Stateside bands prove this year's festival crowd-pleasers
The rain meant that many Dot to Dot punters felt content to stay in one venue rather than hopping around trying to see as many bands as possible, or at least see the bands with the best names.
Those names were not quite as exciting as in previous years, but special mention still needs to Bravo Brave Bats, Most Planes Land and The Rumour Said Fire.
Dot to Dot is building up an enviable reputation for showcasing new talent before they hit the mainstream, so who knows, perhaps one of these bands in a few years time will be as big as previous Dot to Dotters who include Florence & The Machine, Ed Sheeran and Mumford & Sons.
Once again, venues were spread out across Bristol, with the new addition this year of the Stag & Hounds pub at the bottom of Old Market, perhaps aiming to give gig-goers a stop-off point on their way to and from the Trinity, at which Turbowolf and Pulled Apart By Horses were headlining proceedings.
Business Cards From Only £10.95 Delivered www.myprint-247.co.uk
View detailsOur heavyweight cards have FREE UV silk coating, FREE next day delivery & VAT included. Choose from 1000's of pre-designed templates or upload your own artwork. Orders dispatched within 24hrs.
Terms: Visit our site for more products: Business Cards, Compliment Slips, Letterheads, Leaflets, Postcards, Posters & much more. All items are free next day delivery. www.myprint-247.co.uk
Contact: 01858 468192
Valid until: Sunday, June 30 2013
The Fleece is always a popular venue and one which can feel like it is midnight at midday.
Those cans for £2.50 are still for sale in one corner, and the venue is still as hot and sweaty as ever, even when standing still.
Second on the bill in the Fleece at 4pm were The Hundred in the Hands, a hotly tipped electropop duo. an American electropop duo of Eleanore Everdell and Jason Friedman who formed in 2008 in Brooklyn.
They are named after the phrase the Lakota Nation gave to the 1866 Fetterman Battle in Wyoming, in which Crazy Horse led his warriors to a victory that resulted in the death of 100 enemies.
Like their fellow Brooklyn-based boy-girl electro-pop duo Sleigh Bells, The Hundred in the Hands play music that is sultry and sexy, even in the mid-afternoon.
It is mostly head-down stuff, with not many words to the crowd as Everdell and Friedman are content to simply get on with proceedings, as they are joined by another musician on the drums.
Kicking off proceedings at the Stag & Hounds was Joyce the Librarian. "Welcome to the epicentre of Dot to Dot," the male half of their two-strong number said jokingly to the dozen or so people in the pub including a sound-man in flip flops and a woman behind the bar.
After some of the acts that had played previously during the day, this was some much-needed downtempo, the kind of music usually heard at this time of day.
A twopiece when they are usually a fourpiece, there was a woman on keyboards, including organ style, and the man on an acoustic guitar.
At times, without their usual cohort around them, they seemed to be working out what to do while on stage as they went, as a few passers-by on Old Market glanced through the windows to see what was happening – music this quiet doesn't normally have a place in this pub.
This was delightful music, with an engaging band and one at which the small crowd enjoyed so much that one new fan handed out his bowl of chips to all in the audience, and then the two in the band.
There were a few too many to hand out your chips to when The Drums headlined the Academy in the evening.
Playing to a packed house, they also represented Brooklyn, and showed why they have achieved both commercial and critical acclaim, playing their own version of beach pop fantasies as biblical rain continued to soak Bristol.
With rather an obvious nod to the Beach Boys, they played some extremely catchy melodies, indie for people who like pop music.
Another east coast American, Willy Mason, playing back at the Fleece showed why he has been compared to Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash, simple melodies and a voice belying his young age.
If naming your band, why name them after one of the most successful television shows of all time?
Friends don't seem too worried by this.
Friends completed Saturday's Brooklyn invasion of Bristol, their sassy girl-fronted pop and plenty of percussion perfect for dancing to.
They may have been playing in the early hours of the morning in the Thekla, but this boat was still ready to rock; no sailing off for the Jubilee river pageant for it.
And Olubenga from Metronomy and Bondax ensured the party would continue for a good few hours yet.






Comments