Creamfields
Which Way’s the Techno Tent?
We came, we saw, we got our trainers muddy. This is Creamfields and
summer starts here.
5am and the sun is on the rise, the first few strokes of gun metal
grey appearing against a jet black sky. People sit huddled round
makeshift campfires, shrouded in blankets, surrounded by litter and
the detritus of the last 16 hours. The scene resembles a battle zone
in downtown Saigon.
It seems several lifetimes and a few galaxies since checking Monkey
Mafia, at the unenviable time of 3.30 the previous afternoon. Still,
Jon Carter’s boys are on their way to becoming one of the most
crucial forces in dance music at the moment; existing in splendid
isolation away from trends, Carter’s following his own vision thing
which has no real comparison. His use of sound is instinctive,
pushing his ragga-fired style towards dynamic extremes. Go on, boy.
Beth Orton, on the other hand, is all uptempo acoustic melodies and
shuffling drum beats – the natural heir to all that is good and
Balearic. Two 16-year-olds meet and fall in love during her set.
Songs glow like sun on a Spanish beach. Ladies and gentlemen, we are
floating in Beth.
A couple of tents along we get a taste of today’s Ibizan musical
preferences, DJ Sonique is busy doing her variety turn – leaping
around and singing along to fierce hard house, whipping up the first
full house of the afternoon in the process.
Back outside, and we’re torn between checking out that tempting
noodle stall and the Nuphonic crew dropping cool disco and deep
house on the Bud Ice double decker bus as the sun sets. The nosh
takes second place to the Nuphonic outdoors party vibe.
So many DJs, so little time. Over in the Trade tent, the Sharp Boys
are doing their level best to turn a rural Hampshire afternoon into
an after-hours gay club. They duly hammer out a “those who rocked
it” performance before handing the NRG baton to Steve Thomas. It’s
clear that, with the exception of the main arenas, the Trade tent is
set to be the busiest and the buzziest of the day. Not bad when you
consider that this isn’t even the normal Trade crowd. Capital queens
and muddy fields go together like Laurel and Costello. But today’s
crowd are no slouches at raising and riding an authentic Turnmills
NRG vibe. Or caning gear and whooping loudly, come to think of it.
Cornershop are the only real dark horses here today. One hit remix
does not necessarily a successful dance festival band make, and
while “….Born For The Seventh Time” may have been the closest anyone
has come to marrying rock and an experimental dance ethic since “Screamadelica”,
it’s glaringly obvious that Cornershop have a lot to learn about
stagecraft. The sound is terrible, too – Tjinder sounds like he’s
gargling granite, and there’s a time delay between the speakers and
the stage, so the drum beats sound like they’re cutting over each
other. Disappointing.
There’s a stirring in the Force when Money Mark comes on. Knowing
the company he keeps, he sounds like the James Brown band touched by
the hand of Sonic Youth and Beck. Mark is one wild and crazy coot,
slipping from nimble melodies one minute to the kind of totally
fucked-up electronic screeching that The Aphex Twin would
wholeheartedly endorse.
As it gets darker, the eyes get wider and the Bugged Out techno tent
is looking increasingly inviting. In case you didn’t already know,
Green Velvet is a spiky haired geezer who makes percussive Chicago
jackin’ oddities. So it came as little surprise on his opening
number when, with the mic stuffed halfway down his throat, Mr Velvet
growls “When will anyone be satisfied?” in deranged acid-crazed
tones over a pulsing military tattoo. Unfortunately, it’s all too
much for the dreadlocked geezer to our right who whispers “Oh my
god, the shadows are coming alive,” before scarpering out of the
tent.
No time to worry – there’s still Primal Scream, and it doesn’t get
much better than this.
“If you play with fire/You’re gonna get burned/Some of my friends
are gonna die young,” repeats Bobby over and over; a mantra for the
strung-out, fucked up. “Stukka” is a snake skank. “Kowalski” is the
sound of heavy machinery fucking. “Burning Wheel” is the sound of
computers breaking down; entropy and crossed wires. “Rocks” is the
greatest party record ever written, and “Higher Than The Sun”
contains the most significant single statement of intent from any
band – “I live just for today/Don’t care about tomorrow.”
The band are damn tight. What Mani has brought to the Scream party
can never be underestimated. Implacable, cool, bass literally
hanging round his knees, he’s the Lee Marvin of bass playing: firing
killer riffs, point blank. “Has anyone taken any of the acid house
love-drug Ecstasy?” he asks, cheeky scamp. There are some cheers.
Meanwhile, Laurent Garnier’s rare live performance is one of the
festival’s most eagerly anticipated. For all the talk of Daft Punk,
Motorbass and Air, his set is a timely reminder of who really is the
kingpin of French dance music. He brings a touch of typically Gallic
flair to proceedings – namely bongos, mad percussion, violins,
dancing swans, human springs and a mime artist giving it up big time
in a Marcel Marceau style.
Throughout his 60-minute masterclass in eclecticism, Garnier has the
fixed expression of a man on the verge of orgasm, oohing and aahing
as he manipulates his buttons and twiddles his knobs. When he drops
the ice-cool techno stomp of “Crispy Bacon” – with the resultant
scenes of delirium normally reserved for Alan Shearer slipping an
extra-time winner past a floundering German keeper – Garnier visibly
relaxes into a post-coital smirk. What a sexy boy.
Daft Punk’s turntable stint swings between the farcical and the
sublime. One minute the sound system’s silent as the boys pick fluff
from the record needle, the next the punters are going potty as
Thomas drops his own “Trax On Da Rocks” disco-cut-up. Guy looks like
an extra from “The Curse Of Fu Manchu”, resplendent in a bizarre red
silk two-piece while Thomas still looks no more than 12 years old.
Good to see The Chemical Brothers out of the studio and back behind
a pair of decks, playing the kind of faultless DJ set you can only
listen to with your jaw hanging round your ankles. Tom and Ed lounge
around the stage, casually working the crowd into a state of near
hysteria. When Ed drops their mix of the Manics’ “Everything Must
Go,” the tent nearly combusts. Against bone-pulverising beats they
slam out hard-as-fuck acid lines and bassline machine gun fire. They
finish with a medley of “Sergeant Pepper (Reprise),” “Private
Psychedelic Reel” and “Setting Sun”. Godlike.
Spare a thought for poor old Danny Rampling in the Cream replica
Courtyard. At a time when thousands were straining to see a largely
ineffectual Run DMC from the back of the main arena, Danny held the
Courtyard in a stunning psychedelic web, morphing melodic trance
into acid and back again into layered builds and mass confusion.
The crowd, a mass cross-section ranging from fluoro day trippers to
teenage post-hardcore pill-poppers, remained transfixed. They
soared. They flailed. They experienced.
And for two magical hours at least, Creamfields became a rave in the
true sense of the word.
Creamfields’ Uppers & Downers
Uppers
• The sun shining at long last
• The all singing, all dancing DJ Sonique show getting the Premier
League tent rocking like billy-o
• Ashley, Dave Hill, Simon Faze Action and the whole Nuphonic posse
turning the Bud Ice bus into disco central all afternoon
• Undergoing the politest drug search we’ve ever encountered
• The Muzik pantomime cows generally making a right nuisance of
themselves. Moozik!
• Judge Jules getting on the mic and restoring some much needed
order to the anarchic proceedings at the (ahem) Muzik Bedroom Bedlam
stage
• Driving home secure in the knowledge that we’ve still got
Glastonbury, T in the Park, Phoenix and all the rest to look forward
to
• The Full Cycle and Trade tents being mobbed all night, proving
people still like their music that bit harder, faster and louder
Downers
• The flipping cold
• Daft Punk not making our night by not playing “Starburst”
• The deserted state of the Big Beat Boutique tent by the time the
godlike Harvey stepped up to the decks with a bunch of old Led
Zeppelin records
• The food. A fiver for noodles that taste of wallpaper paste? Not
again
• A distinct lack of the chirpy, pre-teen ‘appy ‘ardkore ravers
whose white glove and glowstick antics always made Tribal Gathering
such a giggle
• That very shaky drive home
• Record company liggers staying put in the VIP lounge when there’s
a whole festival going on outside
• Jamie our photographer shooting 30 reels of film of, well, not
very much at all actually, because it seemed like a good idea at the
time
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