PRIMAVERA 2012 - PRIMAVERA
Day 1
Arrival to collect passes from the hotel/Pro centre.
Stuck around for the Cananda/Norway/Catalan party on the deck. The sun melts any bit of tension out of our necks while we watch the awesome Cadence Weapon. A TGE 2010 act from Western Canada. He has a new lp out. This guy is great live, his energy kinda reminds me of Mike I.R.O.K only less damaging
We head onto site for about 8:30 on day 1. Takes a little while to get our bearing as the festival is held on what essentially seems to be the workings of a harbour. I see stages and the sea. NOT TO SHABBY.
We catch only the smallest bit of Death Cab (which I was quite sad about), The XX, miss the show of the evening Beirut, watch a bit of Wilco and Bleached.
But the real highlight was the double length set by Thee Oh Sees , who came out for round 2 after announcing that sadly Sleep wouldn’t be performing as one of the member was taken to hospital. Props to the band the plays twice… they really are completely brilliant live, with relentless psychedelic rhythm.
Closer for the evening is TGE 2010 artist John Talabot who has come on leaps and bounds, and performs tonight with a live element to the show in the way of a second artist, vocals and keys and a few other bits and bobs. He plays to about 10,000. I thoroughly recommend the show on his next trip.
Day 2
Big anthems on Friday from Franz Ferdinand and The Cure.
From that we went onto METAL. Napalm Death followed by Mayhem to be precise. For all the misery and horror that surrounds the band’s history, as a completely superficial observer, what a great show. They had flaming pigs head for christs sake. FLAMING PIGS HEADS. See >
Later up was Wolves on the Throne Room, which I did try to explain to my friend ISNT death metal. Boy was he disappointed..
Day 3
Kings of Convenience kicked off proceedings with a typically lighthearted skippy set, with plenty of sing-alongs and arm swaying.
The Weeknd were brilliant but I’m going to be honest and sayt he crowd was pretty split on that opinion. I’ve been waiting to see this guy for 1 yr and I wasn’t disappointed in the slightest. There are a few improvements to be made in the set order I would say, and bad luck the stage power went as they were ending the 1st track of the set which was taken from the Balloons LP. They didn’t struggle slightly to regaining the attention as they went into a few new tracks which obviously don’t have the anthemic power of the first. This probably would have been a lot smoother had the power not cut. At the edn of it though, the guy has an incredible voice and the music is a perfect blend of sleazy R’n’B and the chill wave indie vibes of the last few summers.
Peppered throughout the weekend were also songs caught by Lower Dens, Mazzy Star – Fade Into You (of course), Refused, Afrocubism, Jamie xx, and the Numbers gang…
All in All, once you get your head round the fact that you are at an outdoors festival without grass, this event is superb. It’s treat. Because you need hotel accommodation to go, you really feel like a king for a few days, jumping between rooftop pools and cocktail bars. The line-up speaks for itself with regards to the quality of the programming.
And the Sun…. Oh the SUN .
Thank you Primavera, I’ll be back for sure.
