Glastonbury 2008: Acoustic Stage

United Kingdom | 01 July 2008

The few people that do pay a passing glance to this spectacle simply roll their eyes at yet another unique Glastonbury experience and return their attention to Seth Lakeman’s speed metal violinism.

The Acoustic Stage is always a unique experience in itself. A musical cabaret of folk, blues and anything containing the soft strum of a guitar, it is the place where people find shelter from the storms and end up staying for hours (or all weekend). Past Glastonbury’s have seen legendary performances by Robert Plant, the Waterboys and the Bootleg Beatles. With Seasick Steve and Joan Baez topping this year’s bill and supporting appearances from Suzanne Vega and Seth Lakeman, it’s enough to give you clash dilemmas with the likes of Jay-Z and Massive Attack elsewhere on site. Especially if you’re a bearded fellow with a jug of cider – which seems to be the look of the weekend here.

The beard quota is already high when Gráinne Duffy kicks off proceedings on Friday. Playing the first of three Blues Club gigs over the weekend, Gráinne and her band turn the tent into a little bit of New Orleans. It being the Acoustic Stage early day performers are usually faced with a tent of seated, chilled people and by the time Virginia’s Devon Sproule takes over the crowd is so laid back they are setting up picnics to Sproule’s sweet harmonies and ickle voice.

It takes Eleanor McAvoy to stir things up, whipping the crowd into a (seated) frenzy with a storming ‘Whiskey in the Jar’ and by the time Camille O’Sullivan takes the stage, with some saucy, decadent blues à la Waits and Brel, whilst knocking back a bottle of red win, the crowd are finally on the seat and dancing.

Perfect for Eddie Redder then. The Fairground Attraction singer is an ideal antidote for the rain that is battering the site. Concentrating on her solo work, it’s still the sublime ‘Perfect’ that gets the biggest cheer, Redder doing a little dance with herself as the sun starts to win the battle with Glastonbury’s darkest clouds. And Arno Carsten lifts the mood even further with a dual acoustic attack with an Ennio Morricone feel.

At last year’s festival Seasick Steve seemed to play everywhere, dragging his one-string guitar and ragged, compelling blues from the Pyramid stage to the Acoustic field and quite a few places in between. This year the Glastonbury powers that be have rightly stuck him at the top of the Acoustic’s billing. Following an ecstatic Sinead O’Connor set with a thrilling ‘Nothing Compares to You’, Seasick Steve practically rips up the stage and sets it back down deep in the Mississippi Delta.

The blues continue into Friday with Andy Fairweather-Lowe revisiting some Amen Corner classics and knocking out a great version of ‘My Wide-eyed Legless’. If the stage is still set somewhere in the American South, Seth Lakeman drags it back to the home country. “I’m going to start with a drinking song for all the people who have been drinking cider all weekend,” he says, introducing an hour of intense, fiery folk. Lakeman swaps between violin, guitar and banjo, sometimes – as on the title track of his new album, ‘Poor Man’s Heaven’ – within the same song. Apocalyptica may think they’re the only string-orientated thrash metal band, but the frenzied violin attack Lakeman delivers is as fast and riveting as anything Slayer’s Kerry King can get from a guitar.

“He didn’t do ‘Cool for Cats’! What’s the point of seeing Glen Tilbrook and not hearing ‘Cool for Cats’?” Some people are not happy that the Squeeze front man have left them short, but they still gets a whole host of Squeeze hits, including ‘Hourglass’. Finishing with a cool version of the theme from ‘Minder’, most people have grins on their faces as they desert the tent, leaving it practically empty for the Swell Season.

If the Acoustic Stage is known for its seminal sets, then the Swell Season’s 2008 visit must surely be up there with Robert Plant. That many people have stayed away proving an ignorance for a band they haven't heard of is a grave error. If they knew the Swell Season was Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová – winners of this year’s Oscar for Best Song from a Movie, from the heartwarming film ‘Once’ – the tent would have been bursting.

The few hundred dedicated souls that have made the journey are treated to an exquisite, enthralling performance. Hansard and Irglová perform songs from the film, including the Oscar winner ‘Falling Slowly’. Essentially acoustic-based and similar to Hansard’s work with the Frames, the songs also have an eerie and compelling ability to lift and soar, giving Sigur Ros-style freezing stirs every time the Swell Season take the melodies to the Heavens.

Finishing with a brand new track, ‘Happiness’, Hansard gets the crowd to sing along with the sublime chorus: “If you gotta go / Go with Happiness’. It has a stirring Leonard Cohen quality about it and for a moment Hansard capture the same emotional atmosphere that the dapper Mr Cohen will provide for ninety minutes a day later.