The Saloon stage - Truck Festival 2016

I've been here before. You might already know about my liking for the Saloon Bar stage at Truck Festival...
Yet again I failed to see every act on that stage over (this year for the first time in the stage's existence) three days. On the other hand I came far closer than I have ever done before over just two days. Here is some of what I saw, heard and pointed my camera at.  It is not in chronological order, because over three days that makes no real sense anyway. There are also a few things that belong in that world which, at festivals in particular, is largely forgotten or used for trips to the facilities or for food: the hiatus between acts can also be an interesting time for people-watching and photography.

Multi-cultural Oxfordshire, complete with cider-drinking rancheros. What was that stuff about Brexit all about?

This was his first ever UK performance and the start of his tour to promote recently released LP 'Silver Line'.

All the way from Austin, Texas came Chuck Hawthorne. A man, his guitar and some very fine songs.

Headlining on Friday was a trio that I have mentioned before - Applewood Road. It is trio formed of UK-based Australian Emily Barker and US artists Amber Rubarth and Amy Speace. (R - L, below).

Three-part close harmony acapella in a corrugated metal agricultural shed.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the self-titled album 'Applewood Road' will appear in a number of year-end best-of lists. The Telegraph, which has recently been one of the most reliable reviewers in this regard, gave it the accolade of a full five stars. I'm not minded to argue with that.

Another coup for the organisers of this small stage was someone who is better known as the front man of American Aquarium. This was Saturday evening.

BJ Barham was however sans band and over in the UK (also for the first time) a week before the release of his début LP 'Rockingham'.

On Saturday the stage was opened at 12:15 by Hannah Rose Platt, whom I posted about last year and who is the creator of 'Portraits', one of the best début albums of 2015, and already a brilliant storytelling songwriter.

Another artist, whose début LP 'Cracked Picture Frames' I reviewed here last year but had previously failed to see live, played early Friday evening. More storytelling... welcome to the often rather dark world of Robert Chaney.

Because of the prevalence of children in the audience he refrained from playing 'The Ballad of Edward and Lisa' and it was as well; it makes most murder ballads sound reasonably humane. Astonishing though it is I was fairly pleased not to hear it again myself, if I'm quite honest.

Returning after a very solid set on the same stage last year, shortly before the release of début LP 'Bow out of the Fading Light', this is Brighton-based The Delta Bell.

The second full-length comes soon and we got to hear a couple of tracks that might be on that. Suffice to say it's sounding rather good. It's not possible to cover everything I saw on this one stage in a single post. I have already written about Rachel Laven here.

This however cannot go without a further mention. I was looking forward to seeing Speedbuggy USA live from the moment I discovered the band was playing. To say that I was not disappointed would be misdemeanour by litotes.

Never mind the fact that this is an original 1930s 'National Resophonic' resonator mandolin.

To finish here are two more photos that don't directly involve the music. The first is that it is wonderful to see so many kids getting involved. Even if they fall asleep...

... and when the adult audience doesn't even notice that the camera is pointed towards them.

Now we are back to that hiatus-between-acts thing; when the all cowboys have left the saloon...

Truck Festival 2015 - Part 5

One last post about Truck Festival 2015 and of course that will feature the Saloon Stage again. It was expertly curated by At The Helm Records on Friday and Clubhouse Records on Saturday except that they swapped one act each between the days.

The watching and the watched are not so far apart. About 10 seconds and 3 metres in this case.

Ags Connolly. His 2014 LP 'How About Now' is quite some statement of intent.

On Saturday the At The Helm act to play was Porchlight Smoker.

Porchlight Smoker's latest LP is 'Water Into Sand', released in January 2015.

If you have been wondering about the owners of the drum-kit that has appeared in several pictures, it of course belongs to The Rosellys but had seen service as-and-when-required on this stage. The Rosellys' forthcoming LP 'The Granary Sessions' will be their third but the first recorded with a full band and also their first for Clubhouse Records, to which they recently signed.

This is The Rosellys, live at Truck Festival 2015.

All of this is what makes the 'Saloon Stage' at Truck Festival unique.

It is time to start anticipating Cambridge Folk Festival now and that is something new for me. One big problem I have is that whenever I go to Cambridge it always rains and it is usually unseasonably cold.

Thoughts on... how many festivals?

It is only possible to do so much...
I'm rather regretting the fact that, after much consideration, I decided not to head off to deepest Suffolk for Maverick Festival last weekend. There is however an excellent review of it - that attempts the impossible and almost succeeds - by Three Chords and The Truth. To some extent that makes up for not being there but more importantly it does put it firmly in my sights for 2016. A lot of temptation was indeed put in my direction when I was a EOTR 2014 I have to say. There is an argument to be made that I should have yielded to it. 
Lots of great artists there, including some of whom I was not aware of until this review (this is always a good thing in my opinion) but also some that I was.
One that the author of the above was not able to see (because of the inevitable clashes that we all know about) was The Rosellys, newly signed to The Clubhouse Records family. I hope that I've got this band covered - as I mentioned here they are playing The Great Western Saloon Bar at Truck Festival 2015. I'm set on seeing that and for good reason. Their new album 'The Granary Sessions' will be released on 7 September. It is their first record with a full band.
Here is a taster (somewhat hazard strewn) from that.

The Rosellys - Two Much Like Trouble (2011).
That said, while it has been a very close run thing, in the last fortnight this has been listened to as much as any other LP here; that is actually saying something.

It is Priddy Folk Festival this coming weekend and I am not going to that either albeit that it is just ten miles away. Outcider Festival is not much further away and is the following weekend (and therefore clashes entirely with Cambridge Folk Festival). 

There are only so many things that I can do and I have to make choices as best I see fit.