Looe Festival 2012

To the outside world Looe gives the impression of an idyllic, quiet, picture postcard Cornish fishing port full of quaint side streets with charming little tea shops, bespoke boutiques and a way of life unspoilt by the relentless technology machine that rampages through most of our lives forcing us to live at breakneck speed and leaves little or no time to stop and smell the flowers along the way.

 However, for the last two years a group of ambitious, and possibly quite brave locals have been plotting to put Looe on the national music festival map, boasting impressive headline acts that many established festivals would sell their mothers for, plus some cracking upcoming bands and artists too, but as any festival goer will tell you, you can book who you like, but that doesn’t necessarily make a good festival and I was keen to see how things went in Looe.

 The most obvious difference between this and the majority of the nations festivals is that rather than take the event to a remote, self contained site out of town, this whole festival takes place across the town, not an unheard of scenario admittedly, but in this country, one more usual for folk or literary festivals than one that has bands like the Levellers and the Stranglers.

Having literally thousands of people descending on a small town very quickly must be a major headache not just from a security point of view, but you cant please all the people all the time and im sure this type of going on must rub some of the less tolerant locals up the wrong way!

 On a positive note though, I doubt the local shops, cafes and pubs have ever had it so good, many of the pubs had put on music as part of the festival and it was a job to get past the front door to see some of the superb bands on offer at most of these venues. The music finished early on the stages every night and on Friday I ended up in the only pub in town I could get in watching…karaoke, though I spared the towns people the talents of my vocal in-ability!

The Harbour stage was effectively the second stage and hosted some of the weekends finest moments for me, with a stage at either end of the marquee and seamless change over’s between the two, Friday night saw local jump/jive legends “Company B” march in and ruffle some tail feathers with a kit bag of swing from the likes of Cab Calloway, Louis’ Jordan & Prima as well as a crowd pleasing version of “I wanna be like you”. Wrapping up the Friday night at the Harbour were pseudo ted-tastic, 70s sensations Showaddywaddy, performing these days without founder member and front man Dave Bartram, I think they surprised almost everybody watching, with a new lead singer that looks and sounds very much like the original, the experience of the remaining original members and a set of songs that no one over forty can possibly fail to enjoy, the tent was bursting at the seams and the car park outside was so full with people trying to get a look, in the end the tent side was rolled up and order was restored.

For anyone who likes to take a camper van to festivals, these type of events can be a bit of a struggle, as camp sites are usually a mile or two away and the local car parks state “no camping or sleeping”. When questioned the local council say if you’re found sleeping in a vehicle in the car park you will be prosecuted. I figured it’s probably quite difficult to find anyone sleeping as when someone knocks on the door and asks “are you asleep in there?” you simply say “no”? So, along with maybe a dozen others, I paid for overnight parking and took a chance. It seems the council took the sensible option and turned a blind eye, but I do feel that provision for these types of vehicles might have been a good idea.

The Adrenalin quarry stage, effectively the main stage was set up on the beach with waves breaking against the shore just a few feet away from the fences that sectioned off the arena from the outside world and the weather blowing in from the sea certainly tested the fences, the sound engineers and the resilience of the performers up on the exposed area of the stage, but Saturdays weather was nothing compared to what was coming.

 The Lamberettas famed for the hits “poison ivy” and “da-a-a-nce entertained a busy Saturday afternoon main stage audience including a few die hard Mods, but the town was quickly filling up with dreadlocks, “longer than average” cigarettes and levellers tee shirts, by 7.30 you couldn’t move anywhere near the beach, the sight of so many people packed so tightly into such a relatively small place was unforgettable, the atmosphere was all anticipation, the security were understandably a tad fractious and with just one shared point for entry and exit to the beach there was a few tense moments. I don’t know how many tickets were sold for the Saturday, but I can’t imagine anyone expected such a crowd.

When the levellers came on stage the crowd was impressively deafening, the band kicked straight in with “what a beautiful day” then spent the next hour or so treating the audience to a back catalogue that kept everyone rocking.
Booking perhaps the country’s top festival band on your second year is an amazing achievement, especially for a festival of this size, and the organisers must feel pretty happy with themselves for pulling it off, but I would imagine there were a few sighs of relief at Looe base camp when Saturday night passed without any note-able incidents. 
   
Sunday and the predicted rain and gale force winds had arrived by mid morning and it was entirely plausible that nothing would happen on the main stage if things didn’t calm down and as I sat having a coffee at the beachside café, looking at the rain blowing horizontally across a deserted sea front I felt a bit sorry for the organisers, but it is nearly October and this is England, so there’s always going to be a chance of this kind of thing especially on the coast.

  Meanwhile across town at the Harbour stage, “Two spot Gobi” were just warming up with what seemed to be an African inspired a cappella song, im not sure if they did it just to show how good they were, but it sounded like nothing you would imagine possible by 6 white boys from Brighton, it was stunning. Two Spot Gobi bill themselves as organic pop, but the word “pop” sounds demeaning when so much time and thought has obviously gone into the song construction, the words, arrangements and performance, pop, that’s what Black lace, Westlife and Robbie Williams are called! But then, so too are Crowded house and Mumford and Sons, as well as classic song writers like the Kinks and Lennon / McCartney, so “pop” it is then, but delivered with enough thought and precision to once again fill the Harbour tent to capacity.

   My feelings were that this tent was a bit undersized for many of the bands over the weekend, maybe because of the weather people were looking for the dryer option, but the disappointment on the faces of those stuck outside, peering through the doorway was obvious, so once again the sides were rolled up for a wet, but better view,  although for those of us inside, a packed tent and a good band always generates a great atmosphere and this was definitely present when Irish folk scallies “Mad Dog Mcrea”  sauntered onto the stage with the customary bottle of Jameson’s, a pinch of Blarney and an hours worth of sing along songs that produced probably the best atmosphere of the weekend.

Having grown up in the era when they had been dominating the charts, Sundays headliners The Stranglers were the band I had been most excited about, back in the day their attitude was aggressive, but with a sound too advanced to really be accepted punks they thrived on the sound of new wave and beyond, building up a back catalogue of hits that spans 4 decades and have consistently released albums throughout the various line ups. But by now the rain had begun in earnest and everything was soaked, the crowd, the stage, my camera and even JJ Burnels hallowed bass guitar!! But when they started with their 1978 classic “5 minutes”, the weather became just detail and though the beach didn’t feel anywhere near as full as the Saturday night... What a way to end the festival!

 There is without doubt a different feel at a festival which is split up across as town rather than in one place, to some extent it doesn’t have that festival vibe and the camaraderie that builds up between total strangers you often get at a single venue event, but that’s not to say this was anything other than a very friendly and enjoyable place to be and along with great music,  there was no mud, no difficulty getting out of the site and you get an involuntary look at a beautiful town, with time to stop and smell the ale along the way.

I had a great weekend here and hope to see Looe festival back again next year with more of the same.