Levellers punctuate a typically excellent Beautiful Days

As this was the second Beautiful Days since lockdown ended, coming back to Escot Park felt as familiar as it once was. For me, it still feels a little strange being in such a big group of people and in close quarters, but the feeling dissipated over the first day, replaced by excitement to be back.

We arrived on site to hardly any queue at all — we got lucky — and were directed to our spot, the stewards making sure there was enough room for an awning and keeping our van close to our friends; although I would be camping elsewhere. After setting up, we headed down the hill to the site proper for our traditional walk around the site and immediately noticed there seemed to be many fewer toilets than we would normally expect. This concerned us, but, throughout the weekend, crew were regularly seen cleaning the portaloos more frequently than usual, and the queues didn’t feel any longer than in previous years. It also felt like a few traders were missing, particularly in the main stage field: there were no Frank Water stalls and several food vendors by the main stage were missing, unreplaced. I was concerned that this would mean fewer food options and repeating meals through the weekend, however, the only meal I ate twice was just because they’re always so good — Fresh Organic’s veggie burgers!

My first meal was Tibetan Kitchen’s momos: 4 for £6, including a bit of dahl and salad, a lovely big snack to keep me going until dinner - masala dosa from Lalita’s for £10, which was about the average spend for a meal this year. Lalita’s never fail to impress, with generous serving sizes and authentic south Indian food which is all vegan. I didn’t catch any music on Thursday night, but there were people playing at Dirty Davey’s bar, and possibly elsewhere around the site — Beautiful Days frequently sees people busking.

Friday’s music was kicked off, as always, by Levellers Acoustic in the Big Top. Expectedly, their set was excellent; I was happy to see they had chosen to keep a decision made last year and remove the sides of the Big Top tent, allowing more airflow and letting people hear and see into the tent more easily from outside. Next, I headed straight to Fresh Organic for my first burger of the event — ‘the other one’ was a lentil and cumin burger topped with slaw, garlic mayo, and crispy onions for £9. Their burgers are always filling and delicious, though I missed being able to choose my toppings. 

Next up was Cam Cole opening the Main Stage; Cam is a one-man band with influences from blues, rock n’ roll, folk, and more. Closing my eyes, it was very easy to forget it was just one person playing at all, which I find extremely impressive. As one audience member near me said — “one instrument is hard enough!” After Cam Cole, I was straight back over to the Big Top for Alex Hart, a singer/songwriter from Devon with Americana, folksy, country vibes. Her voice was beautiful and her guitar playing was lovely, a nice chill-out after Cam Cole’s energetic performance. Alex Hart’s interaction with the audience was intimate and emotional, ending her set with a song inspired by David Attenborough speaking about how the Earth is being dewilded. Eliza Shaddad followed;  she is another one-person-with-a-guitar act, with stunning vocals and songs which, at times, almost felt like lullabies (mixed with more energetic tracks).

Up next was Hannah Moule & the Moulettes, a very fun band mixing synthesizers with string instruments, along with both electric and acoustic drums, in a way that modernized folk music. Several members of the band were multi-instrumentalists, picking up various different instruments throughout the set, and the group had brilliant energy on stage. I picked up some huge and delicious onion bhajis from Lalita’s — 2 for £4 — before heading back to the Main Stage for the Dandy Warhols. I didn’t catch much of their set but did hear a few of their big hits like ‘Bohemian Like You’ while I ate my dinner, a vegan spicy butterbean pie from Barnaby Sykes, with chips and vegan gravy. I’m not exaggerating when I tell you how excited I was to see a vegan option from them — I’ve been wanting to try their pies for years! It did not disappoint, the serving size was perfect for me and they had a £10 meal deal including a pie, chips or mash, and gravy. I finished off Friday with some sea shanties from Fisherman’s Friends, who I haven’t seen before and didn’t expect their adult banter at all! Sadly, they started their set about ten minutes early, meaning we missed the opportunity to photograph them, but their harmonies were as beautiful as I could have hoped.

IDestroy kicked off the Main Stage on Saturday; a punk band from Bristol who met as students, they were a very fun and energetic start to the day, waking us all up nicely. They were followed by Opus Kink, who used a funky mix of brass and electronic instruments, as well as guitars, to create their sound. Sadly, we found the vocals were quite hard to hear at times, possibly because they were in a similar frequency range to some of the instruments, but they got the crowd bouncing! I grabbed lunch from a place next to the Main Stage which, as far as I could tell, seemed to simply be called ‘Vegetarian and Vegan’ — a falafel burger for £9, which I did find a little disappointing compared with Fresh Organic’s burgers, but it filled me up.

Heading over to the Big Top, the Trials of Cato — a folk trio — were absolutely beautiful, getting the crowd boogying once again with their eclectic mix of high-energy songs and slow, relaxing numbers. Between bands, I grabbed a vegan cheesecake with non-dairy cream from Just Desserts, which hadn’t previously stocked vegan cream but now supplied cream and custard. The cheesecake was £6, and utterly worth it: I haven’t had a cheesecake in seven years! The Langan Band were up next — Saturday was a big folk day for me — with awesome folky three-part harmonies and each member playing string instruments: acoustic guitar, double bass, and a violin, plus one member was using a cajon. Again, the Langan Band mixed slower tracks with songs to jump around to and kept the energy of the crowd up throughout their set.

The Lovely Eggs drew me back to the Main Stage: a punk rock drum and guitar duo whose t-shirts I saw around the site all weekend. Similarly to Cam Cole, I would never have guessed from afar that this was a band of only two people! The frontwoman, Holly Ross, was using a pitch shifter on her guitar to give it a bass sound (I think), which added a depth to the music that I didn’t expect from a duo. Their audience interaction was wonderful and the stage didn’t feel empty at all.

Back to the Big Top for Eliza Carthy and the Restitution, who were absolutely not what I expected! They played mostly folk ballad songs, after opening with an a capella song which the entire band joined in for, creating some wonderful harmonies. The vocals throughout the set were a little hard to understand for me because of Eliza’s stylisation, but her voice was beautiful and that didn’t take away from the music for me at all.

The Interrupters were next, with their ska punk music and a band filled with three brothers, alongside their other members. They produced a huge amount of energy and were a perfect pick-me-up in the afternoon/evening time. While they played, I enjoyed vegan nachos from Nacho Burrito for £9, including vegan cheese and vegan sour cream in the form of Oatly’s creme fraiche — it really seems like several of the vendors have stepped up their vegan game over the last year, which made me very happy.

Seth Lakeman was next for me, with his band and a guest appearance from Alex Hart for most of his set. The set started with two of his best-known songs, perhaps to draw more people into the crowd, before Seth and Alex performed a duet with no one else on stage, just their vocals and his violin, which was one of the most beautiful performances I saw all weekend. As per usual, the whole set was excellent; Seth’s experience really shines through and he always performs brilliantly, as does his band. Afterwards, I headed back to the Main Stage (again) to catch the end of Maximo Park, and then the Specials, who were the Saturday night headliners this weekend. I didn’t catch all of their set, but their ska drew a huge crowd.

The final band on Saturday evening for me was the Imagined Village, a huge folk band with guest appearances from several other folk artists from the weekend, including Eliza Carthy’s vocals and violin, and Billy Bragg, who came on for John Barleycorn (a song I had been waiting to hear all evening! It’s one of my favourite folk songs, and, knowing several of the bands play a version of it, I was very excited to finally hear it and have it be a blend of several artists) and sang his own verse. The fiddle-playing throughout the set was a stand-out for me, and it was lovely to hear a set of upbeat folk music, with a synthesizer layered on top to give the band a fresh sound.

The dawn of the final day! Funke and the Two Tone Baby opened the Main Stage on Sunday, with his Funke Monkey Army in tow: many of the crowd had dressed in monkey outfits or were wielding inflatable bananas in support of him, a reference to his song ‘Not Enough Bonobo’. Sadly, I missed the opportunity to buy one of the Funke Monkey t-shirts that were available, but there were plenty to be seen in the crowd! Dan always impresses me with his mix of live looping and drum tracks: he’s another one-man act, and creates a huge sound with his various pieces of technology, his guitar, harmonica, and voice. He was an excellent wake-up act, and I really hope to see him on the Main Stage again next year.

I caught a little bit of Deadletter’s punk music which included a saxophone and tambourine in an interesting way, before heading over to the end of the Bar Steward Sons of Val Doonican with their typical humour and songs. They played several new tracks, such as ‘Goat Yoga’ to the tune of Ghost Busters, and drew a huge crowd that meant I couldn’t even get inside having arrived late. They brought on Tim and Athena from 3 Daft Monkeys to play ‘The Devil Went Darn to Barnsley’ which was a lovely surprise and sounded awesome.

I grabbed lunch before the next band — Tibetan Kitchen’s veggie combo, which included two curries, rice, salad, and a momo for only £8.50, a proper bargain for some delicious food. Then, I was off to Noble Jacks on the main stage to catch some Americana folk music before Bob Vylan took over the main stage. I knew of Bob Vylan thanks to seeing what felt like hundreds of their t-shirts at Glastonbury Festival this year, but had no idea what to expect from their music, and I was not at all disappointed. They brought so much energy to the stage while keeping their vibe very chill, and started the performance with their usual stretching routine. Their music is fuelled by fighting for equality, politically charged numbers discussing current events and racism. The frontman, Bobby Vylan’s, audience interaction was lovely; he even noticed when a young child along the front row knew all the words to one of their songs and let them speak into the microphone. The interaction between Bobby and Bobbie was also really fun to watch, and during the final song, they got a large number of the crowd to get onstage (which I’m sure was a nightmare for the stage manager, but looked like a lot of fun).

Next, I was off down ‘Hobo Hill’ to reach the Bimble Inn in time to get a good spot for the Sweetchunks Band, who I first saw several years ago on the Bandstand at Beautiful Days and now have one of their bees tattooed on my knee — I loved them that much from one performance! They had improved very much compared with last time I saw them perform, and their set was entertaining and brilliant, with appearances from a Doonican and several characters from Funke and the Doonicans’ performances earlier in the day. The Bimble Inn was utterly rammed with people craving their humorous folk music!

I headed back to the Big Top — grabbing my second Fresh Organic burger on the way — to catch the Unthanks’ mournful, orchestral folk music, filled with emotion, before wandering back to the Main Stage for the Levellers to finish off the festival. We all know their songs by now, I’m sure, and it’s always heartwarming to hear everyone singing along to their tunes at the end of the weekend. Their performance, as always, was an energetic send-off for the end of the festival, topped off by their usual fireworks at the end of the set.

The festival was an absolute success for me, having been able to see bits of every band I wanted to without too much crossover. I was sadly unable to get to the Theatre Tent this year, but there was plenty available for children and teens both there and in the Teen Tent at the bottom of the kids' area between the Big Top and Main Stage, including DJ lessons! Booze prices were in the range typical for festivals nowadays, between £5 and £6 for pints and £7 for a spirit and mixer, with Otter ales making their usual appearance alongside local lagers and ciders such as Sanford Orchards and Wagtail.

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