Photo: WENN
The Lake District was bathed in sunshine for the second day of Kendal Calling, with a musical feast of nostalgia to ease the battered, pink bodies of the thousands of revellers.
Will Varley drew a large crowd to the Chai Wallah tent early doors. And he certainly blew the cobwebs away with a magnificent set of troubadour music, tinged with sadness about the rise of fascism but a warmth and humour that softened even the hardest soul. A Nick Drake-esque mix of honesty, satirical wit and well-observed acoustic ballads that somehow ended in a hoe-down set everything up perfectly for the day ahead.
The afternoon belonged largely to the main stage. Fans of music from 2003 onwards set up camp firmly on the grassy knolls for the triple-threat of Maximo Park, The Darkness and The Hives.
Maximo Park arrived slightly frazzled after a delayed flight from Düsseldorf, but the result was a shortened set that was shorn of all the filler and packed to the rafters with hits. They tore through ‘Velocity’, ‘Graffiti’ and ‘Apply Some Pressure’ like men looking to take out the familiar frustrations of aviation on a crowd more than happy to take the punishment.
The Darkness were up next, singer Justin Hawkins declaring that, as it was a sunny day, they’d be playing a set almost entirely comprised of songs from the first album and not “the others that nobody bought”. It was an admirable sentiment, but even the cat suits and head stands couldn’t hide something a little flat about the whole show. Mid-career ennui maybe, or just fatigue, but it feels like they just need something to kickstart their love for the game.
One band you could never accuse of looking tired are The Hives. They bounded onto the stage, resplendent in monochrome checked suits, and tore it up in the way only they can. Howling Pelle Almvqvist had a bit of work to do initially to get everyone on board, but if there’s one man who can win over pretty much any crowd it’s surely him. “Main Offender’ and ‘Hate to Say I Told You So’ got things going and the band never looked back. And the rest of the band more than played their part, with more combined energy than an Olympic rowing team.
Next up was Kelis, who arrived in some style with ‘Millionaire’ and quickly set herself apart as a queen among men (and let’s face it, there are a lot of men on stage at these festivals). A stellar set of house, R&B and hip hop got everyone bouncing and was delivered in the seemingly effortless fashion than only true icons can pull off. By the time ‘Milkshake’ comes along even complete Kelis novices are converts. Truly masterful stuff.
Madness had the unenviable task of following that, but with their back catalogue they were never going to be in too much trouble. It was, to be honest, a workmanlike performance, but that’s not going to stop the older contingent losing their minds and their shirts with unabashed glee.
At midnight it was sweating room only in the Tim Peaks diner for Simon Price’s Stay Beautiful Bowie special. But special is what it was. Emotional, frantic even with people’s desire to sing and dance in tribute to their hero, it was one of the weekend’s undoubted highlights. A mix of sound and vision that would make the musical gods themselves blush.
