Live Review

Boomtown 2011 – Boomtown Festival

• 22nd Aug 2011

Before I had even set off to the quaint Hampshire countryside, rumours about Boomtown were prickling my ears. Picking up last minute packets of noodles and other camping essentials, I was asked at the till if I was going to Boomtown, and whether I knew that it had tripled in size from last year’s 4,000 to this year’s 12,500. I was warned that once people were bitten by the Boomtown bug they returned year after year. Being a Boomtown first timer and knowing next-to-nothing about the festival itself, my curiosity was aroused. What was it about Boomtown that kept drawing punters back? And luring in more and more?

Thursday

Having missed the boat on the Boomtown bus, which takes you straight to the festival and back from a fair number of cities around the UK for around the 25 quid mark, and not having a car, we hopped on the train to Winchester. Before the train had heaved out of the first station, the party had already begun. By the time that we had jumped on the shuttle bus from the station (£4 for a single journey) and made the trek to the festival itself, most of the crowd were in a condition where they wouldn’t have been able to tell the Queen from Dot Cotton. Having pitched our tent next to a friendly old couple, we set off for an explore. The Boomtown centre is like a fantastic Frankenstein’s monster of all your childhood dreams; a maze of carnivalesque tents and rides are nestled amongst old West-style ghost town streets with graffitied buildings, an uptown Mayfair area complete with a gentlemen’s club, and a village of geodomes and tipis. Like lost Hollywood backdrops created by Tim Burton’s set designers on acid, each tent was dripping with imaginative touches; from the circling vultures in the Lion’s Den to the bouncy castle dance floor of the Leisure Centre. As the programme didn’t kick off properly till the following day, we headed over to the Devil’s Kicks Dancehall for a quick bop to some glam Two Lone Swordsmen – style rockabilly punk from Daddy Long Bones, before pleading festival flu as an excuse for an early night.

Friday

Kick-starting the day with a double dosage of Berocca, we ventured over to the Freedome, in the “Hold It Down” village area, for an African drumming workshop. The Freedome offered daily musical workshops, including an Alpha Sphere demonstration from Nu Design, as well as providing a relaxed venue to kick back at in the evening. In the neighbouring geodome we tried our hand at Ocean Dance, which is a bit of a crossover between Zumba and my mum dancing around to Stevie Wonder, and a sipped tot of home-made cider.

Then over to the Village Hall for a chilled set from Melosa, a reggae and dub band from Exeter, whose accidentally topical song about rioting got a really warm response. Complete with bunting and an intimate stage, the Village Hall had a late summer party atmosphere to it, perfect for a quiet drink and a dance. Narrowly avoiding the claws of the Jemmy Shiverers (a rabble of body snatching street urchins) and Gurtie Gusset and her Geeks, some of Boomtown’s more theatrical citizens, we wandered over to the Lion’s Den. We sipped a pint (your usual festival fare of £3.80 for a pint of San Miguel or Thatcher’s Gold) while the vibe shifted from the jazz dub of Prince Fatty to the more sound system style of Root One Band; like a lot of the music that day, neither band was particularly attention-grabbing, but did what they did well.

After an ace set from Babyhead, whose punk-tinged ska was peppered with some first-rate brass, we went in search of food. Steering away from the pricey but popular pizza and pasta (around a tenner for a margherita or plate of pasta and pesto), we settled down with a not so well rounded meal of bacon and egg rolls (£4.50) and churros with hot chocolate (£3.50); I’m not so sure my nan would have approved, but I’m sure I read somewhere that ketchup counts as one of your five-a-day.

Refuelled, we kicked off the night with some dnb among the dismembered corpses and pickled foetuses of the Bodyshop. Navigating a crowd fizzing with excitement, we stationed ourselves in front of the main stage for Gogol Bordello. They lived up to their reputation as party starters, whipping the crowd up into a rumpus before they even appeared on stage. Clichés about their energy and showmanship aside, their incredible ability to weave tales transported us from the gypsy campfires of the Ukraine to the favelas of Brazil to the homes of immigrants worldwide. As a group, they skilfully walked the tightrope between the hilarity and heartbreak, teaming the oompah and fun of the fair with emotive imagery of alienation and romance. Their cover of ‘Pink Floyd’s’ “Another Brick in the Wall” transformed into everyone’s old favourite “Start Wearing Purple” and tipped the crowd into an ecstasy of singing and stomping. Each member led the band, and with seven times the usual number of captivating front men and women, there was seven times the usual amount of drive. Their encore was nearly as long as their original set and left the crowd bewitched.
Our first taste of the Invisible Circus was dished up by Gypsy Unit. Less electro-swing and more Bristolian So Solid Crew than we expected, they still pumped out a summer party atmosphere, getting half the crowd on stage and the other half bouncing. Weaving the way back to our tent, we had a quick tumble in the Jungle is Massive ball pool, before picking up some late-night churros and popping off to bed. As we left, most Boomtowners were just getting into the swing of things. With workshops throughout the daytime, an all-day kid’s area, live music from 1pm till 3am and parties at off-track venues till morning, Boomtown Fair is definitely the festival that never sleeps.

Saturday

As some Boomtown citizens stumbled home to their sleeping bags, others were flooding into the Town Centre for a set from The Skints. An East London quartet, their mashed-up dub and ska (including an ace cover of “I’m Still In Love With You Boy”) got even the midday crowd bouncing. Tempted by early afternoon mojitos (£6.50 from the Cocktail bar in the uptown Mayfair area) and face painting (£8 for a full face), we ducked into Fashpack, a pop-up vintage and charity shop complete with a climb-in wardrobe that led you to a secret fashionista’s den. We then nipped over to the Floating Lotus cafe in Hold It Down for a quick stitch and bitch at the knitting club, before checking out the workshops on offer. Like ‘makes’ from a Blue Peter presented by George Clinton, the workshops ranged from making animals out of vegetables, to crafting rocket stoves to starring in remakes of E.T and The Wizard of Oz.

Our next dose from The Toasters was pretty lacklustre; the kind of ska my uncle Kevin bops around to after one too many. After a quick stop for a chai and rum, we ambled back to the main stage to watch the Dance Off (and avoid participation at any cost); with more lycra than the Tour de France, it was definitely one of the most extraterrestrial dance offs I’d ever seen. Over to the Invisible Circus for some folk punk from Johnny One Lung, the kind of guy you’d happily take home to your mum. We then ambled over to Hold It Down for good ole fashioned tug o’ war. Shaking up traditional jungle and ragga vocals with hard dnb beats and dancefloor fillers, the Ragga Twins and Psychofreud packed out the Lion’s Den. Only managing to catch the last couple of songs from Goldie Lookin Chain, who are definitely up to their raucous old tricks again, we stumbled across the Cheaterslicks. Like characters from an underworld Grease, their dark brand of psychobilly rock got everyone’s elbows bopping up and down. As we rambled over to the Invisible Circus for the Random Hand, we saw a bit of The McMash Clan, whose brew of beats and bass got the crowd warmed up in prep for Foreign Beggars. Reaching the Circus only to find a power cut, we mourned the loss of the Random Hand by dancing at the travelling-superbug-electro party of Arcadia, a collective from Bristol who craft everything from the giant metal insect-cum-disco to fire breathing horses.

Managing to squeeze into a tent so packed that stewards stopped letting people in, we caught some of Foreign Beggars’ energetic grime fused with a heavy dose of dnb and dubstep. We stayed on for Toddla T, whose set roams hip-hop, garage, electro and dancehall. We attempted to keep the party going over at Undertown, a bunker vibrating with heavy dnb, before finally giving into our feet and watching some Clangers at Luna, the outdoor cinema next door. After stopping off for some flat ska punk from Citizen Fish, we dropped over to see Ms Dyanamite, whose jumble of old and new material manages to get the crowd bouncing during a mighty short set. Broken-hearted by the cancellation of Barrington Levy, we cut our losses by hopping over to DJ Zinc and MC Script whose self-named ‘crack house’ fuses together shattering breakbeats and basslines.

Sunday

We kick off our last day at Boomtown with a colossal veggie fry-up (£6) and continue the Sunday vibes with a jam session at the Freedome. With 60s style open participation and the occasional interpretive dancing, the daily jam session with band “We are the ruines” sometimes strayed into wail-peppered freak-outs, but was always worth a watch. Tempted into a neighbouring geodome to make felt pouches (in return for a donation of £3 towards materials), we had a chat with other citizens about the ups and downs of Boomtown life. They declare that the increased numbers have weakened the intimate “vibe” of the festival’s earlier years but that it’s still definitely the craziest in the UK. We have an electro-swing style jive to the last of Dunkelbunt’s set, whose blend of dub, dancehall, Balkan beats and urban klezmer transports the audience to all corners of the globe. The funk jazz turntablism of The Apples, on next, perfectly matched the mellow Sunday atmosphere and got the crowd swaying under our only glimpse of summer sun.

We dodge past some zombies crowing about a dnb apocalypse and have a quick swing-round and eyeful of some oddball (or missing!) costumes at the mass barn dance. Grabbing a pint of Boomtown Wrongen (£3.50 for a pint of 7.5% Perry, the top choice at the crew bar) we head home to cook up a cauldron of soup and noodles and a have chin-wag with our neighbours (who tell us that they have fallen to Earth, but forgotten the name of their original planet and have luckily learnt how to talk and whittle like humans) . The pomping klezmer with a punk twist of Tragic Roundabout (probably the band with the best selection of hats in Boomtown), gets even the lazy Sunday crowd skanking.

The ever-first-rate Captain Hotknives delivered a both heartbreaking and heart-warming set covering difficult issues such as pigeon hypnosis and skankin’ your nana to the packed-out Village Hall. With both Cutty Ranks and Capelton having dropped out, we comforted ourselves yet again with a pint of Wrongen and a dance to Babylon Circus. Their incredible concoction of dub, gypsy swing and ska led the crowd on multiple journeys into poetic realms of French cabaret storytelling, skanking and hollering all the way. The drive and showmanship of all the group transformed their set from a bunch of top-class songs into full out spectacle, which dazzled the crowd and closed the weekend’s live music with a boom. Topping off the night with a jive at the Gramophone Disco (complete with crackly records, chintzy furniture and dancing girls), we say goodnight to Boomtown and try to forget about the morning ahead.

Boomtown is not a festival for the fainthearted, or those afraid of shower-free weekends, drink-fuelled moshing and smoke-filled tents. Far from the polished, corporate set-ups of Reading, Leeds or V festival, Boomtown Fair offers an earthy and diverse mix of music, activities and people that you’d be at a push to find anywhere else. Run off to join the Boomtown fair, and I promise you won’t look back.