Crack

Dot to Dot fest 2010 returned to Bristol for the sixth time this year and despite a distinct lack of really big names on the line-up, exciting new-comers like Egyptian Hip Hop, Washed Out and Alan Pownall certainly made up for that.

It all starts out with the inevitable queuing for wristbands at Thekla but once the queues are left behind, a thrilling evening of new music is about to kick off.

Even though The Crookes at Academy 1 perform to a semi-empty venue, it doesn’t hamper their retro-tastic allure. With quiffs neatly styled and shirts so nicely tucked in even your grandma would be impressed, the Crookes are in equal parts jangly surf riffs a la The Drums and nostalgic 50s rhythm and blues styled on teenage retro-popsters Kitty, Daisy and Lewis.

The singer’s erratic dancing and the sharp riffs of Crookes’ guitar man ensure that the girls in the front row keep dancing. And we all know once the girls are dancing, most boys will follow suit, which turns Academy 1 into nice afternoon swing fest. With praise coming from high places such as Steve Lamacq, who reckons that “...a band this good are unlikely to remain obscure”, The Crookes are likely to have a bright future ahead.

After stepping out for some food, we quickly make our way back downstairs to catch Blood Red Shoes, we discover that the venue has filled up considerably. Kicking off with former single It’s Getting Boring By The Sea, Blood Red Shoes showcase their usual blend of angry pop and pissed-off punk. But possibly, instead of investing all their energy in complaining, they should rather put it into writing some proper tunes for once.

The band gets close to doing that with I Wish I Was Someone Better, but their sound is nonetheless rather generic and samey. I know Laura-Mary is really hot and most of the male audience are here because of her, but when she yowls, “repetition is killing me” on It Is Happening, it strikes a bit too close to home. Maybe in 2008 grunge-esque, rocked-out tales of angst, alienation and boredom were terribly en vogue, but in 2010 they are just terrible.

Wild Beasts ensure that lovers of more elaborate and intricate soundscapes get their share of good music with their Battles meets Sigur Ross appropriation, but they don’t really manage to wow the crowd, which is a shame because their music is genuinely interesting.
Moving on to watch London hotshots Fiction at the tiny upstairs bar in Thekla, we get the first idea of what a really exciting band sounds like. Springing from the arty New Cross scene, Fiction blow off the roof with their sonic double-drumming and gloomy, reverb-heavy beats. Conveying a ferocious intelligence, the band mix the playful with the hard, the dissonant with the catchy and by the end of their set, everybody in Bristol has a new favourite band.

Playing the main room in the Thekla, incredibly young freak-funk popsters Egyptian Hip Hop are already necking their cans of lager. Despite the fact that they are all underage, they sound like a band having gained several master degrees in music. The band turns the sterile venue into a tropical funk P.A.R.T.Y! Egyptian Hip Hop’s nonchalant dream-indie / slacker-soul / noise-techno / freak-rave does not only portray a band that has liberated itself from genre boundaries, but also a troupe that is having fun with music. Take note all you Blood Red Shoes out there. Single Rad Pitt sits comfortably between the loafer antics of Beavis and Butthead and the melodious insurgence of noise-kinks such as Liars or even Atari Teenage Riot.

Still in the belly of The Thekla, Washed Out's dream-state, ethereal electro stylings, combines the blissed-out warbling of early OMD, brought right up to date with contemporary beats. It sounds lovely and brings The Thekla right into the night in proper style.

Long-awaited returners to the live circus - Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster were the prefect closing act to an overall diverse and musically challenging festival, the fact they were ‘sozzled’ brilliantly adding to the fact they were, and still are, one of the oddest, ridiculous and totally entertaining rock bands we've ever witnessed.

The new material is well-received by a devoted crowd even though lead-singer Guy McKnight forgets his words at most junctures. It's shambolic brilliance, with crowd surfing, bar scaling, stage diving and some the dirtiest basslines we've heard in years.

Fantastically well-crafted gloom-goth single Love Turns to Hate and older material standout Psychosis Safari show the band giving the sweaty audience every reason to mosh around. It's pure topless, sweaty, erratic, rock comedy and shows that the band have lost none of the rock-parody sense of humour that made them such a unique band a decade ago.

Clearly the highlights of Dot to Dot were the great organisation that guaranteed no queues during the event, the refreshingly different approaches to music by new bands such as Egyptian Hip Hop and Fiction and THAT quarter-pounder at half past midnight. Roll on Dot to Dot 2011!



Words: Linda Aust

Photo: Joanna Kang

- - - - - - - - - -