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Latitude Festival 2014 Round-Up

• 11th Aug 2014

This year’s Latitude Festival was bigger and better than ever, even the sheep were more colourful; and with the almost perfect weather, and 3 days of consistent activities, Jess Kempner picked some of her favourite highlights from the weekend.

1. The Black Keys. Without a doubt one of the performances of the weekend: the most incredible stage set up, fantastic production, perfect weather and brilliant sound. All of this accompanied an outstanding set, full of hits and minimal chat, in order to get more music played. Kicking off with ‘Dead And Gone’, taken from 2011 album ‘El Camino’, the band largely focused on their more recent oeuvre, bringing out ‘Next Girl’, ‘Run Right Back’ and ‘Gold On The Ceiling’ early on in the set. Following the latter, Auerbach addressed the crowd for the first time, introducing the band and thanking them for “hanging out with us this evening”. The duo then dug further back in their canon to play 2008 track ‘Strange Times’ while ‘Moneymaker’ was preceded by the guitarist telling the crowd that they “feel really good out there”. ‘Bullet In The Brain’ and new album title track ‘Turn Blue’ followed while screens alternated between shots of the band and multi-coloured spirals similar to the album’s artwork.

2. Graham Coxon and a lightning storm making Damon’s set better. I love the man, but to say that I was bored stiff during the main body of the set would not be an understatement. Thankfully, at about 10.35 the heavens opened to an arrogant display of electricity across the sky. Damon decided that that was his time to shine and took control of the situation, conducting the sky around his patter. Thankfully when he came back on for his encore he seemed to turn the set around, bringing on Graham Coxon to play Blur classics and then smashed out a few Gorillaz tunes too. All in all he showed that he was still a fantastic musician and his stage presence was second to none, but perhaps his solo stuff was not something to headline the Saturday of the festival.

3. Lily Allen’s tribute to TDCC. They say no publicity is bad publicity, and for Lily Allen it could be argued to be true. After Two Door Cinema Club had to pull out the week of Latitude due to illness, Lily Allen was called in to replace them, and received a tirade of Twitter abuse over it. When she took to the stage in a TDCC t-shirt and claiming that she loved the people that had supported her (and if you were one of the people trolling her then why were you there watching) she won the crowd over within seconds. With a mighty set, covering her whole discography, and including a Two Door Cinema Club cover of ‘Something Good Can Work’ (tribute, as she put it), she was an outstanding highlight of the weekend, and over too soon. URL Badman went out to the haters, her glorified karaoke reading off screens and lyric sheets for certain songs seemed like a kitsch addition, like the introduction of her daughter Ethel to the stage, but it was excellent. Costume changes, excellent production and a brilliant ending with her cover of Keane’s ‘Somewhere Only We Know’, Allen then left the stage to return for an encore of ‘The Fear’, World Cup song ‘Bass Like Home’ and ‘Not Fair’ she was a national monument and, it pains me to say it, pillar of feminism.

4. Atomic Bomb! Who is William Onyeabor? Sunday. Midday. A collection of artists from Hot Chip, Young Fathers, Beastie Boys, Kelis, Scritti Politti and LCD Soundsystem curated by David Byrne and Damon Albarn. William Onyeabor – a Nigerian funk artist with a mystery background – provided the most perfect setting for the final day of music. There was dancing, so much dancing, there were instruments everywhere, solos throughout, no amount of words or adjectives could describe the fantastical aural orgasm that this act provided the field in Suffolk.

5. Future Islands in the woods. The i-arena is the most amazing setting, for whatever band are playing there, and Future Islands followed by Phantogram was most probably the most special couple of hours we’ve ever spent in a forest! Future Islands were as monumental as they were on the Letterman show, with the most haunting vocals over beautiful instruments and vocalist Samuel T. Herring’s growls were as out of place but perfectly fitting in the woods. Phantogram were just as great, but perhaps deserved the slightly smaller crowd they got, as although their set was good, it lacked the presence that the previous acts had had.

6. Some brilliant comedy. There was too much to name, Katherine Ryan was astutely feminist but hilarious, with her cute kids coming on to tell some jokes at the end; Henning Wehn was as he is on the TV, mainly talking about the German-British stereotypes but still funny (minus the Nazi joke); Milton Jones bashing off the one-liners and Doc Brown making his old teachers proud with poems and comedy traversing the lines of racism, glass and gender issues in the UK. Latitude showcases some incredible acts and always manages to pull out some of the most amazing acts, this year was no different.

7. Women taking the lead at Latitude. Haim’s bass face; Royksopp & Robyn; First Aid Kit channelling their inner Abba. Latitude: the feminist festival. No, not really, but it was good to see that women are taking the lead finally in the industry and being taken seriously! First Aid Kit, playing on the main stage on the Saturday were outstanding, really channelled their inner ABBA and won over those of the crowd that weren’t quite interested yet! Haim, playing on the mainstage on the Sunday were just as great, with bass player Este’s ‘bass face’ making an exceptional appearance throughout. Royksopp and Robyn headlined the 6 Music Stage on Saturday and their duo of DJ/performer went down a massive treat. There were plenty of other women that were just as great throughout the weekend, but these were just some of our highlights.

8. People having a digital break. Because there was no phone reception on site the entire weekend, many people saw this as a massive positive rather than a negative. It was so good just watching people make arrangements to meet using words and watches, minimal selfies and worries over how many likes on Instagram their picture of the sheep had, and people engaging in conversations with strangers. Lush.

9. Bombay Bicycle Club too big for the stage. The main stage. What a beautiful band. Not just in terms of material looks but the gracious manner they dealt with the crowd, the songs they played, the banter they had and the immense production they had on their set. Headline material without a doubt!

10. Scroobius Pip on a few hours after Dame Vivienne Westwood. Where else would you find a fashion icon and national treasure holding court to festival goers and press about her projects and her life, just before you put on Essex’s finest spoken word rapper Scroobius Pip? Scroobius had to get people to stand up to get in the tent, playing some of his old hits taken down a beat as he was missing Dan le Sac, and some new stuff (that he didn’t hesitate in trying to tell you where you could buy it from). But both were on whilst nothing was on on the main stage (one lacking James, one after the headliner) and they both pulled in the most varied crowd you’ve ever seen.

11. Guilty pleasures. Once again the aftershow fun was as great as the activities taking place in the day, and our highlight was Friday night’s Guilty Pleasures as always! A mixture of your favourite disco tunes, dad dancing and other acts, it kept us going until the early hours!

12. So much going on. Latitude is a festival like no other, with art exhibitions in the woods, a Greenpeace climbing space, an entire fairground and kids area, restaurants that you have to book for, discos in the woods, films and theatre, cabaret and comedy, it is one of a kind. Make sure you don’t miss out on next year’s festivities.

Early Bird Tickets for Latitude 2015 will go on sale this Friday 1st August for a limited time until 30th September 2014. The 2015 tickets will be on sale at 2014 prices on SEETICKETS and TICKETMASTER only. There will only be a limited amount of tickets on sale at 2014 prices (plus booking fees).

The dates for the 2015 Latitude Festival are Thursday 16th – Sunday 19th July 2015.

Photo Credit: Jon Stone