Bingley Music Live 2011 - Day Two (Review) @thirteen16 @StateofError @dionneofficial @itsdotrotten @jonfratelli @mysteryjets @maximopark #bml2011

Bingley Music Live – Day 2 (Review)



With the slight threat of rain it was across on the train once more to Myrtle Park in Bingley for day two of this year’s Bingley Music Live, in my opinion what looked to be on paper the strongest line-up of the three days and, though with one day still to go, this it proved.



With the technical issues that had dotted the performances on the Friday seemingly resolved, with a much smoother, flawless set of performances, it was only the rather gloomy weather that cast a shadow over the day, though it didn’t dampen the mood and it only drizzled a tiny bit, so little that it wasn’t even worth purchasing a BML hat from the stand. (However, I did purchase one of the many designs of t-shirts for a tidy £15).



First act on of the day was “Thirteen16” who kicked off the day with thundering guitars and some good attitude that belied their age, though they did at times sound like Dragonforce jamming at a soundcheck. But, if you wanted a band to wake you up after a heavy night partying on the Friday, this band was it, with the bass thumping across the park. They were also worth seeing just for the massive lighting bar the techies had dropped down for them to display on it a small two-metre banner. Ah well, all publicity is good publicity as they say.



“State of Error” were second on and were, for a change, a rock band that both sounded good and you could hear what the singer was going on about. Though the crowd at this time was small, the band certainly got them going with their driving guitars.



Opening track, I shall call it ‘Watching All The Girls Pass By’ in lieu of the actual title, set the mood well and was sunnier than the weather. Other tracks played included ‘Forever Waiting’ and ‘Make Believe’ and were equally as impressive. For such a young band they certainly had the stage patter down, engaging well with the crowd. I’ll even forgive them for occasional resorting to the clichéd rock screams down the microphone as the lead singer had a very good voice. Sort of like ‘Elliot Minor’ but without the shares in the Berlin Symphony Orchestra I would definitely recommend picking up something by this band. Ending on ‘Sunset Boulevard’, the group put some of the bigger acts on Friday night to shame.



Third up on stage was Dionne Bromfield. It’s difficult to mention her without including the words ‘the late Amy Winehouse’s protégé’ before her name, but from her performance on the day she certainly deserves to stand on her own two feet.



Coming on stage with four dancers, their t-shirts emblazoned with ‘Good For The Soul’, ‘Yeah Right’, ‘Ouch That Hurt’ and ‘Get Over It’ (which, coincidentally, is also the thought process of thinking about, asking the price of, paying for, and eating anything from the festival food stands), she jumped into some great catchy soul-based tunes with a voice that’s deceptively mature for her appearance, even if that illusion is shattered as soon as she speaks in thick Cockney.



‘Move A Little Faster’ was her opening number, and a great track that is, before throwing in a couple of covers in after a second song. ‘Mama Said’, the song she performed on ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ was excellent and was followed by an impressive version of Cee-Lo Green’s ‘Forget You’ (No swearing on this song; Skindred clearly had taken all the potty words on the Friday night, though it didn’t stop the crowd from singing back with the, er, alternative lyrics). Her voice was full of attitude and depth though the relying on backing tracks for these two songs did knock the magic a little. However, there was live drumming and synth with them so there was something live. The inclusion of covers was a good idea and many other artists should take a leaf out of her book; yes, showcase your own material, but also give the crowd something else that they’re familiar with.



In fact, all the songs were backed up well with some excellent drumming and synth in particular, even if the band themselves looked distant as they played, as if they were either trying to play too cool or had picked up the instruments a few weeks ago in an impromptu sale in London.



(The lawyers have asked me to say that is a joke – I’m not accusing them of rioting!)



Dionne continued to perform some fantastic songs including one where it was just her and an acoustic guitar, allowing her voice to shine through. She finished her set by playing her most famous numbers, ‘Falling’ and ‘Yeah Right, both delivered brilliantly and backed up by more impressive choreography from her dancers that brought all the songs to the next level.



After her set I had the opportunity to explore the festival ground a bit more, taking in the toilets (nice and clean but please, more hand sanitiser), the V Ball stand complete with small volleyball kit, and some taps to fill up bottles with water that don’t, to my cost, work as a substitute for washing your hands as the taps spray all over your shoes too!



Back to the music and next up was Dot Rotten. No, I’m not sure if it’s an intentional connection to the Eastenders character. Though sticking out like a sore thumb on a roster that’s mostly bands, it was a refreshing change just to have the rapper, a radio mic and a backing CD. Dot, if he will let me call him that, is undoubtedly talented but I’m not sure if the Bingley crowd was the best showcase of his talent, and a lot of the crowd drifted away leaving just a core crowd of the younger ones. The repeated line of one of his songs ‘Are you not entertained?’ seemed ripe for the few on Twitter that were criticising him to jump on.



Overall, a talented young rapper with potential but the jury is out on whether he is fresh enough to be distinguishable from other rappers. He didn’t have the stage presence or, of course, the songs, that Example of Professor Green had the previous year, as my friend noted.



Next on stage was White Denim who should have been done under the trade descriptions act for not wearing any denim but blue. But, to be honest, that was the least of their crimes. I have to confess I’m not a fan of progressive rock, but even so their set was a disappointment. Technically, it was amazing, and their guitar work was something to note but their set did confirm to me the time length that just guitars and no vocals gets tedious (it’s around about the seven-minute mark) and their whole thirty-minute-plus appearance seemed to be just one long song. Thankfully I had my phone to keep me occupied so it was onto Twitter and Facebook, where a colleague noted that the lead singer looked like a young Rolf Harris and I imagined the guitarist as having stolen Timmie Mallet’s glasses. I think only a chorus of ‘Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport’ would have saved their set; either that or I would have had to hit them with a large pink hammer with a face on it. A skilful set but not my cup of tea. It basically dragged on and was like the crowd had been invited to a personal jamming session round their garage. They didn’t even speak to the crowd apart from when leaving the stage.



Up next was Jon Fratelli, proving that like ‘The Go! Team’ the day before, two drummers are better than one. Though not massively familiar with his solo work, his set was filled with catchy pop tunes with vocals you could hear and follow and choruses that stood out and impressed. Frankly, after the previous set, he could have come on the microphone and read out his mobile phone contacts list and I would have been happy.



Jon managed to keep the crowd engaged and clapping along with the songs and, proving that he’s not one of these solo artists that likes to forget about hits he’s done before, treated the audience to a handful of Fratelli’s songs including ‘Whistle For The Choir’ and, of course, ‘Chelsea Dagger’ which got the massive reaction from the crowd that you woul expect.



Jon’s selection of songs really got the crowd going, even if he didn’t really speak to the crowd at all, but it was all very singable and energetic and got the afternoon back off into the swing of things.



The next band up where ‘Athlete’ and they were an eye-opener for me. I’d heard of them and had a few songs in my head that I expected to hear but I didn’t realise that each one of the eight songs they would play I would know, as if they really have been the soundtrack to the past ten years; the sort of band’s whose songs have been played everywhere. And I bloody loved them.



Kicking off with ‘El Salvador’, the setlist was dominated by the crowd singing along and thoroughly enjoying the band. Lead singer Joel Pott immediately engaged with the crowd from the moment he got on stage, making jokes about the weather, and the band relished their time through songs such as ‘Superhuman Touch’, a recent track which reminded me how much I loved the song, and the live synths were impressive; ‘Hurricane’, and ‘Tourist’, Joel making a joke out of missing his cue at the start of the song, really connecting with thev audience through it. ‘Twenty Four Hours’, ‘Half Light’ and ‘You Got The Style’ were all instantly familiar and sung back to the band by the crowd and the ending track of ‘Wires’ was a great double-act between the band and the audience, with lots of the audience now on the shoulders of a friend after Joel’s request to ‘create a health and safety hazard’, with Joel finishing the song on an acoustic section and then leaving it to the audience to sing the chorus one more time as they band walked off stage.



Athlete did an absolutely brilliant set and, for me, the best one up to this point at Bingley Music Live.



The band with the difficult job of following them was the ‘Mystery Jets’ as the lead singer struggled on stage of crutches, assumingly after some sort of accident. I have to confess to not being that familiar with the band’s work and so didn’t have much to hook onto. That said their set was full of pleasant indie songs with a few dancier numbers thrown in to liven things up, though there was nothing that massively stood out aside from their collaboration with ‘The Count and Sinden’, ‘After Dark’. After the cracking set by Athlete it was a bit of a let-down. Chalk one up to the set order being wrong in this case.



Penultimate band of the day was ‘Feeder’, topping and tailing their appearance on stage with the theme from ‘The Good, The Bad and the Ugly’. From speaking to people around it was this set most were looking forward to and I don’t think they disappointed with the crowd going wild during their set. Their double punch of ‘Just The Way I’m Feeling’ and their cult hit ‘Buck Rogers’ made the crowd explode in delight though there was little for me to enjoy after that that was familiar as they didn’t play ‘Tumble and Fall’, which was a shame. But, the crowd really enjoyed them and their recreation of their big hits was flawless, even if elements of ‘Buck Rogers’ was on a backing tape.



It was the headliners of the day that I was most looking forward to, and they didn’t disappoint, and unlike some of the acts last year, they justified their positions as headliners.



Their set-list was a who’s-who of their albums and singles, kicking off with ‘Girls Who Play Guitar’ before rattling through ‘Wraithlike’, ‘The Coast Is Always Changing’ and a brand new song. Paul Smith was on fire, throwing himself about on stage with some energetic dancing and the crowd loved it. ‘Our Velocity’ followed and continued the energy of the set even if it did highlight how low in the mix the synth and synth’s vocals were, which was a shame, and occasionally Paul’s radio mic seemed to cut out. ‘Questing, Not Coasting’, ‘Postcard of a Painting’ and ‘The Kids Are Sick Again’ pushed the set on, with the live version of the latter even better than on their third album with Paul employing a megaphone to create the distorted vocal sections very effectively, and the whole band putting in a big break before the speedy finish, which really added to the track,.



After ‘Graffiti’ they included ‘The Unshockable’, probably my favourite non-single track, and was unbelievably energetic, so much so that the synthesizer got knocked over during the course of the song. The best moment was Paul kicking back a ball thrown at him by the crowd, flawlessly kicking it back without batting an eyelid as he sang the song and dashed across the stage.



The band rattled through more songs on an impressively lengthy and skilfully performed set list with ‘limassol’, ‘Books From Boxes’ (beautifully performed if not up to the album version but followed by some funny banter between the band and the audience), ‘Going Missing’, a new song and then ‘The Monument’, before ‘Apply Some Pressure’ finished off the set and night with pizzazz. I don’t think the audience could have been unhappy with the band’s performance and just pipped Athlete to the award of best set of the day due to its energy, great lighting work behind the band (even if the strobes during ‘Our Velocity’ were painful to watch at first) and mixture of songs and banter.



The night concluded with a brief fireworks display.



Overall, a fantastic day of music. Yes, there were some duff bands and moments but, overall, another great achievement from the festival organisers with some big names that pleased the crowd and some lesser known ones that did just as well.



I don’t think Sunday will beat this line-up and performance but we shall see when I review Chase and Status, The Coral, Eliza Doolittle, Wretch 32, Stereo MC's, The Sunshine Underground, Daley, Kingheadlock and Geek tomorrow.