Photo: Rhona Murphy
Day 3 of Gunnersville
Festival marked the end of summer 2019 outside festival season for me. It was
like a hybrid of outside and inside to be fair with a massive big top and an
equally massive stage. The sky was blue and the temperature high and it felt
like the last day of the summer holidays. There’s also something special about
the people that go to the heavier rock festivals and the feeling that no-one
actually plans on moshing anyone into the ground. People are far more likely to
help you up and chuck you back in the pit again!
Gunnersville was headlined by You Me At Six
playing all of their 27 singles in chronological order who said, during an interview
at this year’s Reading Festival “we’ve always wanted to do something similar
to this but we’ve never had enough hits to fill up a full massive, hour and 45
minute set so after we released this record it was like wow we’ve now got 6
albums and the new single. We’ve played a lot of festivals in the UK if we’re
going to headline one and do something special how can we make it different.
We’re a band that feeds off the crowd so if they’re getting into it we go
pretty wild”.
Milk
Teeth had the
unenviable task of opening up the stage and building up the crowd numbers as
people arrived into the festival. Vocalist/bassist Becky Bloomfield took
control of the crowd from the opening song ‘Vitamins’ to the finale ‘Stain’.
Adding in some phone torch/lighter waving during ‘Swear Jar’ baselined a great
vibe to start the afternoon off.
The
British/American band As It Is won the day for microphone tossing
skills. No question. Singer Patty Walters announced that ‘The Question, The
Answer’ song from the 2018 album ’The Great Depression’ would be the heaviest
song played all day and opened up a huge mosh pit. This energy lasted for the whole set and
marked As It Is out as one of the star performances of the day.
Photo: Rhona Murphy
The Maine. Judging by the amount of Arizona
band The Maine’s t-shirts in the Big Top there were a lot of fans there. But just in case it wasn't obvious who was on stage the big screens were there to help. The
Maine pulled a fan up on stage to sing along. This probably would have gone
better if the lad had known any of the words! Excellent set from this band and massive support evident for them too. They followed up their set with a huge meet and greet just outside the Big Top which caught security off-guard with the numbers of fans wanting to meet the band and get merch and parts of their bodies signed!
Sundara
Karma is an
excellent festival band but even lead singer Oscar Pollock expressed confusion
as to why they were on the bill among the heavy rock bands. They played a solid
set with a mix of hits from ‘Youth Is Only Ever Fun In Retrospect’ and the new
album ‘Ulfilas’ Alphabet’ and won some new fans.
Deaf
Havana opened up
with ‘Boston Square’ and played several songs from their 2018 album ‘Rituals’. Frontman
James Veck-Gilodi had the crowd singing back to him throughout the set. There
was a lot of love in there for this Norfolk band.
Jimmy Eat
World were the final
band to play before the headliners took the stage. In an interview at Reading
Festival YMAS said that Jimmy Eat World was one of their favourite bands so for
them to be on before YMAS was “a bit of a dream come true”. They’re a headline
band in their own right and having a back catalogue of nine albums meant their
set list was packed with quality. Debuting the track ‘Criminal Energy’ live was
a highlight and the appearance of YMAS’s Chris Miller to duet on ‘Hear You Me’
was a special moment.
Photo: Josh Franceschi from You Me At Six Official Festival Republic Image by Lewis Evans
Finally it
was time for You Me At Six to play and they didn’t disappoint. From the
moment frontman Josh Franceschi ran across the stage until the very last note
it was high-octane, full throttle brilliance. Starting with ‘Save It For The
Bedroom’ and finishing with ‘Straight To My Head’ they played all 27 singles.
They usually end with ‘Room To Breathe’ and so after that was played it felt
like they were onto a really long encore. That was the only thing that didn’t
feel right to me, bands usually end with their biggest hits but YMAS continue
to re-write the rules! Franceschi’s near
miss with the pyros came during ‘Loverboy’! He said that “today is not a day
for dying and I’m not planning on dying” but he had missed the soundcheck and
didn’t know the flame cannons were going to go off in that song.
And that
concluded Gunnersville Festival. Things to remember for next time –
the sound
quality varies depending on where you stand (like all festivals) and it’s worth
moving around during the first bands to find the best spots and most
importantly there are no lights in the portaloos!
