Saturday
The first day of Camden Crawl proper began the way festivals tend to begin, with an exchange of tickets for wristbands. I always feel ripped off. We also obtained some poorly designed but useful official 'event guides'.
After studying these (the wristbands not the event guides) at The World’s End over a slow pint, we eventually formed our plans for the day. Mine was to follow Cousin Bish. We accompanied P. Mushy and Sandro to The Camden Eye, which was exceptionally small and exceptionally crammed. Feeling right at home were Newport’s very own, The Dead Beggars Club, who were playing a set that lasted less than half an hour and began at twenty to two.
By the time we arrived they only had a couple of songs left to play, but there was just enough time to notice that the singer was rather small, whereas the bassist was rather large. Turning my famously perceptive gaze to their music, I decided it was also quite large and angular, maybe even square shaped.
More importantly, it was five quid for a Gaymers. We were so disgusted by this that we decided it was P. Mushy’s round.
The Dead Beggars Club seemed like a good old fashioned South Walian rock band to me, so it would have been nice to see them from the beginning. In complete contrast to their lo-fi sound was the next act, Rachael Sage, who whipped out a keyboard from nowhere (a big keyboard case actually) and sat down to play a few songs.
She showed an impressive amount of American confidence, played some entertaining songs and frequently engaged with the audience. As she looked around, seemingly making eye contact with as many people as possible, she utilised the eyebrow raise to great effect. Between songs she was very chatty, evoking memories of the old-fashioned, one-man/woman shows that I’ve never been to. Her tour manager stood next to us, holding a clipboard headed with the ominous heading ‘Mailing List’.
Fortunately we escaped with our email addresses unknown, and headed to the Roundhouse.
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An old favourite from Week 11, Benjamin Francis Leftwich, was the attraction on the Roundhouse Terrace Stage at three o’clock, along with the opportunity to drink in the sun. There were plenty present, but on the whole people seemed more interested in the sun-drenched drinking than BFL. Most were sitting down relaxing and weren’t wholly attentive and you could say a melodic, mellow singer-songwriter like BFL created perfect background noise.
P. Mushy and Cousin Bish got to hear his unique voice for the first time and shockingly, we also realised that the lyrics about a rock that had made Sandro guffaw so maniacally and me giggle so girlily (which is a perfectly cromulent word) the last time we’d seen him, were actually completely different to what we’d remembered.
In his song ‘Box of Stones’, the guffaw triggering “In the forest, there is a rock” was actually the much more poignant “The forest had a rock in it” (I've already amended Week 11 accordingly). Apparently it’s not just any rock. It’s a rock that blocks animals and turns them to stone and then they lose their faces! Sinister stuff indeed and certainly no guffawing matter.
Also on the terrace were a crack team of Wrigley’s sales girls and boys, who were handing out Wrigley’s 5 gum for free. On tasting it, I understood why.
We then stupidly accepted an invitation to climb inside the back of a taxi and have photos taken of us posing in pairs of Ray Ban sunglasses. The upside of this interruption was that we were promised free sunglasses if we went aboard the Ray Ban Routemaster, a double-decker bus doubling as a music venue for the festival. The downside was that we were asked to give our email addresses.
Fortunately Cousin Bish and I are both well versed in the art of giving out false email addresses, as anyone who’s ever tried to email BertvanWinklevoss@hotmail.co.uk will testify.
“That’s not your email address,” Sandro helpfully pointed out in earshot the evil Ray Ban man.
“I’ve got two,” I lied cleverly, avoiding suspicion.
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The next venue was the catchily-named Red Bull Bedroom Jam Outdoor Live Arena, a temporary outdoor stage where the eight of us reassembled to see The King Blues. They were on home turf and were superb, with the crowd lapping up their fast and furious Ska-Punk and political lyrics. 'Political' meaning anti-war and anti-establishment, as opposed to lyrics about the day’s discussions within the House of Commons, as heard in songs such as ‘The Streets are Ours’ and ‘We Are Fucking Angry’.
“Going to war, to prevent war, is the most stupid thing I ever heard!” lead singer Jonny ‘Itch’ Fox sang on one of their highlights, ‘Save the World, Get the Girl’, clearly never having played a game of Buzzrection with Little P.
The King Blues were followed by Fever Fever, a trio from Norwich made up of a couple of ladies and a gentleman. Half the audience had disappeared, but Sandro said they’d been tipped by no less than Huw Stephens so we stuck around. It may have been that they weren’t suited to the large outdoor stage, or it may just be that I’m sexist, but unfortunately they weren’t quite as entertaining as we’d hoped. Even so, they’re still the best band I’ve seen from Norwich.
Little P and Kimbo didn’t stick around for Villagers who were up next, but having missed them when they supported Elbow in Cardiff, Cousin Bish and I did. Theirs was a slower, eerier sound, and the dancing was replaced by swaying, or leaning in my case, which is not to say they weren’t very good. I just like leaning.
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Sandro and Salazar arrived just before Miles Kane came out and stole the show. The former Rascals front-man and one half of The Last Shadow Puppets has his first solo album, The Colour of The Trap, out in May and on this evidence it’ll be worth a listen. He looked a great guitarist (he played chords and everything) and played some great tunes, such as sleazy stomper ‘Come Closer’, beach-pop pearler ‘Quicksand’ and the superb, breathless closer ‘Inhaler’.
I also approved of the way he berated an audience member who’d flung a beer toward the stage. A fella in front of us was using being pissed as an excuse to act like a twat, but thankfully he was thwarted by Salazar. First, she tried to reason with him, but this didn't work, so she had to flex her biceps. As the twat drew back his arm and prepared to launch a bottle to disrupt Miles' chord playing, Salazar bravely grabbed him by the elbow, while I cowered heroically behind, pointing like an evil monkey.
It was a proud moment, which is what I'm used to in this area. As we strolled away from the Forum, we were chased away from an Indian Restaurant whose floor had amazingly caught my vomit on an equally momentous night last year. Sal disappeared to pull more elbows and watch Little Comets, while the rest of us returned to one of the more central venues, the Jazz Café, where Dananananaykroyd were playing at half past ten. More importantly, it was only £1.50 for a pint of lager. It was finally my round.
We watched the frantic 'fight-pop' from the balcony upstairs. Short and sharp instrumental ‘Hey Everyone’ and big single ‘Black Wax’ were the two tunes I recognised and were worth the entry fee (it was free) alone. On the whole they were incredibly loud and energetic, which apparently scared off the attending VIP Mark Ronson, but maybe a tad incoherent. Judging by the 28 Days Lateresque scenes below, it was to the fans’ tastes. Not many of them would have joked that they'd would have preferred to have seen Billillillillmurray.
Salazar met us again for a quick trip to Ben’s café and a rubbish small pizza (sorry Ben), before we returned to the Jazz Café at half past midnight for Cloud Control, an Aussie band who'd had a glowing recommendation from Sal. Little P and Kimbo joined us, but failed to recruit Cousin Bish and I into their dancing school, as we welcomed the chance to sit down after a long days drinking and standing up. Little P and Kimbo weren’t bothered though, judging by their energetic performance of the Cha-cha-Cha.
My memories of Cloud Control are positive, with some fine Aussie indie rock on show. The highlight was the unforgettable ‘Of Course I Don’t Remember This Song, It Was Gone Midnight and I Was Pissed’. Their first album is out in May and might jog some well hidden memories if I ever listen to it.
Disappointingly, we encountered no Anglo-Celt domestics on the way back to the flat, but at least I got to fall asleep once more to the magnificent Tim Vine.
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