo Price, Joy Formidable, Cult of Dom Keller, NOTS, Diet Cig

Oddly, when I’d pre-planned the final day. I hadn’t identified much of interest other than bands I had already seen. So I decided to just base it on take it easy. But there was the odd thing. Beverly was pretty good. I caught Aldous again. Watched some of the FA Cup final and decided to take a chance on getting in to see the Joy Formidable. Luckily, I think the walk down to the Concorde on a cold evening had put people off, so just like the night before with Black Honey, I was able to walk straight up to barrier. I spoke to a long time JF fan after the gig who’s extremely disappointed with their new material. But personally. I loved their performance. To close the evening. I headed to my favourite venue, Sticky Mikes to catch NOTS and Diet Cig, who’s lead singer was still bouncing around as if it was the start of the whole thing. She’s like a walking (and bouncing) advert for Duracell. Amazing energy, another fun performance and a good way to close off this year’s TGE.

Joe Nolan

Coves

A slightly mad Glass

Chastity

Chastity Belt

The wonderful Aldous Harding

Margo Price

Great performance from Joy Formidable

With so many bands around, it’s now possible to catch gigs from the first day as some of the corporate parties have bands play and this was the case this time, with the White Denim playing on the first evening. But even before SXSW started it was possible to catch some of the great local Austin music by simply walking into any of the dive bars on 6th street.

2016 was a bit of an odd year. Yes, there were hundreds of great bands around but despite the fact that it was SXSW’s 30th anniversary, there wasn’t the buzz of previous years. There weren’t any massive bands playing secret shows and during the day and there seemed to be less parties. I think part of this is due to Austin trying to reduce the crowds turning up for the free parties. But I’m not sure this really is working, the crowds were still massive and they seemed to be mainly walking around on the streets. It didn’t help that Austin police had decided to introduce some crowd control measures that made it very difficult to move between venues.

One of the reasons why I loved SXSW was that it was so easy to move between dozens of venues and catch bands. If you didn’t like the band, you could then move across the road and see another one. So it’s been a great place to hear lots of different types of music and discover new bands.

This year, the venue density was lower. Last time I was here, quite a few showcases had shifted to Rainey street but there was still a good core set of venues on 6th and Red River. This time, some venues had shifted out east of I35. These tended to be sponsored venues with the bigger bands and I think part of the reason is to encourage people to stick to the venue. If you’ve queued to get into a venue that’s out of the way, you’re going to stay. Unfortunately, the venues that were left on 6th had changed. At my last visits, The Parish and Maggie Mae’s offered five stages that you could loop around in 10 minutes and catch a lot of music. The Parish was now a single venue and Maggie Mae’s split their stages into separate venues so you had to leave one venue to go back in. Maggie Mae’s also seemed to have switched to programming electronic and rap music and this unfortunately was also the case for several other venues.

In all honesty, rap is the biggest problem facing SXSW. The increase in rap programming seemed to encourage massive crowds who were seeking free gigs hoping that big name rappers were going to turn up. This also encouraged ‘rappers’ turning up often with massive crews trying to push their rap albums on the crowds on 6th street. I’m not sure if rap had led to issues at previous SXSW’s but it seemed like they’d concentrated rap programming into single venues often with heavy security. But this mean that whole venues disappeared off my ‘bounce circuit’. At times 6th street was literally at a standstill.

Unfortunately, the thing I really loved about SXSW was the ability to bounce around venues. I go to SXSW to discover new music. I tend to plan lightly with just a few bands I’d like to see and then just bounce up and down 6th and Red. With the increased crowds I just wasn’t getting to see the same level of bands I’d expect to see each day. Don’t get me wrong, during the music part of SXSW, I was still seeing 20-30 bands a day but it took a lot of effort to catch this number and it took a few days to optimise my route to maximise the amount of bands I caught.

It sounds like I didn’t enjoy myself this time. This is far from the truth. I had a brilliant time watching some great bands in venues ranging from churches to dive bars.

There were the usual programming surprises, where you stumble upon a band you hadn’t realised were playing SXSW. For example going to a venue to watch the excellent Ezra Furman and realising that Mercury Rev were on afterwards. So getting the opportunity to see a great band in a relatively tiny venue.

Them there was the opportunity to see music that I’d never otherwise catch, such as the South Korean band Jambinai who mix traditional Korean instruments to create some really good ambient rock music.

It was also an opportunity to catch many British bands that I hadn’t managed to catch at home. Often they were playing the frankly excellently organised and managed British Music Embassy. YAK, a band I’d been unable to catch in London, I caught playing an excellent set at the British Music Embassy.

In total I managed to catch over 130 bands. This isn’t the complete list as I didn’t catch the name of every band but as you can see it’s a pretty diverse range of bands

[Alexandros], Abjects, Amber Arcades, Autobahn, Avec Sans, Baby Shakes, Basia Bulat, Big Thief, Big Ups, Black Fast, Blaenavon, The Blind Suns, Bombino, Boy Toy, Burn Out, CallMeKat, Capsula, Castillo, Caveman, Chad Valley, Chocolat, Ciaran Lowery, Clean Cut Kid, The Crookes, Demob Happy, DEXSTRINGs, Diet Cig, Dilly Dally, The Do Aways, Dude York, Elanor Friedberger, Enemies, Ezra Furman, Faith Healer, Fear of Men, FEWS, Fior, Fizzy Blood, Get Inuit, Gold Class, Golden Boys, The Gooch Palms, Guerrilla Toss, Gwenno, GYMNSHORTS, Haelos, Harts, Heaters, The Heavy, Hinds, Hooton Tennis Club, Houndstooth, Jack Garrett, Jane Weaver, Judah and the Lion, Juiceboxxx, Kat Dehlia, Keeps, Khruangbin, Laura Carbone, Lazyeyes, Lushes, Lusts, The Parrots, Petite Noir, PMS and the Mood Swings, Jambinai, Julia Jacklin, Luke Sweeney, Magic Is Real, Mainland, Mercury Rev, _Methyl Ethyl, Modern Sons, MONEY, Mothers, Moustache Prawn, Mr Lewis and the Funeral, Nancy Pants, New Berlin, Night Moves, Obn IIIs, Oh Pep!, The Outfit, TX, PARTYBABY, PHASES, PINS, Phebe Starr, Poliça, Power Trip, Protomartyr, Pure Bathing Culture, Queen Suitcase, Ritual Howls, Rozi Plain, Rubblebucket, Runaway Saints, The San Juan Project, Sara [], September Girls, Seratones, Sister Fuzz, Slingshot Dakota, Sorority Noise, Spooklyland, Sons of an Illustrious Father, Spook School, Stealing Sheep, Sunflower Bean, Sweet Talk, Sweet Spirit, Sugarmen, Tacocat, TEEN, Tele Novella, Tiger Town, Thelma and the Sleaze, Trash, Trevor Sensor, Twin Limb, VACATION, Violet Skies, Warprty, Waxahatchee, The Weather Station, Welshly Arms, White Denim, White Lung, The Whistles and the Bells, Wild Belle, Yak, Yonatan Gat

I’ve highlighted bands who stood out. I thought Yak and Yonatan Gat stood put in the best performances of SXSW. But bands such as Sunflower Bean, Ezra Furman and Mercury Rev put in really strong performances. Then there were some great unusual situations that enhanced performances, such as thunderstorms forcing the Barracuda to move their outside stage inside their venue with the bands being playing in a circle in the centre of the room surrounded by the audience. GYMNSHORTS’s performance really was enhanced by this and I’m not sure I would have been as impressed if they’d played outside on a stage.

My only disappointment was missing the Kills. They were playing two venues that according to Twitter, always seemed to have queues so I couldn’t be bothered spending time queuing to see a band I’ve seen numerous times and that I’ll catch again in the UK.

From a photography point of view. Getting a good shot wasn’t a priority. So although I had my Sony A7s with me, as soon as music officially started, I left it in my hotel and just carried a pocket camera and if there wasn’t an opportunity to get to the front, just grabbed a shot simply to document out who I’d seen. I also decided towards the end of SXSW to try and capture some of the atmosphere of SXSW and captured lots of short 20 second clips of video.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcuA-R0pCTw]

When I got back, Kit Hawes and Nuala Honan were playing. They weren’t to my taste. They were too ‘country’ for my liking.

Closing the afternoon was India Electric Company who were more traditional fair. Playing a more traditional range of folk instruments such as mandolins, accordions and fiddles they were played some nice more traditional folk music. Great music to start the year.

I guess the idea behind these evenings is to make you aware of the musical genius of the person being covered. I’m nor sure tonight’s evening did much to convert me to Lee Hazlewood’s music. Except for Josh T Pearson, most singers said little, singing their song and leaving the stage. So you were left no wiser as to why these artists wanted to cover his work. The music itself was okay, but no more. Oh well. It was worth a try.

Ren Harvey

The first few years I attended, the festival was free and based in the Hitchin town centre and had a lovely feeling. With local businesses and community getting involved. They were also constrained by the location. So had to put on more quieter folk music and the church ‘stage’ always featured interesting world, folk and classical-type music. When it moved to Hitchin Priory the focus shifted to music that was loud enough to be heard on big open air stages and in my opinion has become far less interesting musically.

On the surface, it should be a decent festival. There’s still a quieter ‘church’ stage. (with massive sound leak from the noisy main stage). There’s a ‘new music’ stage (BBC Introducing), a big main stage and a few other smaller stages. But it doesn’t work. One small stage, is a ‘mates stage’. The guy running it, puts his mates on each year and it’s lineup is a bit stale. The BBC Introducing stage seems to be 80% ’emo’ rock and despite having 100s of band in London to call upon, only seems to put bands from the ‘Three Counties’ radio catchment area. The main stage is mainstream with ‘festival world music’. You know the type, most of it sounds the same. Music styles that have been westernised by the inclusion of electric guitars and the band dress in ‘traditional dress’. It tends to be bouncy with shouting sections. It’s usually enjoyable, but it’s not something you’re going to listen to afterwards.

Cost wise, the ticket prices have jumped from £6 to £15 per day. As the early bird price of the Great Escape is only £45, you can see that at £15 per day, it’s no longer exceptional value. Last year, they also removed a stage. So there’s even less music than there used to be. Yes, it’s still ‘good value’ for a festival, but it’s not good value from a music perspective. With London on the door step. I can often see a whole day’s music for less than £15. (This weekend I saw 9 bands for £6 and my train ticket was £10). So for me, the draw to the festival isn’t as strong.

But what was the music like this year?

First up was Worry Dolls a band a friend had recommended. They sounded good and had some nice songs. But I’m not a fan of country music and they veered off into a fuller ‘Nashville’ sound far too often for my liking.

Worry Dolls

Worry Dolls

One thing they have got right, is that they have a ‘community’ stage for young local artists. Some of these were pretty decent. First person I caught on this stage was Charmaine Dawson who sounded nice.

Charmaine Dawson

Over on the ‘Arcade Electric’ stage, or the ‘mates stage’ as I call it, due to the regularity of bands getting a repeat booking, one of the said repeat bookings were playing. Maharaja Blues, mix sounds from India with American blues. It sounds okay. But this was the third time they played. If ROTW is a music festival, it should feature new music. If it’s a community festival, then it needs to drop the pretence and price.

Maharaja Blues

On the main stage, was one of the ‘World Music’ fusion bands that have become so popular at ROTW. Blending Brazilian rhythms with Ska. They sounded okay.

The Fontanas

The Fontanas

The Fontanas

Back to the little community stage and one of the first pleasant surprises of the day. A band called Adiescar were playing. The lead singer had a great voice. Her vocal style reminded me of the lead singer of Esben and the Witch. Unfortunately, the music wasn’t up to their standard. But her voice kept me interested. Unfortunately, I only managed to catch the last two songs.

Adiescar

Over on the BBC Introducing stage was the Roxy Searle Band. They didn’t really do anything for me.

Roxy Searle Band

Back to the ‘mates stage’ and a very young looking artist called Izzy Rowland. As you can see from the photo. She looks very young and appeared to only sing cover versions. But it’s all good experience. 

Izzy Rowland

Back on the main stage was another returning artist. Raghu Dixit played a few years ago. They have an ‘indian style’ fusion music. The lead singer is very engaging but the music wasn’t too strong.

Raghu Dixit

On the Introducing stage were an interesting band called ‘Live//Learn’. They’ve got a very heavy electronica sound. At times it was layered so heavily that it was almost goth. But they put on a decent show. Not my type of music. But they kept me interested

Live//Learn

Another young band, Such Strange Arts, put in a good performance. But they were the standard type of indie that Hitchin seems to like. Another pop punk band.

Such Strange Arts

An example of where the festival messes a up from a music perspective. Los Pacaminos are not a Mexican band, but 80s pop star, Paul Young’s country music band. Women of a certain age crowded the front of the stage. But the music wasn’t to my taste. It would have been much better inviting over a real country or Mexican band

Los Pacaminos

Back on the introducing stage another loud rock band, Scar City. But the lead singer put in a great performance. Sadly the crowd were small. Maybe Hitchin’s youth is growing out of punk, emo, hardcore, PPP punk, skater rock music

Scar City

Scar City

There were some ‘world’ instruments. But not sure playing a ‘world’ instrument should classify the performer as a world music artist. But at least he was closer to the festivals core. 

My surprise for the day was a Dutch(?) band called My Baby. After a slow start with several technical problems they finally got going and their rhythmic blues sound was fun to watch and listen to.

My Baby

My Baby

My Baby

English Manner

The Skints, playing a mixture of ska, reggae and hip hop played the main stage. The crowd enjoyed their performance. But they did little for me 

The Skints

Soma

Keid

One new band (I think) on the mates stage was The Fierce and the Dead. The bits I heard were almost prog-rock. But the guys seemed pretty talented. 

The Fierce and the Dead

The Fierce and the Dead

Closing the Introducing stage were an Elbiw like band, Amber Run. Sadly the crowd was still small and they missed the best band on this stage. 

Amber Run

The Brand New Heavies closed the main stage. Meh

Affinity Tribal & The Drum Work Collective closed the Church stage. Frankly this confused the hell out of me. They should have been on at the beginning of the day not the end

As you can probably guess. My love/hate relationship continued. The festival really needs to work out it’s identity. Is it Hitchin festival or a World music festival. If it’s the later, then it needs to start to improve its programming.

Day 0

Arriving a day early and with my hotel room unavailable, I headed down to the main festival site. It was a 30 minute bus ride from my base for the week near the Arc de Triomf. I was expecting to see big hordes queing to get tickets. But I was straight in and out, with my new mini backpack, wristband and access card (think it’s used to get back into the festival). My VIP wristband had a NFC id chip which would be used to gain access to the festival and VIP areas.

Although there was some music on during the evening, I opted to do some sightseeing.

Day 1

The main programme of music doesn’t start until about 5pm. This was great for me as it allowed me to spend most of the day sightseeing, drop my stuff off at the hotel and then head up to catch the music programming.

The previous day, I’d spent some time gathering my bearings and I found that it was more convienent to catch the quicker tram to the festival. It was only a few blocks away from the Arc de Triomf and there’s a platform right outside the festival site.

With VIP wristbands, access to the festival was really quick. But I never saw long queues for normal access. If you’re visting for the first time, there are bag searches and on the first day they were pretty thorougher.

Just inside the main gate was a big Rough Trade store with some familiar faces. Quiet a nice perk for the (always excellent) Rough Trade staff. There was also a poster area with some amazing illustrations from talented artists and graphic designers. Luckily the logistics of getting an undamaged poster back to the UK stopped me from spending a lot of money. But there was a lot of good work.

Home away from home

Setting up shop

Next to this area was the main food hall and bars. I’d read that Primavera was expensive. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m used to London prices but I thought the prices were very good. Half a pint of Heineken cost €3, a pint €5. A bottle of water was €2. Food prices were also decent value when compared to a London venue or UK festival. I discovered later that the prices in the VIP area were even better, with a bottle of water costing €1 and half a pint €2, making a VIP ticket very cost effective. The VIP areas also had their own toilets, which let’s face it, doesn’t really mean much to blokes, as one urinal is very much the same as another. But female toliets appeared to be cleaned regularly.

I didn’t really have any plans for the festival. Although there were a few bands I wanted to see, I thought I’d take the whole thing as it comes. Regularly move around stages and take breaks in the VIP areas if there wasn’t anything that interested me.

Despite some reservations before the festival that the site wouldn’t be laid out well. (Google maps giving me a false idea of scale), the site works really well. At one end of the site are two big stages facing each other that never have music on at the same time. These are the main ‘headline’ stages. At the other end of the site, a number of smaller stages that you can walk between very quickly. The sound at most stages was ‘okay’. But I found that the Pitchfork stage had the worst sound and you really needed to be near the sounddesk for decent sound. Unfortunately, this was also one of the smaller stages without screens. So I found this stage was always a comprimise between listening to a performance and watching a performance.

As I usually do at festivals, I spent most of my time bouncing around between stages.

Occellot – Okay. Nothing earth shattering. But a decent start to the festival

Childhood – Saw these guys at ROTW2014. Like there, it was a reasonable set that kept me interested (for a few songs at least)

Hiss Golden Messenger – Not really my type of music. A bit too country rock. But they were actually pretty good. Again kept me entertained for a song or two

The Twerps

The Pitchfork stage throughout the festival had the most interesting lineup. So I’d often swing around to see who was playing. The Twerps were the first band that I want to catch. They were quiet a good band for a sunny day with a line in jangly indie pop. Although it was pleasant, there were other bands to see…

After Twerps I headed to the ATP stage where Yasmine Hamdan was playing. She sounded interesting in the guide. Mixing arabic music with indie music. It was pleasant and I wanted to enjoy it more. But it was all too delicate for one of the bigger stages.

Sketching bands – there were a number of artists producing works over the weekend. Different from seeing the multitude of photographers usually at the front of gigs.

Although the site is commercialised, with beer from only one source and stages sponsored by companies such as Ray Ban. There were a few commercial tie-ins. But not in a way that distracted from the music

Heading back to the Pitchfork stage, I caught some of the Viet Cong set. I’d heard they were really good live. They were good. But I think they’re probably a band that play off a crowd in smaller venues and the crowd at this stage were quiet flat. But I think they’re worth catching again in a smaller venue.

As with all festivals, managing clashes is difficult. You either stick with a performance, or you try to move between stages to catch bits of both performances. Up against Viet Cong was Benjamin Booker and his set then ran into Thurston Moore’s. So I decided to ‘slice’ the sets. To try and see all three. So I decided to head off to catch the middle of Benjamin’s set before Viet Cong had finished. I’ve been trying to catch him for ages. I always seem to have another gig when he plays London. But I was really impressed by him. Good old fashioned energetic blues rock and a great voice.

Instead of heading to the front of the ATP stage to see Thurston, one of the VIP areas faced onto the ATP stage and the sound quality wasn’t too bad in there. So I decided to avail myself of the beer tent and sit and watch Thurston’s set. With the sun setting behind the stage, Thurston’s set was fantastic.

Thurston Moore Band

The sun setting on the festival

The evening for me was now winding down. Little on the bill interested me. So I headed to see Antony and the Johnstons. He really didn’t work for me. Maybe in a venue like the Barbican he might work. But a big stage at a festival. He seemed like an odd choice. Too quiet for a big venue and too arty to a big stage. His theatrics looking rather pathetic when all you’re watching is a tiny person on a stage.

I swung past a number of stages but nothing seemed to interest me so I settled with back into the VIP area and watched Spirtualized for 20 minutes or so. It was pleasant enough.

There was only really one more band on the bill who I thought worth catching, the Black Keys. But I’d seen them before at the O2 and although enjoyed them, they aren’t a band I was in a hurry to see again. So after about half an of their set, I decided it was time to head back into Barcelona.

One thing that concerned me before Primavera was the travel and Barcelona’s well-earned poor reputation for muggings (I saw one on my last night). So I was a bit wary about the late evening travel, especially as I was at this festival on my own. After midnight on the Thursday, the only options to get back into town are night buses, taxis or to walk back. However, I shouldn’t have been too concerned about catching a night bus. There was a queue of them outside the venue ready to take us back into town. I think both buses drop you off at Plaça de Catalunya. One follows the beach into town (N6) and then up past La Rambla and the other (N7) takes a more direct route. Opting for N7 to avoid walking through the La Ramblas area, it dropped me about a 15 minute walk away from my hotel. The streets in this part of the town were quieter than I would have liked, but I’d walked them the previous night heading back from La Sagrada Familia. It seemed safe enough.

Day 2

Day 2 was much the same as Day 1. In the morning I headed off into town doing some sightseeing. Heading back to my hotel for a rest before heading down to around 5pm. Like the previous day, there weren’t any real queues to get in.

I have to admit that I wasn’t overly impressed by this year’s lineup. Previous years seemed to have had more decent up and coming bands on the bill. This year seemed to be lots of old bands that I wasn’t fussed about. But I chose the festival as much for the location as anything else. Yesterday was probably the strongest bill. Today, little interested me. But that’s not necessarily a negative. It gives you more opportunity to be surprised. So like the previous day, I decided to bounce around stages to catch whoever was playing.

One of the first bands on, was the KVB. I’ve seen them play a small club in London and quiet liked their gothy sound. But I’m not sure their sound suits a warm sunny day at 6pm.

As I sung past the Ray Ban unplugged stage, Opatov sounded fun. But the stage is so small, that it’s impossible to see the band. So after a song or two, I headed down to the Primavera stage to catch Ex Hex, a band I’ve seen before and one that play simple rock and roll.

Like the previous time I saw them, their set was uncomplicated but good. So I stuck around for all their set.

Patti Smith, somebody I’ve not really listened to, was playing the main stage. Unsure of what to expect from her, I thought I’d head over and was really glad I did.

I’m ashamed to say I don’t own any Patti Smith material. In fact I’m not sure I’ve ever listened to Horses, the album she was singing in full. But although this lady may now have a few extra years behind her, she’s clearly lost none of her attitude. I think everyone of us unbelievers was converted to her church today. I think it’s time I investigated her back catalogue.

Next up was White Hill on the Adidas stage but on the way I called in a few other stages. Playing on the Ray Ban stage was The Julie Ruin. They sounded really good so I listened to a few songs before heading off to see White Hills.

There wasn’t anything particularly wrong with the White Hills and I would have been happy to listened to them, if I hadn’t just seen the Julie Ruin. But decided I preferred The Julie Ruin, so headed back.

The Julie Ruin as the sun goes down

Taking a time out, I headed back to the ATP VIP area and watched some of the Belle and Sebastian set. I’ve never really bought into them. They’ve written some catchy tunes but they always seem twee. Nothing tonight changed my opinion of them. It was ‘nice’. So after I felt sufficiently watered, it was off again to see Sleater-Kinney.

One the way to Sleater-Kinney, I dropped by Japan and I. I really wasn’t impressed.

Sleater-Kinney can’t do anything wrong at the moment. I’m not sure I can see why. They rock. But it all seems a bit old fashioned and one dimensional. They didn’t win me over.

Another old reformed band I don’t get is Ride. The first time round, they had zero impact on me. I really don’t understand why they’re meant to be a big draw. But I gave them a chance. But it was all so bland. Really? Are there no new up and coming bands better than these guys (answer is, yes loads). Were they ever ‘headline’ material? Although the crowd seemed to be enjoying their performance, I decided to head off but failed to find anything interesting, only Ariel Pink and Death from Above 1979 were remotely interesting. So I decided to head back into town to grab some beers before the tram stopped at 2am.

Ariel Pink

Death From Above 1979

Day 3

And so the final day. Like the previous days, there wasn’t really anyone I definitely wanted to see. So I continued bouncing around stages. For the first hours or so, nobody really stood out.

Kevin Morby

Holy Paul

DIIV – really disappointed by DIIV. Really couldn’t see why they have a good rep.

We Used To Pray

Bohicas raised the game slightly. With a set that concentrated on their more accessible and high energy material, perfect for the festival crowds

American Football – yet another reformed band. This year’s Primavera’s programme featured far too many reformed bands

Things picked up with Tori Amos. I have to admit, like most, I’d not kept up to date with Tori’s career after her amazing debut. So I was looking forward to seeing what she was like live. Guess what, she’s exactly like you would expect her to be. Good and ever so slightly mad. Playing two pianos (because one just isn’t enough). She kept me entertained for a few songs. It was good. But to be honest, as with a large portion of the programme, should she be featured on a 2015 festival programme? I’m also not sure she’s suited to this type of festival. People round me were talking (I know, it is a festival). But it detracted from the listening experience. So in the end I moved on.

The musical highlight of the festival was undoubtably Torres. I adored her first album and her latest is also an extremely strong album. Here, without her band and only a guitar, she played an fantastic set of mainly new material. I really looks like she feels every emotion she’s singing about. She says she’s not a guitarist, but she manages to wring sounds out of the guitar that are unique that more experienced guitarists would probably never ever think about. I really loved this performance.

Interpol were up next. I’ve never seen them. They’ve never really appealed to me. They were exactly what I thought they’d be. Okay. Nothing to dislike. Some interesting music and enough to keep me interested for a time. But I didn’t see a bright light and convert to the church of Interpol.

Heading over to see Mourn, I stumbled upon Flying Colours, a band who I thought were pretty good at the Great Escape. Again, they impressed. They’re definitely a band I need to see more of.

A few months ago I was persuaded to see Mourn. A group of Spanish teenagers who put in one of the surprising performances of this year. They play like a much older band. They’re surprisingly ‘well rounded’ for such a new and young band. So I was interested to see how well they performed on the big stage. Unfortunately they were up against the Strokes and Babes in Toyland so the crowd thinned out. I thought they made a reasonable stab at playing a festival set. But I’m not sure they’re quiet ready to be so high up the bill. But they’re still young and it’s all experience. They have so much potential and a few years of ‘stage craft’ should make them a fantastic band.

Another surprising band – and again, yet another reformed band, were Babes In Toyland. They put in a great set. It had so much more ‘punch’ than Sleater-Kinney. This is where I made a mistake. I should have stuck to this stage. But instead decided to head off to see one of the big headliners, The Strokes.

I’ve never been a big fan of the Strokes. But I’ve got a ticket to see them in Hyde Park in June. Mainly because there was a special offer and also the rest of the line-up’s pretty good, but I was also curious as to what they’re like live. Why are they so big? I’m not sure I learnt anything tonight that helps me answer that question.

Their music isn’t particularly interesting. But more concerning for the Hyde Park gigs was that I felt they phoned-in tonight’s performance. Looking at Facebook and twitter after the festival, I wasn’t the only person thinking who felt short changed by their performance. They just appeared to be playing by numbers. There was no real interaction between band members. So I’m still at a loss to why there were so many Strokes t-shirts at this festival. Their fans must be seeing something that I can’t. In the end, even the draw of the cheap beer in the nearby VIP area couldn’t keep me at this stage, so I headed off to see if there was anything else.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything that interested me other than the Hookworms at 2am. Alt-J are fine over a few songs, but not a 1 hour set so I din’t fancy sticking around until 2am to watch a band I could catch back in the UK in a decent venue. I watched the tUnE-yArDs for a brief period, but in the end I decided to catch the metro back into town before it closed and to see if there were any celebrations after Barcelona had won the cup earlier in the evening (there didn’t appear to be – only lots of pissed off Athletic Bilbao fans).

So that was my Primavera over with. I did enjoy the festival as a break. Musically I was disappointed by this year’s lineup. Sadly, there were too many old bands, many of whom I didn’t like the first time round and arguably weren’t ‘as big’ as the promoters seemed to believe they were (Ride). I’d expected there to be lots of 4am hikes back into town. But the headline acts really didn’t appeal to me and the late night programming just kind of faded into electronica. Next year they need to get more new bands on to the bill. It all sounds negative, but it wasn’t. I’d chose this festival because I wanted to visit Barcelona. The festival was simply something to keep me occupied in the evening and I enjoyed the whole experience. The weather was great, there was music playing in the background. Food and drink was pretty cheap and the VIP areas were nice areas to flop into. So would I go again? As a holiday, no. Barcelona’s done. But if the lineup’s right, I’d definitely consider it. But I’m not rushing out to get another ticket. In many ways, this just confirms what in all honest I already know. I know the which festival best suits me, SXSW. Time to start saving.