Stag and Dagger, Glasgow: Take One

May 23, 2009

I’m not, by nature, a festival goer – too wary of getting covered in mud from top to toe, shelling out £10 for a half-cooked burger and all the other cliches/urban myths, but the idea of an indoor, city-wide(ish) festival appeals big-scale so off I trot to Glasgow on a Saturday afternoon in line with the second Stag and Dagger progressing from its first Leeds date to its first Scottish one.

The earliest shows are on at The Captain’s Rest, namely featuring multi-instrumentalist local duo Over The Wall. Rather bizarrely, they suffer a string of technical mishaps similar to the only other opening act I’ve seen at the same venue, also a local two-some (see here for more).

Like those previous troubadours though, they soldier boldly on and deliver an enjoyably energetic set of equal parts angst and humour with ‘Angela’, ‘Gimme 5′ and the finale ‘Keyboard Heaven’ particular highlights. Staying put we were soon in the presence of The French Wives, another local group playing good, solid indie tunes (the highlight of which was ‘Halloween’) and fronted by a singer bearing a passing resemblance to a young Thurston Moore or Beck. Featuring a violin throughout, they also augment their sound with an unexpected trombone at one point. Over the course of the day, this proves the bronze medallist of the megamix.

Shoving off from the Great Western Road berth, the next destination is Glasgow School of Art for Meursault, an Edinburgh band currently getting a fair amount of press. Blending knob-twiddling electro with mandolin and ukelele driven folk, and a singer with a pretty amazing vocal range, they bleep and bellow through a reasonable bunch of angst-ridden tunes including a Withered Hand cover. I can’t say I’m particularly blown away by them, though their cajon player is good and looks to be suffering for his art.

Shifting South to Sauchiehall Street and the smelly lower reaches of Nice and Sleazy for yet more home-grown talent in the shape of Findo Gask - and an enjoyable twenty minutes is had with their Simian (pre-Mobile Disco) meets Keane sound. A fair amount of instrument swapping goes on and hell, they seem to have Harry Potter on the keys. Thankfully their technical issues don’t put them off and ‘180′ alone is worth the experience. In need of something other than local groups by this point, I strike out for the Clyde to attempt to gain entry to the Classic Grand, who are apparently limiting festival attendees to a 100 maximum. Quite why they intended to do this is beyond me, as it’s clear this rather tasty venue hasn’t sold out the show that was taking place. On stage as I arrive are the Atlantean garage quartet Gringo Star so I quickly settle down to wallow in their no-nonsense, angst-free tunes. Great stuff.

Deciding against trekking back to the GSA and then down once more to where I already was, I stay put and am rewarded with the performance of the day next in the shape of LA’s Mika Miko. Coming across like The Donnas’ younger, less polished sisters with Darlene from Roseanne as one of their two singer, they look like they’ve all bunked off school to be there. Mika Miko deliver half an hour’s worth of what can only be described as pure punk. Obviously having a ball, they banter good-naturedly with the audience and clearly have energy in spades enough to do it all again at a moment’s notice. The crowd let them down by failing to create any sort of a pit, but that’s their loss. Headliners here are Black Lips and it’s clear the crowd are only really here to see them. They bring to mind live footage of The Clash at times, and carry the gig with aplomb. Over-excited punters are in danger of letting themselves down a couple of times, and for a while there’s a giant inflatable bottle of Jaegermeister getting chucked around atop them. Particularly rousing is ‘O Katrina’ from the Good Bad Not Evil album.

Northwards once more to the GSA for a quick look at The Phantom Band upstairs (very enthusiastically received by the large crowd) and then downstairs to get sonically pummelled by The Joy Formidable – that’s what happens next. Good drummers are often in evidence throughout the day but here there’s a monstrous sound forthcoming, each song was met with rapturous applause; they fully do justice to their great album.

Record Playerz warm things up nicely before I go upstairs for what turns out to be the biggest disappointment of the day. Tim Exile’s recent album Listening Tree is one I am eager to see performed live but unfortunately due to the worst technical trouble of the 10 hours of shows I see and the lack of a soundcheck, he has a ‘mare. At one point he is in the tiny crowd Pied Piper-like. He manages to play one song from the album plus a smattering of beats, bass bits and general gabba sorts of sounds and he doesn’t seem too happy.

Rounding off the night into the wee hours, we have banging sets downstairs from Art Of Parties and the much loved Dolby Anol while some chap called Clark let loose with some quite intense drum and bass upstairs to about half a dozen more folk than Tim Exile had attracted.

A grand exercise on the whole then and one that should be welcomed back next year with the only criticism being the distance between the two furthest afield venues and those in the centre.