So the annual, small and bijou family friendly Deershed festival was upon us once again, and the weather gods were smiling on us with a forecast of sunny spells over the whole weekend.
The live music is only actually spread over 2 full days, 4pm start on Friday, and roughly 5pm end on Sunday afternoon, but if you have young kids, there’s plenty of other activities to keep them occupied.
Being in the massive minority with no kids to entertain, after the tent was erected, we headed into the arena on Friday afternoon with the first stop being a cold cider to keep us cool.
The music takes place over 4 stages - Main, Lodge, In The Dock and Obelisk, in decreasing capacities, and the festival does its best to avoid any clashes, which means due to the intimate venue, it’s simple to stage hop and catch sets from pretty much anyone and everyone.
Highlights from day 1 were Lusts - Leicester based shoe gaze, indie types, Gwenno and Patch & The Giant - a 5 piece, multi instrumentalists of alt-folk. Everything Everything closed the first day, doing what they do.
Day 2 dawned warm and sunny making it impossible to stay in the tent after about 9am, so the hangover had to be nursed alfresco with the obligatory bacon sandwich....although the baby crying at approx 5.30 woke most of us in a 100 yard radius.
Saturday is the real meat of the festival, where the established acts mingle with newer unknown artists and where I always look forward to finding someone new to go on about. New (to me anyway) were Fews (Swedish/American guitar driven indie), Plastic Mermaids (uncannily sounding like Mercury Rev playing Flaming Lips songs), and a 17 guy called Declan McKenna who played some lovely songs to a sun drenched, lazy midday audience on the main stage. It’s also worth mentioning the quality of the sound system at this festival - always top class.
The wonderful Emma Pollock played the Lodge stage on Saturday afternoon - incredibly engaging and charming - swigging from a bottle of York Brewery Guzzler, and playing mostly songs from her magnificent latest release In Search of Harperfield. The only downer was her declaration that she no longer plays Delgado’s songs....”a line had to be drawn”.
Misty Miller was next up, on the Main Stage, and have to say left disappointed. She seems to have been turned into a pop princess - over produced and polished, as opposed to the rock chick I first saw a couple of years back.
Boxed In livened us up again, being the first band we saw you could dance to. Excellent set. This Is The Kit were there usual charming self, but with 1 major omission.....no Rozi on bass. And no explanation either...
Steve Mason pulled the largest crowd so far, which still was’t much as most of the kids and therefore parents, were still playing and enjoying the other distractions. He did hilariously keep referring to the people on the slope of the hill with their camp chairs and picnics as the Melton Mowbray brigade.
Anna Calvi was next up on the 2nd stage, where I bumped into Mr Marc Riley, who was also doing a DJ set at midnight. Ms Calvi reminds me of another Annie....Ms Clarke. I admire both of them, without actually liking much from either of them. Leaves me cold.
Leaving half way through the set meant we could catch C Duncan playing to approximately 50 of us in the In The Dock stage - massive highlight of his set (and maybe the festival) was his cover of The Cocteau Twins’s Pearly Dew Drops Drop. Fantastic. I may have been the only one present who knew the original...
Richard Hawley closed the night and was as professional and fantastic as ever. We finished the night watching Mr Riley press play on his ipod a few times, before staggering off to bed.
After the horrendous tasking of dismantling the tent etc, the few of us that bothered to make it down to the main stage for 11am on Sunday had our spirits well and truly lifted by the wonderful Mt. Wolf. Sounding like a choirboy accompanying electronic, ambient and at times indie music, these guys were a most pleasant surprise. Laters on The Lake were also as lovely as ever, even when the unexpected rain shower hit.
A trio of folk acts closed the festival for us - Serious Sam Barrett (finger picking a 12 string acoustic like a banjo), the uplifting Buffalo Skinners and Sam Lee & Friends playing earnest folk to a large gathering. We didn’t stay for Beth Orton which in hindsight I regret at least not staying for the minimum 3 song Bob Boilen set.
And so that was that for another year. For me Deershed always feels like a warm up for the rest of the summer, especially for the End of The Road festival, but the loveliness, politeness and quite frankly value for money it affords, cannot be denied. 25 bands seen, from stage front and centre, while the kids and parents are playing, cannot be argued with, and add to that the fabulous food and beer, and that’s what I call a good weekend.
Keith
@kjsmith4082
