The Great Escape '08 - Day One

Multiple venues, Brighton - 15 May 2008

by Jon Fletcher

Queues and overpriced beer fail to hamper some old New Noise favourites on day one

"The cost of three pints? A massive £22.50 – more than seven pounds a pint. There is no second round"

Day one and it’s already business as usual for The Great Escape: queues, bad weather and great, great bands. By the time we reach Barfly to catch the end of a typically animated Late Of The Pier set (pictured, above), the queue is stretching for over 100 metres back down Gloucester Place, filled with punters bearing the festival’s gig-only wrist bands.

They’ve made an easy mistake. The promise of 34 venues and probably the best new music line up anywhere in the UK, all for a forty five quid three day pass sounds too good to be true – and it is. The wrist bands grant you entry into any venue, but crucially, only if there is no-one bearing a far more expensive delegate pass ahead of you. If you’re heading to a popular band in a headline slot, the chances of getting in are pretty much non-existent.

But then what do you expect for £45? There are some superb venue-specific line-ups at The Great Escape and for £15 a night, it’s best to treat this festival like three nights of gigs, not an opportunity to do a bar hopping pick and mix. The delegate passes cost £200 a pop – more expensive than a ticket for a standard summer festival – but include access to the TGE conference by day. If you want to treat The Great Escape like one of those other festivals and genuinely have your pick of the bands though, a delegate pass is the only way to go.

We kick off by spending a bit of time at Audio, where Levi’s Ones To Watch is hosting one of those line ups that justifies bedding down in the same venue for the whole evening. We arrive just in time to catch the close of Ida Maria’s set. Her hair’s shorter than when we saw her last, but she’s just as compelling and just as loopy. ‘Oh My God’ as lost none of its explosive tension and Ida only adds to the sense of release as she careers around the stage.

Johnny Foreigner follow, sadly playing to a somewhat diminished crowd, which is a shame because this is a hugely undervalued band. The vocal split between guitarist Alexei and bass player Kelly propels their brazen, staccato indie from the average to the exceptional, Alexei’s dexterity on the guitar adding a swirling, unpredictable energy.


Johnny Foreigner's Alexei

Forgoing the heat of Audio and a Young Knives close out we make for Audio, where the basement room is filling up in anticipation of a set by The Whip. We’ve become something of Whip fanatics, tracking down their live shows whenever we can – including last year when they played the Barfly at this festival. Their debut album is disappointingly flat in places, but live they remain one of the most dance-friendly, engaging acts on the circuit.

Before they arrive though, we have to run the gauntlet of Audio’s bizarre drinks policy. Despite having draught beers available, the basement bar is only serving bottles, but pouring them into plastic pint glasses. This only serves to underline the fact that one bottle is equivalent to exactly half a pint, so we double up. The cost of three pints? A massive £22.50 – more than seven pounds a pint. There is no second round.

The Whip more than make up for the shock of the beer prices. “You’d better make the most of this – we’ve only got half an hour,” front man and Ricky Butler lookalike Bruce Carter tells the audience at the start. The crowd obliges – when ‘Divebomb’ is played mid-way through the set, the space in front of the band is already a seething mass of bodies. By the time they get to ‘Trash’, the place is in meltdown.


Late Of The Pier

All the excitement makes us a little late for Late Of The Pier (we’re sure there’s a Brighton related gag in there somewhere), but we’re still there to catch the blindingly daft-yet-catchy ‘Bathroom Gurgle’. As we leave, the queue is still snaking way down the street. Silly buggers.

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