Tag Archives: music festival

Wireless Festival 3 July: Pulp, Grace Jones, Metronomy etc

18 Jul

A little Metronomy who played at Wireless:

Despite the best intentions, I found myself drifting back in time when Pulp played the Wireless festival in Hyde Park this year. When one of their best known songs features your name over and over again and references the year 2000 – you can’t help but look back. The past can be a dangerous place to delve into. Either it’s painted with a certain rose-coloured perspective that didn’t really exist or, alternatively, you may see only pain. The purpose of life is to experience, learn and be wiser in the present and appreciate the joy that people can bring to your life if you don’t get caught up in some image that really isn’t important. Therefore I threw off the past and concluded that Pulp hadn’t really changed that much from when I’d seen them in the nineties. Yes, they have grown older but Jarvis is still a show-man regaling us with tales and jumping around the stage. The set focused on the A Different Class album but my friend and I concluded that maybe it could have benefitted from a bit more of the edgy This is Hardcore. But, as this was when their popularity seemed to start to wane those years ago, maybe it was possibly a wise move to limit it in a comeback gig.

Grace Jones, who was on stage before them, was fabulous of course. How she manages to slink around the stage in those heels and hoola hoop all through Slave to the Rhythm just has to be seen.

Metronomy added much perkiness earlier in the day. I only wish their set was longer. I was also intrigued by whether The Horrors would smile and I can reveal that the keyboard player let one slip out every now and again while other band members hid behind their hair. TV on the Radio were lively while The Hives coordinated their formal evening wear perfectly.

Love to lovebox you

1 Aug

The air is so still but cool under this grey sky. Not like that time when I shuffled across Victoria Park in July to find the perfect spot to claim for the evening and prepare for a legend at the Lovebox Festival.

I think back to that encounter when life was a multicoloured fairground of joy, laughter and dazzling outfits. That was night Grace Jones came to town and made us abandon our troubles and watch only her.

We beheld her with awe as she strided and strutted before us, purring the classics like La Vie en Rose and I’ve Seen that Face before. She gave us attitude for Pull up to the Bumper.

Oh never underestimate Grace. So many of today’s hat-slanting, style driven starlets appear to have plundered her look. Oh how she added a little sparkle to our lives.