John's Comprehensive Reviews Presents: Lovebox

Another weekend, another festival. While I do my best dear readers to insure I cover all that's good between London and Bristol, my legs, like my bank balance is becoming knackered.

Not too badly for last Saturday though when thanks to my good friends Steve and Nat, I got a free ticket to the Lovebox Saturday. I couldn't really turn this one down, could I? So, off we went to Old Street and then had to run for a bus, which frothed up the Kronenbourg I was carrying and consequently meant I sat on the bus reeking of alcohol looking like I'd pissed myself. With such legendary antics already occuring Lovebox was sure to be a good one...

MORE BLOODY QUEUING

Festival organisers of Britain - SORT IT OUT!



I'm not sure how what appeared to be at least seven gates for entry turned into two huge queues, but it still happened. To be fair, the entry process speeded up when more gates opened, but honestly, how long have they been running this thing? On getting to the front gate one was confronted with a large police presence, more so than at any other festival this year and weren't mucking about when it came to drugs. I, of course, was squeaky clean and so once had breezed in, and the rain had started, it was time to leg it through the festival for:

THE SUPER FURRY ANIMALS



Admittedly, what with all the queuing, we only made it to the last 15 minutes of the set. Just in time for a superb version of teenage crowd-pleaser 'The Man Don't Give A Fuck' and to watch Gruff Rhys put his Power Ranger helmet on and rip into a guitar solo. Which is good considering he's now signed as a solo artist to Rough Trade as well. Well done, Gruff!

GILLES PETERSON

By now it had started to bucket down and we fought our way into the 'Strangelove' dance tent, hands gripping cans of Red Stripe like our lives depended on it. Here's Nat and Steve in the tent:



The DJ of the hour was Gilles Peterson. Whole gigs-worth of servers have been written on how much fun Peterson is and how much he means to dance and world music. All of which is true, he embodies a jazz spirit by being rather short and isn't adverse to dropping something as classic as 'Apache' into the middle of a set.

Halfway through the set, Peterson was joined on the stage by a group of people dressed as characters from the movie Dr Strangelove. All this business was a little unnecessary, complete with the getting naked during the set. I'm there to dance!

JUNIOR BOYS

Weird electro outfit from Canada. Still enjoyable stuff from the mainstage. The new Pet Shop Boys (without the angst)?

THE SCRATCH PERVERTS

Tony Vegas, DJ Plus One and Prime Cuts - all three were on hand to deliver some true party set festival style dancing. Unafraid to drop classic after classic and have the crowd try and keep up with their cut-up shenanigans. I was delighted cos they played pretty much the whole of Intergalactic without scratching it beyond recognition. Very enjoyable, now why weren't they that up for it at every Blowpop I've seen them at?



MEANWHILE, BACK OUTSIDE...

It had turned into a lovely day. Finally the Glasto-curse had moved on and we were free to experience some festivalling again.



Okay, so the size of Lovebox may be pretty small compared to that of Glastonbury, but it was just about right. The right number of people, the right level of facilities, except for ladies loos, where the queues are astronomical and you could get pretty close to the stages. There were plentiful bars too, which would have been perfect had it not been for:

THE WORST IDEA AT FESTIVAL BARS EVER

Up until Saturday this had been 'not selling unlabelled bottles of Brothers Bar Cider', now we have a new champion.

http://www.peppermintbars.co.uk/

This is the web address of bar managment company Peppermint Bars. They were tasked with running the festival bars at Lovebox. Unlike the Workers Beer Company, Peppermint have a more unique way of doing things. You order your drink, the bar person serves you and then...



GOES TO A TILL TO GET YOUR CHANGE?!

That's right, all your orders are rung up on a till and your change handed to the bar person who, after waiting for it, then returns it to you. This process of waiting must add an extra two or three minutes to the wait time. Then, they give you a RECEIPT! What do they think I'm going to do? Put my tab on expenses?! "Yeah, load up on the cans of Red Stripe, I know they're £3.20 a go, but I reckon if I get a receipt I can stick it all on the account!" What a joke. All this did was cause anger and frustration, as queues became almost five deep at the bar, especially when the till had to have its printer roll replaced. GAHHHHH! I needed something to cheer me up, I marched back to the mainstage.

Before the next act came on we were lucky enough to catch champion beatboxer and Lovebox legend Beardyman.

This guy was really brilliant. See, just how brilliant by watching the video (from last year) below. Beardyman pretends to be a lecturer and then astounds a crowd.



BLONDIE

I kinda saw SOUL II SOUL from a distance, but not enough to warrant a gig report and so onwards to one of the most iconic bands of the 20th century. Playing what can only be described as 'hit after hit after hit', BLONDIE were magnificent and beautiful, hair and all.



This really was the greatest hits show. The band was tight, Harry could still sing, even though she looked a little bit like a drunken auntie dancing at a wedding. It didn't matter though, this was camp as tits and all the better for it. Even managing an encore with 'Heart of Glass' this was gig of the festival for me and really showed up the headlining act...

But it took 45 mins for them to come on and so it was time for some limbo dancing:



SLY AND THE FAMILY STONE

Well... they did 'Dance to the Music' first, even though 'Sly' didn't actually show up on stage until four songs in. Popbitch reckon he'd been shopping in the West End for new clothes when he'd realised they needed him on stage. He managed to do one song, before announcing that he "had to take a piss" and then only came on again to do one before the 10:30pm finish. A virtual hunchback, Sly could certainly sing, but for a finale act it looked more like a standard soul band with way too many walks on the bass. And the rain returned. A slightly disappointing end to an otherwise brilliant day.



So, not bad for free! If you're holding a festival and want me to come and review it, then let me know and I may just do that... Free entry, mind.

John's Comprehensive Reviews Presents...

Well a mini-review of Ashton Court Festival, Bristol. With pics.

ARRIVAL

My plan was an absolute masterstroke - avoid the big queues of early afternoon by diving into the Mardyke and getting pissed. Due to some market research, no alcohol could be brought on to the site, so getting a few drinks in beforehand was a good thing.

However, the plan failed due to an idiotic queuing system that forced everyone into a bottleneck.



So... we had to wait 45 minutes to actually get inside. Meaning I missed HACKSAW and THE SHE CREATURES.

Once in, I grabbed some food and saw:

TURBO WOLF



Crazy five piece band with an indie-dance ethic and the best thing: Babe on Keyboards. Overall great stuff.

By now the cider had kicked in...



And it was time to have a bit of a look round...



Alright, so we only got as far as the beer tent, just as some insane man in a balloon decided to descend on the festival, flying dangerously close to the ferris wheel...



And by then it was time for

FORTUNE DRIVE



Who seemed to be beset with more problems, in fact it seems whenever they play live. Still it managed to come across as lively, angry guitar music. I've really got to see these guys inside as their festival curse keeps on.



As the clouds moved across...



The drugs kicked in...

THE FALL

It's not exaggeration to say The Fall are one of the most prolific bands the UK has ever produced.
I've now seen them four times and each time it's something different. This time the band were plagued with sound difficulties causing MES to get the band to leave the stage. Luckily they came back and gave an outstanding rendition of Blindness (which is pretty much my fave track now).



Overall then the gig was about a 3/5. Ironically the best I've seen them was at the Bristol Academy and that's not a great venue.

And that was Ashton Court, sunnier (and cheaper) than Glastonbury and completely rained off on day 2, which has lead to widespread speculation that the festival will not continue. A shame.






Mark E Smith, like John, enjoys drinking in The Quinton.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

John's spoilerous review

One of the many advantages I have with the Harry Potter movies is that I haven't read the books. This means each movie is a delight to behold, keeps me guessing and surprised and I don't spend the whole 2-3 hours going "Where's that bit? Why have they cut that character?" and then telling people like me to 'read the books because there's more going on'.

What was clear from the movie of OotP, was that the plot clearly couldn't justify 800-odd pages
of book. The plot is simple. The Ministry of Magic decide to surpress growing fears surroundnig Potter and his assertation that Voldemort is back, by cracking down on Hogwarts and Dumbledore. The teenagers fight back in a 'we'll put the show on right here!' style by learning magical defence themselves, which gets them into trouble with a delightfully sadistic Imelda Staunton. Surprise, surprise, the Ministry's being manipulated by the dark lord himself and forces Harry into breaking into the Ministry to steal his own 'prophecy' (more on how awful this is later). This Harry and the Famous Five do, only to end up in a big fight with Rafe Fiennes and defeat Voldemort with the power of love and friendship, a resolution as old as the Care Bears Movie.

So it's clear that Rowling had to invent the Quidditch bits to give Ron something to do and fill out a few hundred pages. In that respect I'm glad they ditched it from the movie as mercifully the movie comes in at only two hours.

However there is something missing here and that's the sense of wonder. When I think back to Azkaban, I think of the magnificent Hippogriff, brilliantly realised by London's Framestore. Or the Cinesite realisation of the underwater scenes in Goblet of Fire. Most of this stuff seemed to be missing in Phoenix, it is only the Ministry of Magic that really made you go 'wow' and then only for a few seconds. When are we going to see an X-Wing style dogfight on broomsticks across the London nightsky?

As for the new characters, well he cops off with Cho Chang only to have the useless girl sell him out (thus one assumes setting up a string of 'trust issues' Harry will have around women who aren't his Mother). Better was Luna Lovegood, a loopy Irish girl who you assume is going to betray the group because she has blonde hair. More Luna please.

Overall 4/5 - not as good as Azkaban or Goblet of Fire, but better than the first two run-arounds. Let's hope something a bit more substantial happens in the next one...