Sunday 06/07/08 Counting Crows, Ben Harper, Eddy Grant @ Wireless Festival, Hyde Park, London

All festivals have a reputation; Glastonbury has the mud, Bestival fancy dress, Zoo8 the worst festival ever and unfortunately the O2 Wireless Festival is regarded by many as a rather corporate and soulless affair, despite 2008’s big name acts. Hardly a finale worthy of note on paper at least, especially given the dull weather, but with five stages and over eight hours of live music, there’s plenty on offer.

Eddy Grant isn’t complaining; his strong, laid back and confident sing-along performance of ‘Hello Africa’, ‘I Don’t Wanna Dance’, ‘Electric Avenue’, ‘Gimme Hope Jo’anna’ and ‘Living On The Front Line’ is enough to kick the clouds into touch and coax the sun out of hiding. And it has the desired effect on the audience, whose knowledge of reggae probably stops short at Bob Marley, but extends far enough to execute the Caucasian reggae swing-step-skank with stereotypical embarrassing ease.

A few hundred metres away, at the O2 Stage are Melbourne’s answer to Bill and Ted’s Wyld Stallyns: The Galvatrons. A verbal promise to fuck the crowd up with their synth fuelled electro ridden Van-Halen rock is backed up by classic axe wielding poses, stage jumps and more air grabs than necessary. It’s all good fun and although ‘When We Were Kids’, ‘She’s In Love’ and ‘Donnies On TV’ seem to hit the spot it’s not enough to keep the majority of the crowd from making a beeline for the main stage to catch the Goo Goo Dolls.

Like the proverbial festival sheep, Gigwise follows to witness a sixty minute set that includes ‘(I Wont Tell Em Your) Name)’, ‘Never Take The Place Of Your Man’, 'Dizzy’, ‘Better Days’ and ‘Real’. The crowd are lapping it up and why not, it’s got enough main stage festival polish to rival Mr Sheen and these New York rock veterans are a big draw; but regardless of the performance, this a crowd that would clap at anything and in this safest of festival environments nostalgia often outweighs performance.

Unfortunately consigned to the half empty Sandisk Stage, are Delays, arguably one of Britain’s best kept secrets and for once the rain works in their favour, forcing a multitude of fair weather festival goers into the tent, boosting the crowd to capacity. Their onstage power lives up to the buzz and justified excitement that peppers a rousing set, one in which the entire band are energetically and emotionally linked to through the melancholic glory that ‘Your Friends Are False’, ‘Hideaway’, ‘Hooray’ and ‘Keep It Simple’ hold.

One addition and to this year's Wireless is the Bella Union Stage, which takes pride of place under tarpaulin in front of a good old-fashioned route-master bus. It’s a tiny stage and the weather dictates a tiny yet dedicated audience for Swedish duo Wildbirds and Peacedrums. Banging away at their disjointed percussion-ridden wonky country rock the pair or rather Mariam Wallentin’s beautifully possessed, raw, exposed and honest vocals throughout ‘The Window’, ‘I Cant Tell In His Eyes’, ‘Lost Love’, ‘Places’ and ‘Today / Tomorrow’ invoke a mesmerising fervour. 

It’s a short set and a quick turnaround as Eugene McGuinness steps up to showcase his semi-acoustic musings. The Liverpudlian seems in his element yet curiously subdued. It’s stopped raining but the atmosphere is still damp and its not McGuinness’ finest half hour despite the upbeat and pleasing simplicity of a vocal which dances across ‘A Girl Whom My Eyes Shine For’, ‘Rings Around Rosa’, ‘Nightshift’, ‘Monsters Under The Bed’ and ‘Wendy Wonders’.

The majority of the audience appear to pivot around the main stage, happy to sit and wait for the next act. Exploration it seems only extends as far as a different beer tent or newfound clutch of porta-loos. But with Ben Harper on next, all is temporally forgiven. Looking self-assured as ever, a slow-building, applause inducing jamm soon takes the shape of ‘Jah Work’ and leads into ‘Beloved One’, ‘In The Colours’, ‘Gold To Me’ and ‘Steal My Kisses’ much to the delight of the screaming female fans, yet despite the laid back and passionate performance, its somehow disaffected.

Closing Wireless 2008 are Counting Crows who take the stage to an expectant and anticipated roar of applause. Vocalist Adam Duritz collapses to the floor several times throughout the set, one that mixes new with old including ‘Mr Jones’, ‘Accidentally In Love’, ‘Round Here’ and covers of Joni Mitchell’s ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ and Jackson Frank’s ‘Blues Run The Game’. An intense show, Duritz’s performance is dramatic and emotionally charged by anyone’s standards, not more so than during ‘Colour-blind’ in which he stands completely still with eyes shut throughout, illustrating a complete understanding and empathy to the songs sentiments and proving that Wireless is anything but soulless. Their performance receives the applause it thoroughly deserves and is strong enough to silence the majority of cynics who all but dismissed their final night headline slot, including perhaps me.

See the action from the day, below: