Boxford offers something a bit more upbeat on a Saturday night at Truck

Saturday morning arrived, and I was awoken by our camping neighbours making a large racket, and thus dragging my poor head out of my tent. There were a few comments aimed our way about keeping them awake the previous night after a few of us had a couple of drinks in our tent when we returned from the dance tent. I suspect their rather upper-middle class bellowing at 9am was payback for our late night activities.

After attempting to sort out my hangover with Lucozade and coffee we head over to watch local stalwarts Alphabet Backwards. I have seen frontman James Hitchman do a few solo shows of late, but it had been a while since I had seen the full band in action.

An amusing tale about co-singer Steph's dress not fitting quite right and being worries about her breast's being exposed if she jumped about too much gave the crowd a giggle and the band finished their set with the infectious 'Polar Bears' which has become their signature tune of late.

A great addition to the festival is the workshop area and the most popular by far was the circus workshop by the 'Enjoy Poi' group from Abingdon. The group showcase their talents for poi and then teach people of all ages how to use the kit and give one on one lessons to anyone who wants to have a go. The interacting was continued when one of my friends found a stall that sold handmade drums and was allowed to have an impromptu jamming session on their instruments they had to sell.

With the majority of the punters now talking about the news of the death of Amy Winehouse which had reached the site earlier that day, we decided to get a bite to eat. This was however a bit of disappointing experience as outside of the rotary club selling burgers and chips there was a hog roast and an Indian stall which despite smelling lovely was very bland and finally a Michelin-starred restaurant, which whilst it had lovely food, it was wildly over-priced and was lacking in custom for most of the weekend.

I was surprised to not find the stone baked pizza stall that the organisers had used at their sister festival Wood back in May. Again people were leaving the site and heading into the village for a pub lunch or to the local supermarket to line their stomachs.

After settling on a portion of chips for dinner, we caught the majority of Edwyn Collins in the clash tent who duly obligated and performed his 1994 smash 'Girl Like You' right at the end of his set. Special mention must go to him to still perform after two strokes which has left him paralysed down his right side.

After refreshing ourselves from the bar we head to the main stage to see the Super Furry Animal's Gruff Rhys perform to an enthused crowd before we return to the clash tent to see St Etienne, however their performance didn't really get the crowd going and left much to be desired, with everyone looking for something a bit more upbeat on a Saturday night. We turned to DJ Justin Robertson to provide salvage, but the sound was so low I was stood having a conversation with one of my friends at normal speaking level right by the stage, so we left and again headed for the delights of Boxford to dance badly into the night.

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