Friday 14/06/08 Day One, Isle of Wight Festival @ Seaclose Park, Newport

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The journey down from London to Isle of Wight was as startling uneventful as this years headliners. Train, bus, ferry, taxi preceded hit single, shit banter, crap new song, hit single. Weren’t expecting that? Let me set the record straight. Having glanced over a few reviews since the weekend, all have said how good the ‘Pistols’ were and what a great man ‘Sting’ is and hoorah for ‘Ricky Wilson!’ No deal Noel. This year wasn’t about the main stage headliners; it was about the newly erected Rock The Big Top Stage. And Ian Brown. I’ll explain shortly, but first credit where credit is due. Both the Main Stage and the Big Top had quality sound systems – crystal clear and really fucking loud – and they were a measured distance apart so as to no get that half in one ear, half in the other that can so often happen during festival season. Well played IOW.

Friday night at the Big Top saw the efferescent Stranglers (they played ‘Peaches’) close the show, but more importantly being preceded by The Duke Spirit – who put in one of the set’s of the weekend. From start to finish their intensity was startling at Leila Moss – although slight in build – dominated the stage from amp to drumkit to mic. ‘Step and Walk’s’ fantastic pounding bassline contrasts Moss’s gravely yet angelic purr with the kind of audacity not seen since Burger King started charging for BBQ sauce. New single ‘My Sunken Treasure’ rocks back and forth before descending into a singalong chorus without being daytime Radio1. Their set is refreshing because there is no bullshit, it’s just a great band putting on a great show and they set the bar for the rest of the weekend.

Earlier in the afternoon The Wombats had smashed their way onto the main stage  with their attack on the chick flick institution that is ‘Bridget Jones,’ ‘Kill The Director.’ Although beset with technical difficulties they closed with their recent smashes ‘Let’s Dance To Joy Divison’ and ‘Backfire At The Disco,’ introducing the latter with “apparently the weather forecast is garbage,” couldn’t have got that more wrong. KT Tunstall came later and looked confident throught as she encouraged the crowd to “body-pop for youtube” and assured us that ¼ was “clincially unstable.” Her singing proved more entertaining thankfully with ‘Big Black Horse In The Cherry Tree’ and ‘Suddenly I See’ getting the crowd bouncing as best you can to a Tunstall record.

Closing the main stage for the first night was the Kaiser Chiefs fresh from their homecoming gig at Elland Road, they never really got into the opposition penalty area. New track ‘You Are History’ started off a more punchy affair than what we are used to before descending into the kind of formulaic teetering-on electro breakdown that the Arctic’s wouldn’t put as a B-Side. ‘Ruby’ got the crowd moving but probably only to starve off another lengthy trip to the toilet and although Ricky Wilson threw himself around the stage like Lee Bowyer outside a nightclub, in truth, they were startling average. Their lament ‘Everything Is Average Nowadays’ couldn’t have been more apt. 

Day One in pictures: