Ha French Bread

As long as it's not Phoebe Bridgers/Mac DeMarco or anyone with weird fanatical fanbases I'm happy St Vincent could be due a return and seems about the right level

Top 5 requests for next year: Altin Gun Altin Gun Altin Gun Altin Gun Altin Gun

Sharing my five-word five-star reviews I do each year as mementos for looking back in future years (mostly at how stupid I was for massively underrating someone at the time) I personally and sadly did not see Jessie Buckley/Bernard B, so that one's a guest review! Fair to say the run of performances on Sunday evening was possibly the best I've been lucky enough to experience in the space of mere hours Will try not to take up a whole page... Thursday Wesley Gonzalez - nice glass of Orange Juice *** John Mouse - shirtless danceoff avec anthropomorphic pigeon **** Mandrake Handshake - aesthetically pleasing Brian Jonestown dabblers **** El Goodo - Coralesque harmonisers now sadly departed **** Adwaith - amazing songs, didn't click live ** Metronomy - sweet, slightly insubstantial. Like Squashies *** Friday The Real Charlie Chaplin (documentary) - amazing archive of 'complex' character **** Pregoblin - another Adwaith situation unsure why ** Mdou Moctar - supersonic desert rock guitar wizardry **** Ailsa Tully - shimmery melodies for shimmery afternoons *** Mickey Callisto - ass-slapping dance party good times ***** WITCH - most interesting backstory of festival *** Viagra Boys - basically being blended in humans ***** Jessie Buckley & Bernard Butler - lessons in warmth and class ***** Public Service Broadcasting - archivists with synthesisers? Yes please **** Kraftwerk - bad graphics fetishists press buttons **** Scalping - angriest guitars since records began ***** Saturday Ghiblioteque (live podcast thing) - Ghibli lore: not just nerdfodder! **** Donny Benet - Pope of delicious, sleazy bass ***** Alice Low - Alex Cameron/Iggy Pop = daughter? **** Psychedelic Porn Crumpets - name of my next cat *** Katy J Pearson - uncannily vocal'd trumpety pop sweetness **** Mary Lattimore - hopefully what heaven sounds like ***** Black Country, New Road - proper wonderkids. Basically limitless potential **** Arab Strap - bittersweet never sounded so good ***** Beach House - sous vide in liquid synthesiser *** Sunday Carwyn Ellis & Rio 18 w/ BBC Welsh Orchestra - Bond flies to Brazil soundtrack **** Ural Thomas & the Pain - Pixar grandad and his band **** Gruff Rhys & Imarhan - Gruff goes well with everything **** Jenny Hval - genuinely mindblowing songwriting. Exquisite oddball ***** Ezra Furman - Queen of modern rock? YES ***** Charlotte Adigery & Bolis Pupul - these guys are so good it broke my review system see them immediately *****

That's terrible, well done for sorting the pr*cks out!

Another fantastic year! The Great About as positive a prolonged atmosphere of happiness and camaraderie as 25000 humans can produce Fantastic acts throughout - very few let-downs outweighed by numerous pleasant surprises The variety of acts is great and really well curated in terms of stages, timings - so easy to build a day with ten different genres that flows seamlessly Sound was superb (with exceptions) Agree with the comments that it felt less busy with food and toilets, and getting in and out was a dream compared to last year The weather! Had nice chats with John Mouse, Davey from Boy Azooga (watching his dad play one last time at Carwyn Ellis, which was sweet) and the bassist from Alice Low. Didn't say hello to but did spot Ezra Furman looking absolutely gorgeous walking about - love the lack of barriers between artists/festival goers Not So Great To add to the current thread of conversation, the kids themselves are pretty much all great and a positive aspect of the festival, but there's a definite increase in entitled parents. Festivals/gigs come with a certain amount of things you have to accept - space is at a premium sometimes, camping is a bit cramped and short on luxury, there's noise 24/7, there are lots of adults who enjoy dancing and jump about, you can't always go wherever you want whenever you want during a popular set, and so on. While it seems the vast majority of the parents completely get this, there's a minority who seem absolutely affronted whenever them/their offspring are confronted with these realities. I'm sure I'd add nothing by giving specific examples as we've all seen them - the Walled Garden example given above is a pretty good one! Talkers - not actually so bad this year, especially compared to most other festivals, but still easily the single most annoying thing about crowds/music in general. Please god stop shouting to your mate about what you had for lunch The Walled Garden had some big issues with vocals at the front of the stage, especially with louder acts. Think the L/R speaker banks have a blind spot Agree on the lack of late-night variety - it's generally all brilliant, but one area having a well-curated indie/disco/pop/'cheese' area would be a nice thing to switch up the house and DnB. More acts like Charlotte Church and Scalping late night in the Walled Garden would be sweet Will post up 31 five word reviews later, but Ezra Furman, Jenny Hval, Arab Strap, Charlotte Adigery/Bolis Pupul, Scalping and Viagra Boys were the standouts