Photo: Imogen Lippett
This is Not a Love Song is a small, three day indie festival in Nîmes, France, that takes place every June. The lineup this year included legends such as Death Grips, Echo and the Bunnymen, as well as newer acts including HMLTD and Mick Jenkins. A compact but joyful event which feels surprisingly international, it has all the classic markers of your average British festival, with plenty of flower crowns and warm beer, but with a little more poise and a lot more heat.
With three outdoor stages and two indoors, balanced around grassy fields and non-imposing artistic structures – picture a massive pegasus made out of wood and some pretty metal and paper flowers, plus an area where you can "get married" – TINALS is easy to navigate and generally ambient. Pair that with a carefully selected range of performers and the fact you don't have to stay in a tent, and there's no reason not to go. Here’s 11 things we learned from the festival this year:
Nîmes is quiet as fuck: TINALS is based in Nîmes in the south of France. It’s a pretty, Roman town with a massive amphitheater and a bunch of other Roman temples and ruins that are over 2,000 years old. There’s also a 17th century park area called Les Jardins de la Fontaine, brimming with beauty and wildlife. During peak time the centre of the city can become nearly-busy, and there’s a fresh food market worth checking out. However, in the main, Nîmes is quiet, small and romantic. The festival itself is based just outside of the main city at a outdoor/indoor venue called Paloma, and can be reached by a tonne of buses, and, this time round at least, a shuttle bus. There’s no camping but AirBnB’s and hotels in the city are abundant, and not too pricey.
If you have good legs the world is your oyster: Alex Cameron was the biggest surprise of the festival and also one of the first performances on the Friday afternoon when everything kicked off. Unconvinced by earlier YouTube videos, I found myself falling for this man, mainly thanks to his legs, which slinked and sexed their way across the stage with a smoothness only matched by his voice. With an unidentifiable (apparently Australian) accent, a monochrome uniform and purposefully slicked-back greasy hair, he looked exactly like a big, slightly pretentious European alt-popstar in the making. Each of his songs tells a small story.
Danny Brown is a modern day rockstar: “Hi, my name is Daniel,” the Detroit rapper announced during his Friday closing set, grinning like a child – his gold fronts on show. This is a man for who music is less vocation, more source of joy, eyes alight as he introduced himself to the excited blacked out room. He cites his influences as Korn, Joy Division and Dizzee Rascal; it showed in a varied, electrifying performance. Industrial posse cut Really Doe made an appearance, as does his joyous hit, “Grown Up”. The Warp Records signee rode beats effortlessly, the smile never leaving his face, closing out with the energetic “When it Rain”.
Everyone should know about Shugo Tokumaru’s creativity: This Japanese singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist loves unusual sounds. On stage at TINALS he used everything from flutes to accordions and little cat puppets, all of which added to a fun pop set. In bare feet, guitar in hand, he led a band of six, singing mainly in his native tongue, and showed off his complex arrangements.
It's possible to be a cool one man band: Less Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins and more Stockholm-stylishness, Bror Gunnar Jansson has transcended the hapless one-man-band stereotype and made it impressively suave. His music, which he describes as “southern gothic with a Swedish twist”, is a twanging, beat-heavy conundrum. Because, like, how is it possible for one person to be tapping out that many rhythms and melodies at once, while also singing? “I am a perfectionist,” he tells me with a smile the next day, after his second TINALS performance. Jansson enjoys the freedom of working alone.
Mick Jenkins really likes water: When asked why he raps, Mick Jenkins casually responded, “I have something to say and the people want to hear it”. And they certainly did, as he gracefully willed his lengthy frame across the stage, imploring the crowd in a short, impassioned speech to “love each other”. Jenkins’ deep Alabama drawl boomed out as he played old favourites ("Jazz", "Canada Dry"), cuts off his new, unreleased album, rounding off with hard-hitting fan favourite "Jerome", and a final call to “Drink more water”.
Echo and the Bunnymen still have it: Smoking through his set on the Saturday, Ian McCulloch provided gracefully grumpy, effortless vocals. “This is the greatest song ever written," he told the audience before they group launched into their mega hit, “The Killing Moon”. Although McCulloch got pissed off a couple of times with other members of the band, this was a glorious performance from the two living legends, McCulloch and Will Sergeant, who were both original members of Echo and the Bunnymen.
French festival food is very French: Yeah, I mean the food at TINALS was both good and bad. With only four to five outlets to choose from there were plenty of baguettes and crepes on offer, but very little in the way of non-carbs which got a bit frustrating by day three. However, a mention does have to go to Vins De Nos Péres, who served not only the best wine of the festival, but also great big platters of delicious cheese, fresh dips like guacamole, hummus and tapenade and desserts like macarons and rum baba cake all for reasonable prices. To pay for everything at the festival was a nifty little card which you could top up which wasn’t as annoying as it sounds.
You can make instruments out of anything: Perhaps the most energetic set at the festival, KOKOKO! line the stage in their signature sunshine yellow jumpsuits, with instruments they have made with their own hands. Lead singer Makara Bianko leapt about the stage, gyrating this way and that, always fluid; the young MC runs a club in Kinshasa, Congo, where he performs four hours a night, six days a week, so he makes light work of this 40 minute set. That kick drum that makes you dance – typical of music from the continent – is present, but to lump this music with the "world music" label would be a mistake. As Makara made his way into the crowd to finish his set, it became evident this was not just music you heard, but felt too.
Crowdsurfing doesn’t work in small crowds: HMLTD (formerly Happy Meal Ltd, before McDonalds got involved) are a buoyant, joyus, six-piece punk band from London who like to defy gender norms by dressing in “feminine” clothing and makeup. Playing to a bouncy, but relatively small crowd as the sun went down on Saturday, they managed to have both the first stage invasion of the festival – a grinning, dozy dude who got shoved off twice by the increasingly irate bass/guitar player – and the first crowdsurf, which almost went horribly wrong. Their lead singer, Henry Spychalski, sounds like a punkier Morrissey, with an operatic vibrato and vividly blue hair. I was into it.
Death Grips are popular everywhere: A vicious mosh pit was in full force barely five minutes into Death Grips’ set on Sunday night, proving that the Californian punk band, fronted by MC Ride, is as valued by French rockers as it is by cult communities everywhere else. I could stick out the loud, noisy set (the sound system at TINALS was better than decent), but the crowd were fucking loving it.
