Crack

Underhill Festival - Friday


Crack arrived at Underhill on Friday a little later than we hoped, though the sight of many slightly worse for wear punters at 10pm suggested there was plenty of fun to be had.

The beautiful festival site in the Wiltshire countryside was a great setting for Underhill. A last minute venue change had forced the festival to move from its initial site somewhere near Bristol Airport, to a location closer to Salisbury and an hour away from Bristol. On first reaction this had clearly affected numbers. This and the fact it was incredibly poorly signposted, rumours circulating that disgruntled locals had removed all signs directing people from the surrounding area.

The organisation of the festival was such that the Crack’s own tent in conjunction with The Breakfast Club had a great placement in the middle of the festival site. This allowed for many a passing punter to get down to the contemporary house sounds bursting out of it.

The encouraging quality of contemporary house music emanating from Bristol was perfectly showcased by Christophe and Lukas whose recent releases on Futureboogie Records have positioned them both as forerunners in Bristol’s burgeoning house music scene. Their sets were truly reflective of this encouraging musical development in the city.

After getting an always amazing Bath Ale from the bar, Crack went to check out Julio Bashmore for Crazylegs in The Big Top tent, which, as the main commercial attraction of the weekend, was strangely placed at the far end of the site with the entrance disguised round the side. Bashmore being a Bristol boy, and with the festival’s distinct Bristolian feel, he commanded a healthy crowd with the set highlight coming in the form of Scuba’s outstanding new track, Adrenalin.

Unfortunately for Martyn who followed, the placement of the stage made for a much quieter crowd, who were inevitably drawn by the lighter surroundings of the central Breakfast Club stage, who by this point were showcasing the outstanding talents of headliner Richy Ahmed. The sound on this stage was also a major feature of its success with a consistent bounce coming from the crowd for the whole time Crack was in attendance.

Final act on this stage Bristol’s Waifs And Strays, who had adorned Crack’s car stereo on the way to the festival with Pete Tong playing their current smash Yeah Yeah as his ‘Essential New Tune'. The reaction to this record in the flesh six hours after hearing on the radio was every bit rewarding as the praise lavished on it by Mr Tong. A flawless set and a top way to end the first night of the festival, expect massive things from Waifs And Strays in the coming year.

A few hundred more people would have ignited Underhill much more on the first night. It nearly had the party magic it so hoped for, bar a few extra bodies.

Underhill - Saturday


Having not erected our 20 quid Argos (or should that be Argoose) teepee correctly – with the groundsheet and our half in/half out of sleeping bag bodies exposed to the elements – meant waking up with a seriously sore head on Saturday morning covered in bugs. This ensured that our day didn’t get off to the brightest of starts.

It’s fair to say had the weather continued in Friday’s vein, there would have been a lot of seriously unhappy campers, and though some people decided to leave after one night for various organisational reasons, we felt that the best was yet to come from this little festival in only it’s second year. Everything seems better in the sunshine.

After hours of topping up our farmer tans amidst the necessary pre-lash – we were finally lured by the sounds of old skool UK garage coming from one of the main tents. A quick look at the set times informed us we were listening to Ste-V-Something, promoter and DJ for Bournemouth based party starters We Are Your Friends. Traversing through UKG and older house classics, S-V-S certainly got the party started, and it was to our great disdain that whichever DJ followed his last track (or so), Gabriel by Roy Davis JR, just whacked on some dubstep with no thought to the vibe that Ste-V-Something had just spent the past hour or two building up.

Caught between the rock and the proverbial hard place and weighing up our options of either breakbeat in the Blowpop tent or dubstep in our current surroundings, we wandered over to the Big Top and waited for the sounds to change. It took what seemed like a couple of hours before Real Nice DJs took the reins and directed proceedings back towards our preferred sunshine Saturday vibe.

After a tactical break, we returned to the main tent in time for Zombie Disco Squad who were rocking it like it was the Berghain. It may well have been what with Nat Self of ZDS’s relocation to Berlin, that the music took a distinctly German turn a with punishing techno providing the crux of their set.

It was either Round Table Knights or Alex Metric up next, as finding a list with the set times was about as difficult as finding the one A4 laminated road sign on entry to the festival itself. Not that it really mattered, by this point the music had descended into some serious guff, and with the news circulating that Erol Alkan had showed up but would not be playing, we swung over to the other tent to catch the last of Fabric resident Stopmakingme.

But firstly, Erol. Two rumours were prevalent: firstly the slightly nastier of the two, that he’d turned up and (as Underhill seemed slightly quieter than expected), they couldn’t afford to pay him, so he left. Second rumour was that a DJ of such high esteem as Erol Alkan had turned up with only a set of USB sticks in order to play a set, at a festival which had been only going two years, in the middle of East Wiltshire. You’d think that someone with the experience of Erol would have a back-up CD wallet, or, the festival organisers would have made sure that they had the technical requirements of their headline DJ. A non-appearance from the headliner then, leaving a slightly bitter taste in the mouth for most of the punters.

Unfortunately, there was little to catch of Stopmakingme by this point, as the music finished all too soon and it became time to trudge back to our tents in a haze. Underhill has a lot of potential, and with a few tweaks and improved organisation in certain areas, next year could be a big year for the festival.














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Words: Artbeats

Photos: Ben Price

http://benjaminprice.carbonmade.com/

http://underhillfestival.co.uk/

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