Review: Saturday @ Glastonbury

Day two of Glastonbury brought more great acts, including some of the brightest new bands around this year. Starting off with Stornoway - the indie folk band from Oxford who are viewed by many as the calmer, relaxed, love-child of Mumford & Sons - Saturday was another great day of music. After seeing Stornaway put on an accomplished performance in their debut at Glasto - on the Pyramid stage, no less - we headed to the John Peel tent to catch the London indie rock quartet, Yuck.

The four-piece released their impressive self-titled debut album earlier this year to widespread critical approval, and it was interesting to see them perform that material live for the first time. Whilst Yuck don’t have great stage presence - more like a “we’re know were good, so we’re going to do that cool rockstar ambivalence thing” attitude - their enthralling guitar driven songs proved a hit with the the packed-out tent.

Friday @ Glastonbury: Review

For some campers, especially those who travelled to Worthy Farm on Tuesday evening, Friday could not come quick enough. Friday means music, and at the end of the day, that’s what Glastonbury is really about. In fact, the desperation for music - after two days of average to crappy weather - was evident from the huge crowd that gathered to watch Chipmunk open up the Other Stage.

The ‘Oopsy Daisy’ singer was a suitable warm-up act, getting the crowd going with his mainstream-orientated hip-hop. Next up on the Other Stage were Brother, a band that are better known for the amount of vitriol they receive, than the music they make. This is entirely justified, though. The four-piece from Slough bring much of the hate on themselves through their cocky, self-assured boasts, and their ‘lad’ personas. They put on an accomplished performance, but their attempt to regurgitate Britpop for a new generation, comes off as tiresome.

And if Brother weren’t derisive enough, it has now come to light that the band have changed their name to Viva Brother as the result of a legal dispute with Australian Celtic rock act with the same name. This explained the band waving a big flag with Viva Brother emblazoned on it.

Kings of Leon Live @ Old Trafford Cricket Ground, Manchester, 19/06/2011

The rise of Kings Of Leon in the past few years has been incredible; they have ascended from little-known Southern rock act to huge stadium-filling anthemic rock band in the space of one album. This showing at the sold-out Old Trafford Cricket Ground, demonstrated the dramatic shift in sound that has accompanied the Followills’ climb and seen them ditch the label that was attached to them earlier in their career - the Southern Strokes.

Kings of Leon’s debut album, Youth and Young Manhood – which gained them a strong cult following in the UK – was virtually non-existent in a set that revolved around the foursome’s most recent stadium-friendly output. There were 12 songs in total from the band’s last two albums, the biggest selling album of 2008, Only by the Night, and their most recent fifth album, Come Around Sundown. However, the band clearly attempted to satisfy those who sought a set based around their debut album and the formidable follow up, Aha Shake Heartbreak.