FIELD DAY 2017
HIGHLIGHTS
Victoria Park, London
June 3rd 2017
This weekend I ventured down to London to attend Field Day 2017, which boasted one of the best lineups of the year. The festival is mostly dedicated to Electronic music, but also covers great acts in Hip Hop and Indie Rock too. Definitely the kind of festival for eclectic music fans to venture to. With such a strong lineup there were inevitably some brutal clashes with Aphex Twin, Flying Lotus, Run the Jewels, Slowdive, Thee Oh Sees AND King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard having their sets all crossover on different stages. I wish I could have cloned myself and seen them all, but here is what I did get to see on this beautiful day in Victoria Park.
Methyl Ethel
My first act of the day was Australian Indie Rock quartet METHYL ETHEL who provided an upbeat and lively performance to match the glorious sunshine. Their guitars had light touches of reverb creating light psychedelic vibes. Laid back mid tempo drums gave them that chilled out slacker vibe. Vocalist Jake Webb was a strong vocal point, with a bubbly and slightly twee sounding vocal, performed with great confidence. After sticking around for a few songs, I went to check out ABRA on the Resident Advisor stage. Instantly I was drawn in with the duo's massive, pounding bass heavy beats that shook the ground around me. Their Trap influenced Alt-R&B grooves really hit hard. Abra herself oozed so much confidence as a vocalist, with a sugary sweet singing voice. Definitely one of my favourite discoveries of the day with a sound fans of FKA Twigz and Jessy Lanza will probably enjoy. Certainly one to look out for.
Bristolian's BEAK> were a fine highlight in the Moth Club tent. The band is a side project lead by Geoff Barrow of Portishead fame. Beak> are highly inspired by Krautrock acts such as Can, locking into funky, repetitive grooves, with wild electronics and scatty guitars often searing away over the top. The tent was absolutely packed out to get a glimpse of this band and it was hard to even get inside. Instead I went back to the Resident Advisor tent to watch FOREST SWORDS. The scouse Electronic producer (real name Matthew Barnes) brought his Ambient Dub productions to the stage, with a live bass guitar player added to the equation. Barnes himself also added live guitar on a couple of tracks. The use of background visuals was quite striking and his beats sounded loud and pounding through the immense sound system.
Death Grips
There was no time to spare once Forest Swords had finished, as most of the Field Day crowd dashed to the opposite end of the park to the Crack tent to secure a decent spot for DEATH GRIPS. Even half an hour before the Sacramento trio hit the stage, the tent was practically full. DJ ESTHER JOY did a solid job of warming up the crowd, but the anticipation was so high that I think most people were staring at their watches, glimpsing towards the backstage area eager for the trio to emerge. Death Grips even teased the crowd by doing a brief linecheck of 'Guillotine' before leaving the stage again, sending the fans into a pre-emptive mosh. Finally Death Grips came on, and Field Day 2017 became a completely different beast, with a mosh pit so ferocious you would think Slayer had taken over the festival. Gone were the chilled vibes that Methyl Ethel began the day with. Death Grips force-feed a crowd with so much visceral, blood pumping energy. Flatlander's dense and noisy samples and synths, Zach Hill pounding the drums like they insulted his mother, and MC Ride's manic vocal acrobatics all converged perfectly to deliver one of the most vital, free-form and passionate expressions of the entire festival. The crowd were truly swept into a frenzy of ugly, unforgiving and blunt chaos as Death Grips blasted through discography highlights such as 'Come Up & Get Me', 'No Love', 'Hot Head', 'Guillotine' and more. In particular 'Giving Bad People Good Ideas' and 'I've Seen Footage' commanded the crowd to go fully insane. Certainly one of the main draws of this year's Field Day.
Following this breathtaking performance was a more controlled chaos. The Bleep Bandstand was situated right next to the Moth Club tent, and two very different but equally influential artists were playing at the same time. To my left was MIKE PARADINAS, best known as his alias U-Ziq (part of the 90s Cornish Acid scene with Aphex Twin), and founder of Planet Mu Records. And at the same time to my right was the last remaining member of SILVER APPLES, a man who pioneered Electronic music and breakbeats in the late 60s. I was so intrigued by both artists that I felt the need to zig-zag between the two. Silver Apples presented a rather crass and primitive approach, paving lots of wild oscillated sounds across his canvas. But ultimately I found myself more drawn to Paradinas, who was rocking the joint, belting out such a well crafted array of glitch, breakcore and ambient techno mastery, that it is puzzling that his name isn't as revered as his friend and collaborator Richard D James.
S U R V I V E
Closing the Resident Advisor tent was one of the most anticipated acts of the entire day. FLYING LOTUS not only brought an incredible visual and light show, but his sound was deafeningly loud and just sounded massive. FlyLo played a lot of new material, even slipping in some currently unreleased material from his upcoming score for Kuso (the film Ellison directed). A trap rendition of the Twin Peaks theme was an unexpected delight, and he also performed a lot of retro video game inspired pieces, with numerous beats that sampled different Silent Hill games, and an amazing rendition of an iconic theme from Final Fantasy VII. FlyLo weaved them together through many of his most incredible album cuts into an unrelenting flow of jazzy and funky Hip Hop/IDM fusion. The vibes inside this tent were unreal. I wish I could have stayed for the whole set, but I had to leave after forty minutes to ensure I got myself a good spot in The Barn for the big headliner...
Flying Lotus
Richard D James, best known as APHEX TWIN was clearly the act most people came to see. I saw so many people donning his iconic logo on their shirts and there was such a positive buzz in the air. As you can imagine, he delivered one of the most dynamic lighting and visual crafts of the entire festival. So many coloured lasers and dizzying strobes were used. There were amazing visuals on the screen such as cartoonish images of the queen, Nigel Farage, Theresa May and... Chris Evans... with Richard's famous creepy, distorted face super imposed over the top. And at times people in the crowd were even filmed up close, but with that haunting face super imposed over their own faces. Aphex Twin performed for an incredible two straight hours. There were probably a lot of young people who were seeing Aphex Twin for the very first time (I think he last played the UK five years ago). Old school fans will know that he doesn't play the hits live. No 'Come to Daddy' or 'Windowlicker', but he did sneak in a more obscure cut 'Audax Powder' from the Polygon Window album. Aphex usually will create a unique live experience of material that even die hard fans have never heard before. Aphex truly pulled out all the stops. The first half hour was particularly doomy, and horrifying, favouring slow, warped beats and chilling horror synths. But the show gradually got a lot more playful, as Aphex moved into those classic Cornish Acid Techno vibes. He showcased some of his Drill & Bass sounds reminiscent of the 'Drukqs' era, and even some more colourful and accessible spots. He would often break people's expectations by dropping in something like an old school Hip Hop beat here, or a jungle tune there, or a straight up Dub piece. But as a whole it felt like Aphex was drawing from just about everything he has delivered over his vast and ever changing career. His set was constantly changing up at an ADHD pace, so there was always something fantastic for our ears to feast on. Originally I had planned to watch an hour of his set and then go and catch a bit of Run the Jewels, but I felt so engrossed and mesmerized by what Aphex Twin was performing, that I just could not leave. Aphex Twin delivered a true masterclass in all the things that make Electronic music interesting and innovative. His set finished on devastatingly loud lashing of bit-crushed noise and wild Industrial beats with a vocal sample screaming "FUCK OFF" repeatedly. A darkly humourous way to end a two hour colossus. As the music died down and the floodlights came on, Richard D James waved goodbye to the crowd with a big smile on his face, leaving chills down my spine as rapturous applause engulfed the massive Barn stage.
Aphex Twin
Sadly Field Day 2017 left on a sour note as news started to break that a string of terrorist attacks had broken out not far from the venue. Fortunately nobody at the festival was directly affected and hopefully everybody made a safe journey home. But aside from this, Field Day 2017 will be remembered for being well organised, full of dedicated music fans who were well behaved and contributed towards an incredible vibe and atmosphere across the whole day. For eclectic music fans, Field Day offered what will easily be one of the best lineups of cutting edge artists this year. I had a truly fantastic time!
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