WALES GOES POP! – DAY THREE | LIVE REVIEW
The Gate Arts Centre, Cardiff, Sun 20 Apr
The general sense of communal decency given off by Wales Goes Pop! is exemplified by Rozi Plain, who helps the final day’s schedule run smoothly by playing two 20-minute sets in the cafe, between other artists’ longer stints on the main stage. Her brand of folk is intimate and extremely spindly, musically speaking, but generally enjoyable. It helps that she seems highly personable and genuinely grateful to be here, although when someone points out the poshness of her Winchester accent, I can’t unhear it thereafter.
In between, a set by Cardiff’s Sweet Baboo – who, over the past decade, has developed from a moderately eccentric local curio into an artist with a legitimate UK-wide rep – is well received, as expected. That aforementioned sense of communal decency is pricked somewhat by a pair of complete wankers who talk loudly through his entire set. Through their dreary din, Baboo (often with a band, this evening he plays solo) delivers a set including I’m A Dancer, Motorhome, Two Moles and various other songs with the recurrent theme of being colossally thrilled about having a romantic partner.
Ex-Stereolab vocalist Laetitia Sadier, while by no means above a little gentle humour onstage, is rather more serious in her subject matter, with songs played tonight including There’s A Price To Pay For Freedom (And It Isn’t Security) (which I still think sounds like a rejected Public Enemy album title). Her music has enough cosmetic resemblance to Stereolab to keep fans of that band happy, but is different enough to avoid suggestions of rehashing, with influences seemingly coming from garage rock, psychedelia and French pop. Silent Spot is dedicated to her friend, the late Trish Keenan of Broadcast, although its gravity is slightly marred by two small children crawling around the front of the stage and waving a torch.
Sunday’s headliners Withered Hand have a name which makes them sound like a doom metal band, but assuredly not the music to match. Dan Wilson, WH vocalist and founding member, observes that he doesn’t consider his music indiepop either, half-jokingly questioning why they’re on the bill – although a cursory glance at it would confirm that WGP! doesn’t stick to the genre very rigidly. Either way, some of their songs sound remarkably like Teenage Fanclub (such as, despite its title, Black Tambourine); others are slower, vaguely doowop-ish and built to sway to. Probably not regular festival headliners, Withered Hand go down swimmingly nonetheless. Completing the day’s litany of distracting audience members, meanwhile, are the group purchasing a seemingly endless supply of prosecco – sadly, they fail in their moral duty to make it rain in the club, and settle for merely drinking it instead.
words NOEL GARDNER
