2/7/2006 East Barnet Festival

Subject	East Barnet Festival
PostedDate	7/2/2006 12:55:00 AM
	No Download festival for me this year, so I have to make do with my local festival - which also takes place over three days. Obviously it's a very poor substitute, but it does have a couple of major advantages; It's free (well actually so was Download the last couple of years for me) and I can walk there in a few minutes. No free booze though.  I'm only really interested in the East Barnet Festival for the music, and that didn't look too strong on the Friday night and Saturday from a ROCK fans point of view so I gave those days a miss. I had plans for Saturday night anyway - see the previous blog entry. However, my adventures on Saturday night led to me finally arriving home in a state of disrepair at five o'clock on Sunday morning... I had intended to be at the festival in time to catch the first band at about 12.30 on Sunday afternoon. However, I didn't wake up until ten to one and was still drunk from my activities the previous night.  Unfortunately this led to me missing the first four bands, although I've seen Shady Deal and Three plenty of times in local pubs and Viagra Falls once or twice as well. I was particularly disappointed to miss Three as there are certainly one of the best bands on the local scene. Fortunately (or perhaps not) I had sobered up quite a bit by the time I got to Oakhill Park and Texas Flyers were about to take to the stage. I met up with some friends and they had some beer waiting for me - which was handy as my hangover hadn't started to kick in yet - and more beer ensured it never even got a chance to start! To make things even better, the weather was superb!  This made a nice change as the past few years has seen overcast weather for the festival, with it trying to rain much of the time. Texas Flyers did their ever reliable pub rock blues thing and singer 'Big Steve' managed to stay upright and concious throughout the performance - which is more than he managed last time I saw the band perform when he fell off a barstool in the Cat & Lantern and knocked himself unconcious! As the MC observed after the band finished their set - Steve managed to get through the gig without having a heart attack too - which was a relief considering the way he leaps up and down! I thought my band including the Undertones classic 'Teenage Kicks' in our set was rather ironic to say the least - but Big Steve starting his band's set with it was really taking the piss! Still, the crowd watching the band perform seemed to enjoy the band's set so I guess they did what they were booked to do. Personally, the main reason I watch this band is for Dave Page the guitarist - the best thing about the band in my opinion. He is always improvising and never seems to play the same solo twice - something very rare in pub rock bands. Next band were Crafty. This local indie style outfit are different from all the other bands on the bill - they play only their own songs. I've seen them a couple of times in a local pub several years ago and thought they were very good. They have also played at this festival in the past. I hadn't heard anything of them for a long time though, and I didn't even know if they were still going. This band were the highlight of the bands I saw this day and were excellent - they managed to really get the crowd going even though they can't have heard the songs before - quite an achievement. They also provided an amusing moment when the singer in his between songs banter let slip out in reference to England just getting knocked out of the world cup "The football was shit wasn't it?" - then realising this was supposed to be a 'family' event and backtracking with "The football wasn't very good was it?". Now I know this band are still going I'll have to try and catch them again sometime. The next act was local poet and Prince Of Wales regular 'Cornish' - a naturalised Barnet resident of 12 years. He recited a long poem of his about the 'Battle Of Barnet' and how it is still going on today in various forms - particularly the fight against local bureaucracy and Barnet Council - this seemed to strike a very strong chord with many present! Before the final band we had an acoustic interlude from well known local muso Arran, assisted by Marnie from Three on backing vocals. I've never heard an acoustic version of Green Day's 'American Idiot' before, but it worked surprisingly well. This act seemed oddly placed on the bill for this time of day. The quiet before the storm? Or maybe not... The last band to play at the 2006 East Barnet Festival were Schweet Azz - appropriately playing their last ever gig before splitting up. Personally, I've never been much of a fan of this popular local band - even though I really like most of the material they play - it was great to hear the Ruts punk classic 'Babylon's Burning' thrown in with all the familiar rock standards. Some bands seem to be able to produce something bigger and better than the sum of their parts - for instance, no one in the Beatles was a particulary good musician individually - but put them together and their chemistry created something special. This band somehow manage to do the opposite - they are excellent musicians and have a fine setlist of classic rock covers, but as a band there is something missing and they often sound a bit of a mess.  I know plenty of local people will disagree with me on this as band have a large following around these parts. Of the East Barnet Festivals of the past few years that I have attended, I have to say that based on the admittedly small part of it I saw this year - the 2006 festival was easily the best as far as the music was concerned.  And also the weather.  The only thing I thought which wasn't as good as the previous few years was the overpriced beer tent.  No draught beer, unlike previous years, and only canned or bottled beer. The cider ran out very early and I was less than impressed with being charged £3 for a can of watery Boddingtons with a suspect 'use by' date.... That gripe aside, I had a thoroughly enjoyable day out in the sun with good friends, live bands, and beer - I'm already looking forward to next year's event...