Photos: Sky Ferreira and Stromae live at Primavera Sound 2014

Awesome acts battle the rain in Barcelona

Tags: Sky Ferreira, Primavera Sound Festival

Thursday 29th May 2014 by Andrew Trendell | Photos by Primavera Sound/Dani Canto

Tags: Sky Ferreira, Primavera Sound Festival

Wednesday 28 May, 2014: Sky Ferreira, Stromae, Temples and Holy Ghost all battled the rain to play one of the first major shows at Primavera Sound last night - drawing huge crowds despite a torrential downpour. Check out photos of Sky Ferreira and Stromae rocking the crowd here.

The main festival in Barcelona begins tonight, but to warm up the masses of music lovers that flocked to the city for the huge seaside event, a range of huge acts took to the ATP Stage in the main arena at the Parc Del Forum.

Psych-rockers Temples pulled in a pretty large audience, before the heavens opened and a biblical downpour of torrential rain commenced. Despite many fleeing for cover, the hardcore remained to go fittingly insane for the optimistically titled 'Shelter Song' as the band played an impressive set of tracks from debut album Sun Structures to the soaked crowd.

The clouds then briefly dispersed for a teasing of mid-evening sunshine from Belgium's Stromae, who quickly warmed up a massive crowd who gathered to dance off the rain to his eclectic blend of house, hip-hop electro, jazz and big beat. The audience quickly became a sea of flailing limbs, camera phones and Belgian flags as Stromae brought in a rave atmosphere with his animated and elastic dance moves, accompanied by his band in matching bow ties, bowler hats and knee socks.

No sooner had he left the stage than the heavens opened once again, but a sizeable crowd remained for Sky Ferreira, who struggled with sound problems throughout her short but remarkable twilight set.

"I'm nervous, which is why I'm wearing sunglasses," Ferreira anxiously told the crowd as her ear-piece kept failing and the bass overwhelmed her sound. In spite of this, she was still in full voice and gave an incredible performance of tracks from her debut album Night Time, My Time, with fan favourite 'Everything Is Embarrassing' thrown in for good measure. Her stage persona and charisma was utterly magnetic, and she certainly has the presence and talent of an icon in the making - and the crowd could tell. People could be heard howling closer 'You're Not The One' into the wet night sky for hours afterwards.

Holy Ghost closed proceedings on the ATP stage, delivering a set of infectious DFA dance rock to those who remained, while many flocked across town to attempt to see The Brian Jonestown Massacre and Har Mar Superstar at the Sala Apolo, or join the epic queue to see Jamie xx and John Talbot at the Teatre Principal. The lucky few who managed to get in have spoken of an epic evening had by all.

The first main day of Primavera Sound 2014 kicks off today with performances by Arcade Fire, Queens Of The Stone Age, Disclosure, St Vincent, Warpaint, Neutral Milk Hotel, Midlake, Metronomy, Moderat, Future Islands, Chvrches, Bo Ningen, Peter Hook and many more.

Check back at Gigwise for the latest news and reviews from Primavera Sound 2014, and check out our Primavera Sound playlist here.