T in the Park

12/07/2010

Mud and glitter @ Balado, Kinross

 T in the Park, Balado
3/5

Braving mud, Muse and soggy hot-dogs to bring you The Big Issue’s review of T in the Park are Derek Kennedy and Lauren Mayberry




FRIDAY

Paloma Faith bore everyone to tears on the main stage before Faithless get the crowd going; which may not necessarily be a good thing as most of them are half-cut teenagers. It’s only 7pm and already there’s a lot of freaky dancing going on.

The trademark booming vocals of Editors’ Tom Smith blow out across the airfield, driving drum and bass mixed with synths and drum machine beats identifying radio-friendly hits including ‘Bullets’ and ‘Munich’. We reach the NME/Radio One stage just in time to catch Jamie T play Sticks and Stones, then camp out and wait for Florence and the Machine. During this time we see so many revellers dressed as Scooby Doo, smurfs and ninjas that the mind begins to boggle... It is only later we discover today is ‘Dress Up Friday’.

Florence Welch arrives promptly and delivers an nigh-faultless but characteristically kooky renditions of a variety of harp-tastic album tracks and rhythm-filled fan favourites, including ‘Kiss With A Fist’, ‘Dog Days’ and semi-legendary cover ‘You’ve Got The Love’. Dressed in a cream lace smock with shiny gold hotpants underneath, the flame-haired songstress prances around like a Kate Bush-esque nymph, discarding her shoes early in the set and conducting the crowd with a drumstick.

In the Futures Tent, a surprisingly buff looking Kele Okereke careens through a trance set of new material from solo album, The Boxer, as well as working in several Bloc Party songs. ‘Bluest Light’ and ‘Flux’ work well, due to the dance potential in the originals, but other notable choruses from the band are adapted well to fit with Okereke’s new groove.

One of a fair handful of homegrown talent on show this weekend, Calvin Harris wraps up the King Tut’s Tent. Green lasers stream across the tent as floor fillers ‘Colours’ and ‘Ready For The Weekend’ blast out, offering a handy alternative to the shredding rock on the main stage.

Muse seem to have wowed everyone, given the amount of people who tell me how great they were for the rest of the weekend. It must have been a different Muse I saw headlining the main stage, then; a deaf-man’s Radiohead churning out bombastic, turgid, soporific charnel-house riffage with lyrics of witless banality. Nice lasers, though.


SATURDAY

Saturday in the Slam tent; full houses dancing to one of the songs from the Glee soundtrack before the sublime Four Tet take the stage. Two minutes in and the tent has barely 200 people in it. Philistines. Still, the mood is brightened considerably (and unexpectedly) by two unlikely saviours; Vampire Weekend and Paulo Nutini. Festivals re-contextualise certain acts, meaning that while you wouldn’t necessarily want to listen to them at any other time, they make sense when heard while standing in the pouring rain and eating a soggy hot-dog. VW at least have the sense of occasion lacking in most other acts; engaging and energetic, the staccato plucks of the guitars and the tight rhythms actually have a ‘festival’ feel. Nutini, on the other hand, seems to have an uncanny knack for channeling some mythic Caledonian sentimentality that keeps the crowd dewey-eyed and grinning at the same time.

Broken Social Scene wow a depressingly under-capacity Tut’s Tent, followed by Frightened Rabbit. Opening with ‘Modern Leper’ and closing with ‘Keep Yourself Warm’ (inciting the rudest/most bizarre crowd chant of the weekend...), it’s clear that Midnight Organ Fight is still the band’s go-to album. Yet, newer material like ‘Swim Until You Can’t See Land’ prove that there’s plenty of fight left in the young team yet.

Laura Marling, despite being dogged with the occasional bout of feedback and squeeks, produces delicate, intricate folk in the Futures Tent, wry lyrics and confidence belying her youth.

A reality check comes in the guise of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Sorry, Stereophonics. It’s hard to tell the difference. They ticked off all their ‘greatest’ hits one by one, to the point where it feels we’ll be trapped forever in an endless loop of mawkish pub-rock sung by a gravel-throated dwarf; like a David Lynch nightmare sequence.

The Prodigy may not seem as scary as they did when your mum wouldn’t let you buy their CDs, but that’s not to say they aren’t just as good. Surely festival pro’s by now, they produce incredible energy despite having so few people, classics like ‘Breathe’, ‘Poison’ and ‘Firestarter’ causing the crowd to surge as one in time with their dirty, dirty beats.

Julian Casablancas, by comparison, is a tame headliner. Gone, it seems, is the troublemaking wastrel of The Strokes. Instead, the singer concentrates on his characteristic drawl, keeping between-song chat to a minimum and just getting down to business, undeniably injecting emotion into his trademark croon but not offering much of energy.

Eminem is playing his only UK date this year at TITP just to prove he has no relevance whatsoever any more, and his whiny, frat boy schtick has worn so thin that even his own fans boo him for coming on stage 45 minutes later than scheduled. His ‘display’ is so half-arsed he may as well have mooned the audience and left after 5 minutes. He deserves to be treated with contempt.


SUNDAY