Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Green Man Festival in Artrocker August 2005
The Green Man Festival, near Hay-on-Wye, 19-21 August
The Green Man Festival had some fabulous folky treats, and it was in a gorgeous place - the grounds of Baskerville Hall near Hay-on-Wye, in a lush Welsh valley where we watched the full orangey moon rise like a backwards sunset, with dense woods covering the hill opposite the main stage, bouncing back the songs and hiding 19th-century dog graves.
On Friday night, The Incredible String Band laid the foundations for the weekend. They are proper 70s folksters; I felt like we were at one of the old-school stages at Glastonbury (this is no bad thing). They are one of those bands that make you want to be a member, because they look ruddy and content, and they sing honest songs about love and dancing and water and animals.
Bonnie Prince Billy and his country cohort Matt Sweeney headlined on Saturday. At first I thought he was a bit pompous, but after a couple of songs I realised it was the crowd of hushed boys that was pompous; Bonnie Prince Billy is great. A couple of nice touches popped the pomp anyway: a flare flew across the sky just as the band were getting to the chorus of I See A Darkness (very inappropriate, obviously, and probably very annoying for the band, but it was a bit magical and made everyone suddenly start singing along). Then Billy got a girl of about nine and two little boys on to the stage (his kids, maybe, I don’t know) to sing and dance with him to I Am A Cinematographer. They clearly weren’t prepared for this, and were terrified and funny and natural, and not at all twee.
There was still a lot of twee going on - Aberfeldy spring to mind - but more troubling for me was the cumulative effect of listening to emotionally dysfunctional men singing about loves lost or never won for an entire weekend. Get over it, boys. It’s funny for a bit, but after two days you start feeling a bit ragey. That old virgin-whore theory is still going strong, and it seems there’s a lot of men who are very pleased that they can grow a beard but terribly sad that they can’t find a girl who’s as nice as their mum.
Among the dumbasses though were some good uns making the sun that bit shinier. Among them were Jeffrey Lewis, who makes very sexy folk, and King Creosote, who has the bottle and the pure motives you need to write good music.
But the real magic, the great and glorious highlight of the weekend, the performer who put heart and beauty and real jaw-dropping genius into the festival, was Joanna Newsom. You get nervous writing about her set because you know you won’t do it justice. What a powerful joy to have someone writing fantastic lyrics, making wonderful songs, singing them with a voice that is sweet and clear but has strength and darkness too. Every song is a little story, they are poems with words that you revel in. She’s enjoying them too, as she sings them, the sounds and the shapes of each syllable and each line. She is beautiful, and cute, and this has been lamented, as if it is a shame that such a great songwriter should be saddled with being so beautiful. Rubbish. Are we not to take women seriously if they are sexy? Is that the best we can do? It’s an absolute wonder to go and see Joanna Newsom, I felt amazed and lucky that things can be so good.
The Green Man Festival had some fabulous folky treats, and it was in a gorgeous place - the grounds of Baskerville Hall near Hay-on-Wye, in a lush Welsh valley where we watched the full orangey moon rise like a backwards sunset, with dense woods covering the hill opposite the main stage, bouncing back the songs and hiding 19th-century dog graves.
On Friday night, The Incredible String Band laid the foundations for the weekend. They are proper 70s folksters; I felt like we were at one of the old-school stages at Glastonbury (this is no bad thing). They are one of those bands that make you want to be a member, because they look ruddy and content, and they sing honest songs about love and dancing and water and animals.
Bonnie Prince Billy and his country cohort Matt Sweeney headlined on Saturday. At first I thought he was a bit pompous, but after a couple of songs I realised it was the crowd of hushed boys that was pompous; Bonnie Prince Billy is great. A couple of nice touches popped the pomp anyway: a flare flew across the sky just as the band were getting to the chorus of I See A Darkness (very inappropriate, obviously, and probably very annoying for the band, but it was a bit magical and made everyone suddenly start singing along). Then Billy got a girl of about nine and two little boys on to the stage (his kids, maybe, I don’t know) to sing and dance with him to I Am A Cinematographer. They clearly weren’t prepared for this, and were terrified and funny and natural, and not at all twee.
There was still a lot of twee going on - Aberfeldy spring to mind - but more troubling for me was the cumulative effect of listening to emotionally dysfunctional men singing about loves lost or never won for an entire weekend. Get over it, boys. It’s funny for a bit, but after two days you start feeling a bit ragey. That old virgin-whore theory is still going strong, and it seems there’s a lot of men who are very pleased that they can grow a beard but terribly sad that they can’t find a girl who’s as nice as their mum.
Among the dumbasses though were some good uns making the sun that bit shinier. Among them were Jeffrey Lewis, who makes very sexy folk, and King Creosote, who has the bottle and the pure motives you need to write good music.
But the real magic, the great and glorious highlight of the weekend, the performer who put heart and beauty and real jaw-dropping genius into the festival, was Joanna Newsom. You get nervous writing about her set because you know you won’t do it justice. What a powerful joy to have someone writing fantastic lyrics, making wonderful songs, singing them with a voice that is sweet and clear but has strength and darkness too. Every song is a little story, they are poems with words that you revel in. She’s enjoying them too, as she sings them, the sounds and the shapes of each syllable and each line. She is beautiful, and cute, and this has been lamented, as if it is a shame that such a great songwriter should be saddled with being so beautiful. Rubbish. Are we not to take women seriously if they are sexy? Is that the best we can do? It’s an absolute wonder to go and see Joanna Newsom, I felt amazed and lucky that things can be so good.
