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Adult DVD by Lindsay Melbourne
As has been the trajectory of their year, Adult DVD take Rough Trade by storm with an intricate, euphoric blend of indie rock, electronica and acid-house shimmer.
The only real issue with Bristol’s Simple Things Festival is abundance.
There’s simply too much good music, too many must-see acts and too many painful clashes, such as this year’s scheduling duel between Dry Cleaning and Adult DVD.
Yet that’s part of any festival’s charm, and this year’s is a mad scramble through Bristol’s best venues, breathlessly trying to catch a band, racking up the step count while often hearing of a barnstorming set that, typically, you missed.
The first band your correspondent is able to catch is My First Time, a local outfit whose sound is akin to Rage Against The Machine gate-crashing a Franz Ferdinand rehearsal.
They play a blinder at The Sportsman, where their wiry riffs and sharp hooks punch hard in the tight pub space. Wind Up Merchant becomes a whirling blitzkrieg live (far more bruising than on record), while at other points they swagger with Sex Pistols’ march and indie-disco swing.
Lead singer Isaac Stroud-Allen alternates between still, staring focus and strolling through the crowd to serenade selected punters.
By the time they hit Brand New, a big-chorused stomper with a razor-sharp riff, they are likely to have earned a lot more fans.
After a quick detour to The Lanes for Nobody’s Dad (a dose of sugar-sweet slacker rock in the vein of Throwing Muses or Breeders), it’s on to Rough Trade for Mandrake Handshake.
The London-Oxford collective crams nine members onto a stage that can barely hold them, with a look that suggests a sixth-form music class gone wonderfully rogue, led by a patient teacher.
The result is a heady, slinky swirl of jazz, funk and Krautrock, like Funkadelic jamming with Can at a school assembly.
Back at The Sportsman, Sick Man Of Europe deliver a darker sermon of electro-doom rock steeped in anxiety and digital dread.
With just a single red spotlight piercing the gloom, they conjure a skeletal motorik pulse that builds inexorably through the nine-minute Sanguine.
Like an electronic Joy Division for the algorithm age, they are brooding, pulsating and very good. Certainly one to watch out for, and this year’s self-titled album should be added to your libraries.
From there, it’s up to The Beacon’s Main Hall for Ditz, who unleash a ferocious set built around their album Never Exhale.
The Brighton-based post-punks open with Four, a screeching burst of feedback and fury before sliding into buoyant Taxi Man.
Frontman Cal Francis blends chaos with charisma, balancing their blistering noise with a vibrant, theatrical delivery.
Then comes that dreaded clash: Dry Cleaning or Adult DVD? Curiosity wins out for the latter, and fortunately, it proves to be a wise choice.
As has been the trajectory of their year, Adult DVD take Rough Trade by storm with an intricate, euphoric blend of indie rock, electronica and acid-house shimmer.
Their synth-heavy sound is layered but loose, pulsing with joy. You know you’re heading in the right direction when the
audience is singing your riffs, and the Leeds act looked set to leave the Southwest with set of the festival.
Back at the Beacon, Factory Floor brought their signature swooning electronica and dual drummers to bear, creating waves of percussion and texture that wash over the late-night crowd.
But the festival’s final word belongs to VLURE, Glasgow’s gothic rap-rock prophets who take to the stage at 1am in near darkness to a disconcertingly small crowd.
No matter: Let It Escalate channels The Prodigy (there can be no higher compliment) while Something Real revels in echo-chamber drama.
By the end, they’ve transformed any fatigue into rampant fervour and, deservedly, run off with Band Of The Festival at the very last, stealing it from under Adult DVD’s nose.
Simple Things remains what it has always been: a reassertion of Bristol’s unshakable love of live music.
Punters stumble from venue to venue, clutching their timetables like a map to buried treasure, and by the end of the night have found at least three new favourite bands.
Too much good stuff? Absolutely. Long may that continue.
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