Big Chill @ Eastnor Castle 2011
Thursday 4th to Sunday 7th August 2011Eastnor Castle, Ledbury, Herefordshire HR8 1RL, England MAP
£165 for the weekend
Daily capacity: 30,000
Saturday got of to a very sombre start, with Dionne Bromfield taking to the stage less than a week after having to attend her mentor and godmother Amy Winehouse's funeral, she dedicates the performance to her and there isn't a dry eye in the house when she finishes her set with an emotional 'Love Is A Losing Game'.
I deviated towards the big chill radio stage, where Craig Charles was doing a live broadcast for BBC radio 6 so I indulged myself in a little soul funk bubble for half an hour, before checking out The Bullitts festival debut, this project fronted by Jeymes Samuel, performed with some very high profile guests, Lucy Liu narrated and Jeymes was joined on vocals by Jay Electronica and Idris Elba (The Wire).
They performed debut album 'They Die By Dawn & Other Short Stories'. They really got into the performance and ended up performing there last track from the crowd, after taking a leap off the stage and over the barriers into the crowd, the crowd lapped this up and give them a huge ovation, this seemed to be a crowd strong of hip hop enthusiasts on day tickets for Kanye West that evening, so they were preaching to the converted already.
I decide to break up the music by taking in a little cabaret performance and find Lee Nelson's Well Good Party Live, well, I am not sure good is how I would describe it, but it kept a few of the tracksuit wearing posse busy for an hour or so!
When I returned Tom Middleton was ripping up the Deer Park Stage with one of his Legendary Big Chill sessions, this is the 16th year he has played in a row, and on this form, I can easily see why he gets the gig every year, time for some food, what a treat I happen to stumble upon an old favourite la grand bouffe, some tartiflette washed down with some hot n spicy, from the burrow hill bus, and I was ready to roll, I took in 20 minutes of Katy b, who was thoroughly entertaining, with a great lyrical performance set to her unique pop-dub step, throwing out all her hits for the crowd to salivate over.
Kanye performance was to be totally unceremoniously blown right off the stage upon 2manydjs arrival, they brought their 'A Game' to The Big Chill and didn't disappoint, With a Bass heavy mash up set, cut short by half an hour due to West's antics, they ran riot with amazing backing visuals animated from the albums they were mashing tracks off. They had the Deer Park crowd in rapture! Headline material any day of the week for me.
review by: Jamie Licence
photos by: Phil Bull
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