Green Mun

Last night, at around 1am, Sarah and I arrived home from Green Man. Cliffey, fresh from his adventures in Europe, had very kindly agreed to pick us up from the festival grounds, and we spent the hour-or-so journey home exchanging tales of our weekends. Oddly enough, Cliffey seemed to have a lot more to tell than we did.

But perhaps I was just tired. Green Man was excellent, right down to the weather, and many many bands were seen by all.

I'm not going to do my usual trick of expanding my weekend into a novella - I can't be bothered - so here instead is a list of my Top 10 acts from across the weekend, in no particular order, with a brief description and YouTube links provided.

Bellowhead
Lots of very skilled people playing high-octane folk music, among other things. Awesome, though it's a shame we missed their first couple of songs. Considering buying tickets to their Cardiff show in November.

John Mouse
The first act I saw (excluding Tim Minchin on the Thursday night, who was probably brilliant but I couldn't really hear him due to being some distance from the stage) and he was good fun. His partner and baby were in the audience and he left the stage at one point to say hi. Which was sweet.

Sic Alps
Very noisy and very to-the-point. Actually the song I've linked to isn't that noisy but they were live believe me. Kinda grungey, kinda bluesy, very short songs, and lots of them.

We Were Evergreen
Parisian trio who opened the Pub Stage on Saturday. Wonderfully twee and very entertaining.

The Burns Unit
Very enjoyable Scottish/Canadian supergroup, featuring Mercury-nominated King Creosote. I was going to see Josh T. Pearson but opted for these instead based on their description in the programme - I don't know if I made the right choice, JTP was apparently amazing, but I had a lot of fun watching these nonetheless.

The Avett Brothers
That song is hardly representative of their sound, but it remains my favourite, even after their otherwise very bluegrassy country set stole my own kick drum heart. Special mention for their cellist, who was absolutley mental.

The Low Anthem
Undercard on the Sunday night, perhaps a little quiet for the Main Stage but brilliant regardless. Spent the set sitting with Sarah MacG's parents, her dad is very passionately into The Low Anthem. Also saw them play a brief two-song set in the Rough Trade tent, which was nice. They signed a piece of paper for Josh.

Michael Kiwanuka
Soulful and summery songs that went very nicely with the beautiful weather the last day came out with (Sarah got sunburned! At Green Man!). The studio versions on YouTube are a bit more full-bodied than the ones I caught yesterday, which consisted of him on guitar and his mate on his bass.

Iron & Wine
Closed the Main Stage proceedings last night. Sarah and I had been listening to I&W's first couple of albums in the weeks leading up to Green Man, but where those records are lo-fi and stripped-back, the live show featured a full band (and then some), while the music often bordered on jazz. I was surprised, but Sarah insists that she knew more or less what was coming. After all, songs often sound different when you hear them live*.

The Antlers
Perhaps my most looked-forward-to band of the weekend, I was a little let down when I realised that they weren't going to play anything much from Hospice, the album I'd had two months to get to know, instead choosing to focus on their new album Burst Apart, which I'd heard for the first time the day before we left for Brecon.

They were still awesome though.

Feel a bit worse for wear today. But I imagine I'll be right back down in it next year.

Joel.

*Fleet Foxes' songs, conversely, sounded exactly the same live, which might be why they were so disappointing.