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FRIDAY 23rd AUGUST at THE READING FESTIVAL
SATURDAY 24th AUGUST at THE LEEDS FESTIVAL

2 MANY DJ'S (SOULWAX):
With a cult following assembled, the 2 Soulwax guys set alight the evening session stage, concocting a slammin mix of pop, Indie and dirty phat breaks. Just a pity the Dolly Parton / Royksopp mix got pushed to the side. Mat
Fucking amazing DJ-ing set. Tracks included, among others, 'Hate To Say I Told You So', 'Bohemian Like You', 'Sandwiches' and culminating with a superb cross of 'Bootylicous' & 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' - C.W
Inciting a riot in a pink thongJ.E.
I’m trying not to fall asleep, but it really is hard y’know. Can’t help feeling that there’s something wrong about watching men scratching or mixing, or whatever they do, onstage. And clapping too. Are they performing? Um… Is this note for note? Is it immoral? Hell yes! To top it all off, I’m in no mood to dance… MI
FEEDER:
I'll be honest, I did little more than make cruel necrophillia jokes about Feeder all festival. During their set was no exception. - Ollie
Undoubtedly the finest Feeder show I've seen since 'Swim' - an awesome tribute to Jon! -Mat
THE BREEDERS:
Sounded a bit too lo-fi but it was probably just cos of where I stood knowing those speaker stacks - Raz
I wanted teasing guitar hooks and sly, cool-as-fuck vocals. I got a rambling mess of disorganised noodling. I'm sure they can do better. - Gen
THE VINES:
I was at the back of the crowd, closer to The Boutique Tent - Raz
What on earth is all the fuss about? - SA.
The Vines was too packed and didn't really deserve it. ChrisO
NEW FOUND GLORY:
They bopped and popped in that kind SoCal, bed-head, skinny white boy t-shirt way. No surprise there then. PW
Bouncy. Makes me wish I knew the words. Did I say that aloud? MI
GUIDED BY VOICES:
Damn drunken idea's of what time of day you guess it is - SA.
THE BELLRAYS:
Even with the bass seemingly turned off the explosive sight of frontwoman Lisa Kekaula stomping her way around the stage shaking her tambourine like a woman possesed to the Bellrays distinct whirlwind sounds is enough to strike fear in the heart of any man!! And I like it. -Mat
THE VON BONDIES:
They blast through the same set as they've been doing all year. professionally yes, but it's starting to look like it's getting a bit too by the numbers. - Ollie
Pissing down outside and loud inside but despite a packed tent, no-one seemed to care much for the band. Standard garage rock. - C.W
Standard garage rock maybe. But watching the two female members introducing a little grrl power to the genre? *shudders*-Mat
FINCH:
On record they rawk it loud Glassjaw stylee. Reading made them sound like were riffling through my grannies sock drawer. Hmmm. PW

SATURDAY 24th AUGUST at THE READING FESTIVAL
SUNDAY 25th AUGUST at THE LEEDS FESTIVAL

JIMMY EAT WORLD:
see Rival Schools. Except with added anxiety and growing boredom - MI
JON SPENCER BULES EXPLOSION:
I had space to bop such was the crowd sparsity - Raz
COOPER TEMPLE CLAUSE:
They re-named 'See this Through and Leave' to "Drownedinsound". Might of been the best set I've seen them play this year. Certainly lining themselves up to be mahuuuge on the 2nd lp late next year. SA.
Cool hair, apocolyptic Berkshire noise sponsored by DiS himself. PW
Last year, I pottered off on my own to a half-empty Carling Stage whilst everyone else watched Feeder. This time teeny little 5'1" me had troubles worming my way even 5 rows into a crammed Evening Session Tent. And they were still just as head-messingly brilliant! KP
RIVAL SCHOOLS:
I catch the tail end of their set. At least, I think I do. But the sound in this place is godawful, and from my side it’s all drums and no atmosphere. Thinking about it, this is like watching them play Brixton academy if you were in the gallery and staying underwater in a bath - MI
ALEC EMPIRE:

Turn your microphone on - Raz
Or throw the mic to the ground and go crowd surfing, get the sound working and crank it up way past the legal limits "I'm tired of this pussy-ass shit" then finish by calling in an army of flying noise robots, killing everyone. - Ollie

THE ICARUS LINE:
Didn't really rip it up today, just pulled it apart gently - Raz
I can't actually remember seeing them, I think I was there though... says more about them than me. I hope. - Ollie
Couldn't really kick it under the circumstances. Must've been scared of Stevie Ray coming to get them. PW
A band to be seen in a grimey, dingey little toilet venue down the road - not on a nice stage with security guards, a good sound system and pretty lights. Still one of my very favourite bands though! KP
Not quite sure what went wrong 'ere. Great band but bad corporate context? SA.
The Icarus Line seemed to be strutting as much as snarling, continuing some hard-to-pin-down progression they are making out of hardcore. Playing 4 new songs that were debuted on a recent peel session, "Getting Bright at Night" is so incredible and epic, pounding repetition and feedback, makes it one of the highlights of the weekend. ChrisO
GOLDFINGER:
Get your stage time right. Fuckers - Raz
THE LIBERTINES:
Can a band be any more dreadful? Spent more time tuning than rocking. Bad. SA.
To be honest I didn't notice when they finished their set and left the stage. They were just a whole lot of noise. SL
THE PATTERN:
The Pattern's lead singer dances really funnily, along with the RnB Garage Punk it makes an appealing package, but little did I know that this would begin a theme of camp dancing punk frontmen throughout the day. ChrisO
Pretty postures, fun moves and great tunes – the pattern have it all - S.E-H

SUNDAY 25th AUGUST at THE READING FESTIVAL
FRIDAY 23rd AUGUST at THE LEEDS FESTIVAL

SPIRITUALIZED:
Then, the Death of the Festival, soundtracked by Spiritualized. The tent was emptied as everyone watches the Prodigy, the band don't even acknowledge the crowd, the music is depressingly beautiful and I sit there wrapped in a salvation army blanket ignoring everyone and coming down from the whole weekend. The drones of "Walking with Jesus", "Out of Mind" and many songs I'd never heard before invoke feelings and images completely different to the energy and fanaticism of ...Trail of Dead, it all washes over you and then they all leave, and people shuffle out, destroy things, burn stuff, make the whole "Beer for Rubbish" cleanup operation obsolete in one nights wreckage. ChrisO
...TRAIL OF DEAD:
The stage rigging has been strengthened apparently - Raz
The tent was half empty, they took out 'A Perfect Teenhood' in full WTC style, and rebuilt in from the ashes before throwing their drum kit into the baying crowd - Ollie
Trail of Dead's main flaw is their live tendency to turn sprawling epics into incoherent dribble. Happily they seem to have sorted that one out. The most satisfying band of the weekend. - Gen
I could of died right here amongst the noise, the shouting, the guys sweating out their all. And you wonder why they have that moniker? SA.
They didn't break stuff. except maybe if you consider that the moshing was THEIR fault, and so they're responsible for my toe pain.J.E.
I go back after nightfall to watch …Trail of Dead. Another transcendent experience, black hair, music reinvented for the live show, "Aged Dolls" turned into an intense build-up of white noise, "Richter Scale Madness" still a nihilistic youth destruction anthem, Jason Reece destroying the set screaming poetry before it being hastily reassembled for the final song, "A Perfect Teenhood", and then everything thrown to the crowd. "the atomic thrust is gonna tear you askew...". ChrisO
CORNERSHOP:
They really do only have one song don't they?J.E.
SIX BY SEVEN:
It's just boring now, guys - Raz
Music for chilling out to, at home, when not in a lot of physical pain. one song in and you're already planning your next day out, 'listening' on autopilot. - Ollie
The Band The Rest Of The World Forgot induce a trancelike state and a compelling desire to smash your head through the speaker stack just to get closer to the noise. - Gen
Below par performance. SA.
REEL BIG FISH:
"This song was one of the biggest songs in the 80s. And if we'd written it in the 90s, it still would've been one of the biggest songs in the 80s." Absolute class!-Mat
SPARTA:
If only I could have actually SEEN anything... KP
Less abrasive, Sparta may not be At The Drive-In, or even that similar, but their electronic post-hardcore sound has a lot of great moments. "Cut Your Ribbon" and "Mye" are perhaps the most notable, and for me whilst much of the set wasn't that outstanding they show promise for writing both more anthemic and atmospheric music. ChrisO
Not that they’re even trying to, but they don’t quite capture that magic. The little sparkle that makes the difference. They’re not plodding along, Jim could never ‘plod’, but although the songs are good, especially the new single ‘Cut Your Ribbon’, and his wails rip through the heart, a lot can be said for the fact that I’m lying on the grass as opposed to pointing in the crowd - MI
CAPDOWN:
Whoa... slow down boys! Tent overflowing - where'd all these fans come from?-Mat
HOGGBOY:
I hate this band. I hate their leather jackets, their greasy hair and the way they think they're so fucking rebellious and taboo because they have "lady noises" in one of their songs. Even more than that, I hate the fact that I missed Capdown because they swapped time-slots. Grrrr. KP
DEATHCAB FOR CUTIE:
"so, are we your hangover band then?" yes, so the crowd appear to think, a few un-loud tunes and emo-ish songs later they're done, no one is scared. - Ollie
So I woke up and ran. And it was worth it. Floatily beautiful, like a soundtrack to the view of a train ride in Scotland (or some equally mesmerising scenery), this is how I wanted my night to end. But it’s all like one big continuous day so… fuck it. This is good - MI

Breeders & Trail of Dead Photos by Greg Neale
Alec Empire & Icarus Line Photos by Ollie
Soulwax & The Bellrays Photos by Sean Hopson