Sarah Powell: Loop Festival from an indie girl’s point of view!
If you’ve heard my show (Juice Drive 3-7 on Juice 107.2) one thing will become instantly apparent: I love indie. I’m an indie girl through and through, raised on a diet of Oasis and New Order, lover of Elbow and all things skinny jeans and pretentious haircuts. Boys and guitars is what I preach. So how would I get on at Brighton’s highly sophisticated two-day homage to electronic music, Loop?
I was going in head first, into the unknown world of beats, DJs and synths, so would I be ousted for not knowing my d’n’b from my breakbeat? Would it all come out that the closest thing I get to electro is La Roux? Do people wear converse at dance festivals? There was only one way to find out, don a suitable disguise, learn an impressive line about dubstep and get stuck in.
Inevitably with every festival you always miss the first person you had down to see and then have to hear from everyone else how great they were for the rest of the day. In our case it was Casiokids who played a storming set early on in the Dome, so we heard.
We settled for the next “hot tip” (according to the girl in The Mash Tun), the XX. The premise was good, guitars and a Sixousie t-shirt as well as suitable hype. However, while the music was good and singer Romy has a stunning voice, they lacked a pleasure of playing that I look for in a live set. For me, there failed to be a connection between stage and audience and so it was difficult to tell if they were really enjoying it or not. It raises the question, if a track is good on record, is that enough to give a good live performance?
Telepathe are two girls, with a lot of kit. They provided the best bass moment of the day, the one where it reverbs through your whole body and vibrates round through your temples. Lovely. But again they failed to interact or reach past the stage. They spoke twice to the audience, first to demand, “Why are you all sat down?” (because it’s hot and we’d just watched Warp Films). They’re obviously really close, but where’s the joy?
My fears were becoming true, electronic music seems a solitary practice, even to those playing in groups, there’s a lot of segregation and that can lead to self-indulgence. On record that’s ok, but live I need something from the stage. It’s an exchange, a conversation, not just watching someone on stage telling you how it should be. Still the day was young and local boys Mirrors were due on any minute. Four boys, no guitars, but lovely suits and here was a band who wanted to be here. Dancing over their laptops, they were loving it and consequently so were we. This was more like it! Catchy synths, a decent vocal and boys with smiles, yes yes! Live these guys are great, the songs are strong and they have their act sorted, even coining a new genre “pop noir” because pop is important, hurrah!
Datarock were easily the best band of the day. They arrived in matching red jump suits with wrap-around glasses and more energy than cheap Red Bull. Feel-good beats, catchy bass and more fun than you could shake a stick at. There were the choreographed ‘80s aerobics moves, band members on their knees worshipping each other and the keyboardist just having the time of his life. Thank God for that.
The drum set-up alone was enough to get me excited about Squarepusher, with a raised and shiny set between two massive flat speakers above a set-up of laptops and a single bass guitar. The performance was unreal, I don’t know how he did most of what he did, but his bass technique was mind-blowing. It was rock, it was beats and every time I found a rhythm he cut it back and switched it inside out. I have never danced or bounced along to a band, a DJ or an act like it, it got under your skin and this guy was loving what he was doing to us.
Loop had the potential to be a lot of fun; we watched a room full of bubbles on giant screens, we doodled on an electric map of the city and had an afternoon sit down with Warp Films watching boys blowing bubblegum while their heads exploded.
I am prepared to say I was going with a pre-assumed knowledge of what electronic music meant and it may seemed small minded to compare a genre I know to one I don’t, but I was desperate to be proved wrong. I wanted the music to feel as emotive as when I’m watching the bands I love, I wanted to be moved by this new exciting landscape that means so much to others. Maybe by putting myself in this position I was already alienating already, but overall I feel perhaps this is a festival for connoisseurs rather than introductions.
Still, it’s wicked that in a city that embraces everything from music, art, film and is constantly pushing all their boundaries, we have another festival to celebrate where we’re at. Although I doubt I’ll ever be totally converted from guitar to chaos pad that dance village is going to look a whole lot less scary from now on.
xox
