Get Loaded In The Park 2011 - Preview

To the casual observer and at the risk of massive over generalisation, unless you’re the sort who got into ‘indie’ a few years back and sticks to the idea that skinny jeans, Top Man check shirts and slightly over styled spiked hair are the best look ever, the chances are that you’ll have not even considered the idea of grabbing yourself a ticket for Get Loaded in the Park 2011, on 12th June. With the likes of Razorlight, The Cribs, and The Rifles all featuring prominently on the bill it’s a wonder that The Kooks and The Enemy aren’t playing as well. Get Loaded in the Park 2011 could have been titled ‘Now That’s What I Call Landfill Indie 2004-6’, but thankfully a more detailed examination of the line-up reveals a broader brush stroke of bands, including a number of Breaking More Waves approved new acts.

The name Get Loaded in the Park is somewhat misleading. Those expecting a debauched day of getting off your face and rock ‘n’ roll excess into the early hours of the morning will be severely disappointed. “There is a zero tolerance to drugs at Get Loaded in the Park. Offenders will be handed over to the police and drug dealers will be prosecuted,” warns the event website.

Furthermore because of the residential areas that front onto the park the whole one day shebang is only licenced till 9pm, meaning that those who plan to spend all night raving, will have to do it elsewhere.

Then there’s the sound levels themselves. The website explains “Lambeth Council set licensing conditions which include music sound levels. These are not the best in the world. The organisers do everything in their power to maximise the situation by employing the best PA companies and noise consultants. Added to the set levels, other influences such as atmospheric conditions and wind conditions can make it extremely difficult to get the high music sound levels that some may expect. Should the levels not be to your liking, we can only apologise and rest assured that we have the best people working on it. However, we are restrained by conditions set on us by the Council.”

But let’s ignore the fact that Get Loaded in the Park operates under these strict licencing restrictions. Let’s also ignore the fact that the event often falls somewhere between an extended gig and a mini-festival, therefore feeling somewhat more of a compromise than anything of eminence. Instead let’s concentrate on the music. Because if you ignore the likes of Razorlight and The Rifles there are still a number of smaller and newer acts worth catching. Here are some our suggestions.

Johnny Flynn (Last FM Stage)

Whilst Flynn hasn’t found the chart-bound commercial success that his peer group of Mumford & Sons, Marling and Noah and the Whale have, his rousing rootsy songs are nonetheless delightful, displaying all the trademarks of a very gifted songwriter. If it’s a choice between this Johnny and the other one named Borrell on the main stage, take this one as our recommendation.

Johnny Flynn - Kentucky Pill

Alpines (Gigwise Stage)

Alpines have cropped up regularly on Breaking More Waves since last October and the night-pop duo are gearing up for a busy summer of festivals following their recent appearance at Brighton’s Great Escape where we caught their late night beat-heavy intensity. Lead singer Catherine is the central focus – prowling the stage like a fierce combination of Fever Ray, Lykke Li and Florence and the Machine, her voice a booming dark force that will demand your attention.

Drive by Alpines

About Group (Gigwise Stage)

Featuring Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip amongst their number, About Group take an unorthodox approach to recording their material, with much of their songs being formed through improvisation. If that all sounds a little jazz-wanky and self-indulgent, fear not because the results are subtly impressive – the songs on the album Start and Complete being pleasantly subdued and showing a very different side to Taylor’s day job. Catch them on a smaller stage than you'd see Hot Chip on these days.

About Group - Don't Worry

Los Campesinos! (Main Stage)

In amongst the landfill you’ll find something brighter, angrier and way more dramatic. Los Campesinos! may have started with the twee-indie shouty vocal label hung crucifix like from their backs, but they’ve now evolved into something rawer, darker and substantially more powerful. Awkward and yet oddly celebratory Los Campesinos! is a band chock full with ideas that they manage to translate into passionate live performance. Side-step the lesser bands that occupy much of the main stage’s content and catch this lot instead. Here's an oldie.

We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed by Los Campesinos!

Spector (Gigwise Stage)

We first mentioned Spector in a Saturday Surf a while back, where we described them as ‘a crooning pop extravaganza’. Since then the Guardian’s New Band Of The Day featured them and stated that ‘they have plenty to recommend, not least a frontman who has pretensions towards the foppish literacy of a Jarvis and musicians striving to frame those lyrics in a suitably epic context,’ which to our mind sounds, like a Mr Kipling cake, exceedingly good. If their debut single – Never Fade Away – is anything to go by, then Spector should be one of your top new bands to see at Get Loaded.

Spector - Never Fade Away

Rizzle Kicks - Down With The Trumpets (New Version + Remix)

At year end it’s pretty much 100% guaranteed that one of the songs that will find itself sitting pretty near the top of the Breaking More Waves ‘irresistibly happy’ list will be Down With The Trumpets by Rizzle Kicks. Its brassy grooves and ska-bound rhythms have managed to re-invent and merge the sounds of The Specials and De La Soul in one youthful modern package and bring the bounce wherever it’s heard.

With a well-received Radio 1 Big Weekend slot and a having spread the word further with a number of shows at Brighton’s Great Escape it’s onwards and upwards for Rizzle Kicks and that starts with a slightly re-worked version of Down With The Trumpets (the original which we first featured in November 2010 now cast into the hidden dark chambers of the internet) plus a new video and a Wookie remix that was given its first spin out on the radio courtesy of BBC Radio1 Xtra's MistaJam last Saturday. You can purchase the track on June 12 on iTunes.

Ready? Yeah yeah, let’s get down with the trumpets.

Down With The Trumpets by Rizzle Kicks

Down With The Trumpets (Wookie Remix) by Rizzle Kicks

Still Corners - Cuckoo (Live Video)

The word cuckoo applies itself to a surprisingly large number of resplendent songs. I’m A Cuckoo by Belle and Sebastian, Cuckoo by Curve (anybody remember them?) and even Marina and the Diamonds got in on the act yelping the word on Mowgli’s Road. Now here’s another to add to the list. Still Corners was a band that soundtracked the slow drift from the golden rays of summer to the more muted browns of autumn for us last year with a number of posts on the blog. Since then things have been a little quiet but the group have been busy getting themselves a proper record deal with Sub Pop (who have also signed Memoryhouse, another band that formed part of that soundtrack) and preparing a new album entitled Creatures of an Hour, which they will be releasing later this year.

Cuckoo, the first single from the album, follows on from where Still Corners left off – that is to say it’s dreamy, hushed and idly beautiful – the kind of music that drifts rather than punches – and that’s fine by us. There’s no official stream or video of the song right now, but this live version is certainly more than adequate.

Still Corners performs "Cuckoo" in NYC

Pris - The Better You Look The More You See (Video)

Richard Russell, founder of record label, XL Recordings, said in a recent interview with the Guardian that the sexualisation of female artists is “boring, crass and unoriginal.” He certainly has a point and the fact Adele, an artist on his label, has sold huge amounts of records without having to ‘sex up’ shows what it is possible to do.

But let’s be clear about this. From the starting rush of adolescence, to your first snog at the school disco, pop music has always partly been about sex; remember Elvis Presley thrusting his hips provocatively? Britney Spears in a red PVC catsuit? It’s always been there and probably always will. When you’re young, full of breathless hormones, your friends, looking good and getting f*cked are probably all you care about and pop stars are part of the fantasy. Of course, commentators are right to express their concerns about the influence of sexualised female pop stars and their affect on young impressionable teens and pre-teens. There’s a line to be drawn. But ultimate sexiness is not about revealing everything, it’s about suggestion, confidence and imagination.

Which brings us, for the second time today, to Pris – a sexy band. Pris are not sexy in a fake grinding-your-half-naked-arse like Rihanna manner, but in a confidence-verging-on-arrogance cool indie-punk way. They’ll no doubt get criticised for just being a sum of their reference points, but we reckon that they really wouldn’t care. Their cheeky-trashy couldn’t give a shit attitude feels surprisingly refreshing; we could quite imagine a good percentage of indie-punk teen boys (and girls) wanting to be in their gang – and, thank god, this is a band who look like a proper gang. Boring crass and unoriginal? Only if you’ve lost the will to live. Back in the early 90’s the Manic Street Preachers were criticised for ‘not being able to play’, the indie snobs just waiting for them to fail. Pris could well get the same sort of backlash – but judging by their tweets, they’ll be ready to take it on just as the Manics did. Sometimes there’s more to pop music than just pure musical quality, otherwise all we’d have are 100’s more Adele’s.

Earlier today we posted about the Pris involvement in Wangate and streamed their debut single – a foxy uh-huh-yeah Kenickie-esque puncher. Now the band have released a video – littered with their musical reference points we think it’s fair to say the probably don’t like Mumford and Sons, but do like The Clash and The Pixies. And how often do you see Birdland as a reference point these days? Now were Birdland ever sexy? Were The Pixies? Mumford & Sons? It’s all in the eye of the beholder.