Back for one more walk around the park, final day of this Year’s mostly positive rather giant All Points East ten day festival in East London’s Victoria Park. The vibe each day has been flavoured somewhat differently, there’s been some great performances; from Stormzy‘s unforgettable triumph in that rain on that epic first night – actually from Debbie‘s short set at a press preview on the Thursday evening before it all properly started – to the proceedings on Field Day Saturday, the London Gospel Choir‘s free performance as part of the In The Neighbourhood thing on the first Sunday, to the action as Black Midi and Warmduscher duked it out in the blue tent while taking the honours between them at the start of the second weekend, we’ve had standout moments from HotWax, Ms Banks, The Lazy Eyes, the Return of Be Your Own Pet, and today, well, on paper I must admit it didn’t look like that much but hey, what do we Know about anything?
What do we Know about anything? Today turned out to be a fine fine final day, the Bank Holiday Monday weather certainly helped it all flow, the genuine excitement in the air all day, the anticipation, an audience that was easily three quarters female has to be a positive thing and a bill that felt like it was a similar balance, a whole coming together of positive things in a park in East London. It was curiosity more than anything that dragged us over to there again, a band like Haim headlining a bill like this really isn’t our natural territory. As we’ve already said several times over the last week, we are the shortest of walks away and yes we were invited to come cover it and we were kind of thinking on the Morning of this final event shall we bother? We were kind of thinking this is not our thing and wipe away your cynical smile, I know what you’re thinking, we’re not the types to say something was good just ‘cos we got in for free, we’ve always call it as we see it around here and most of the time if we don’t have anything positive to say then we just don’t bother using up our precious time and space saying it. Today deserves lots of positive coverage, today was a great day, today was a joy..
We didn’t catch everything of course, it is a big park and running times do overlap, attention can’t possibly be everywhere. Romy had us back to what was, once again, a very packed blue tent, Romy in her solo form, Romy Madley Croft guitarist and singer from The XXs channelling her almost retro Euro-dance and something rather euphorically strong, her solo work is mostly a love letter to formative years of queer clubbing apparently. Euphoric electro pop, really lifting the place up, euphoric really is the word in terms of what Romy is doing. The big (big) blue tent is packed for her, it really is a squeeze to get in, the energy being generated inside feels massive. The freedom Romy is expressing up there on her stage, her lyrics and her space to just sing what she’s singing, to celebrate what she’s celebrating, kind of sums up a lot of the feeling of the day, her queer positive sense of freedom. There’s a joy to Romy’s music, she’s Strong, her performance, there’s a joy to her day, a joy linking pretty much all of the music today, things are relaxed, happy, good, smiles everywhere – not to say they isn’t an intensity to the music, a commitment, this matters to the people making it as much as any art matters to the artist making it, Romy is pumping it out…
Earlier in the day Durand Jones and his very tight band of impressively high-end musicians treated us to some serious old school R&B flavoured soul, some mellow fusion and funk that at times got positively gritty and indeed serious rocked out when it needed too. We got his solo side today rather than his more harmonised even more mellow work with The Indications, his almost effortlessly brilliant band were perfectly placed out in the late afternoon sunshine of the final day, the four of them up there just dripping so much soul as they channelled Stevie Wonder, a touch of The Faces, some Weather Report-ish fusion and dare we have the audacity to even think of mentioning Otis Reading? Yes I am aware of what I’m saying there, that should be taken as high praise indeed and there is quite a hint of what we got today on his recent solo album Wait ’til I Get Over – that new album is good but we really really we weren’t expecting things to be that good live! The four of them certainly pulled the crowd their way, the audience looked to have doubled by the end of their excellent mid-afternoon set…
It is at times rather hard to put names to the performers found on the smaller stages dotted around the festival, yes there is some kind of corporate app that would probably tell us, but not everyone wants to download a corporate app and be marketed at, a sign here or there wouldn’t go a miss, it happened quite a few times over the last ten days, who was that? was a question that came our was severall times, nameless bands or performers
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So we’re wandering around, not really wanting or needing to see anyone in particular, just seeing who we encounter, take in the flavours, catch a bit of Joesef in the sunshine. Griff up on the main stage sounds good, especially with a strong live band and free of the over slick hand of a studio production, Sarah Faith Griffiths to give her her full name, Griff is having a good time up there with her very modern soulful pop.
FKJ or French Kiwi Juice, a French multi-instrumentalist doing it all himself back on the big West stage, mostly instrumental, a star of the Parisian electronic scene so the internet tells us, he’s (very) busy up there triggering everything himself, a bass guitar in hand one minute, a sax the next, over to the bank of keyboards, triggering this and that, no one else with him, all very clever, all very slick, all very atmospheric just after sundown with the big red moon adding to his show – it probably is too clever and it doesn’t quite connect, you get the idea after fifteen minutes or so and politely drift away to find that Confidence Man have that blue tent serious jumping once again, Kicking up a dance storm with their positively cheesy breezy up-for-it Australian electro pop.
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Girl in Red has the attention of a massive crowd, she rocks out quite a bit more live than she does on her records, she’s Norwegian singer-songwriter Marie Ulven Ringheimm, she kind of sounds North American, she’s a little bit whinny, she could easily become annoying, but then she is a twenty something not-long-since teenager just like most of her big big (very big) audience. She is very slick, rehearsed, even the shambolic bits and the over long song intros seem slick, like she’s part of some big well-oiled well rehearsed globe trotting pop rock festival machine, tales of touring the world and how she’s just been on a festival circuit in Australia with Haim. She can certainly work her audience, something about having low self-esteme and “don’t we all”, so when she asks everyone to wave back you’re not going to leave her hanging there waving to herself. She’s impressive, of course tens of thousands sway and wave back during the appropriate part of the song she just introduce, a big mass sway. Actually this is her second appearance at this year’s All Points East, I bet she didn’t have things this positive as the main support on the big stage to The Strokes last Friday? Don’t as us, we were in the tent with Black Midi at the time, it sounds like she’s enjoying this a lot more than she did The Strokes crowd! These are her people, every mention of her sexuality cheered loudly, every shout our responded to with screams and yelps of high-pitched delight. You do kind of feel that with this much power already, she could already be doing so much more, but hey I’m twice her age and more, she’s not singing to me, hopefully she couldn’t care less what I think about it and yes, these people in the big big crowd are having the time of their lives, this is brilliant! To stand on the edge of it, far enough in to catch the vibe and the massive doses of joyful fun everyone is having, it does feel like they’re hanging on her every word, it just feels like everyone is having such a wonderful time, Girl in Red is great, she’s a great singer songwriter – i almost said she’s great fun, but, as much as it is great fun here in the park, it is so much more than just that.
Haim time, they are slick to the extreme, probably way too slick for their own good although it does seem to work rather well for them. I don’t know how big the audience is now, all there in the dark, in the moonlight, in the lights from the fairground rides and the multitude of food stalls, thousands and thousands of people, faces in the light as far back as you can see, a sea of excited faces all waiting for Haim, waiting for the showwomen and their ultra poppy hooky slick as slick can be pop rock. The atmosphere is wonderful, can we say joyous again? Joyous really is the word of the day, and well the tension as we wait is massive, the anticipation, the eruption of cheering that is about to happen, it feel likes like something bigger than just Haim today, more than just the music, it feels like a celebration of something more. Earlier we caught the eye of two girls on one of the fairground rides, they shouted “Live life love” at us and started kissing as they laughed their heads off, it just feels like brilliant fun in here, freedom, is this still a post pandemic thing?
Hain’s entry is extra super showwoman slick and yes there are questions to be asked about corporate rock festivals and flying around the world on a seemingly endless conveyor belt of a monster tour and maybe there isn’t too much actual substance to their harmless throwaway pop rock, but right here, right now, this feels brilliant, and the giant crowd are loving it, they’re lapping it up. Half an hour in to it and it feel like a good time to turn and head off in to night, Haim really aren’t our musical thing, their music doesn’t matter to us, they certainly don’t need our words, feels like a good time to walk away and leave the cheers ringing behind us, the day has been excellent, joyful, brilliant, Haim and their vast crowd are having a brilliant time, they’re loud in our ears as we head off, All Points East has been rather good (again) this year, today was a joyous day. (sw)
Previously…
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THE ORGAN 
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