It’s just a day now before All Together Now kicks off its Thursday evening programme for campers and we are priming ourselves for some serious festival action.
Today, we are thinking about the big festival moments, the songs, singalongs and anthems played by the artists on the stages that we are looking forward to.
So, if you need a last minute reason to get the goo for ATN, read on.
Having experienced the Dublin band perform this in Vicar Street earlier this year, I can’t wait to hear it again.
This song from Lankum’s fourth album False Lankum (now Mercury Prize-nominated to boot), features lyrics that date back to a 1611 ballad by ‘A Forlorn Lover’s Complaint’ by Robert Johnson about a lovelorn Juliet character who takes her own life. Lankum’s version sung by Radie Peat, takes its cue from a Jean Ritchie recording in 1963.
Live, it turns into a shuddering droning juggernaut of clanking strings and percussion, imbued with Lankum’s singular brand of industrial sludged trad music. it’s a song that feels like it could wake the undead.
2.
Caribou – ‘Sun’
A Caribou live set at a festival is perennially a festival highlight – simultaneously a sustaining highlight and an energetic pick-me-up.
The Caribou live band bring Dan Snaith’s psychedelic euphoria to a polychromatic crescendo every time. I could easily have picked any number of Caribou songs not least the likely closer ‘Can’t Do Without You’ for this, but ‘Sun’ is the transportive centre circle of the set.
3.
Overmono – ‘Good Lies’
Brothers Ed and Tom Russell have developed a reputation for combining gargantuan bass with clanking two-step and garage beats and euphoric synths in the past few years.
‘Good Lies’ though, is a softer take on the sound, and is a live favourite in an Overmono set, with Smerz repeating vocals gliding over two-step rhythms and subtle synths. It all adds up to one of the earworms of the year.
4.
Jessie Ware – ‘Freak Me Now’
At a festival last summer, Jessie Ware brought some classic disco diva style to the stage, matching her disco pop and electronic soul anthems with a show that featured vogueing dancers and a sense of Studio 54 glamour.
Ware’s latest album, Mercury-Prize-nominated album That! Feels Good! leans into the dancefloor in a way that many of us had been begging her to do, and it’s armed with big dance numbers.
The pinnacle of which is ‘Freak Me Now’, a French Touch meets disco bacchanalia that, anointing its dancefloor credentials, now has a Róisín Murphy version.
5.
Warmduscher – ‘Midnight Dipper’
This “disco ditty” from the London-based post-punk band Warmduscher is a hoot.
Warmduscher’s music often has an ironic sleazy edge, a perfect vehicle for festival escapism, and ‘Midnight Dipper’ feels like a brilliant B-side song that was rediscovered on a ’80s vinyl record when bands were messing around and having fun. Bring on the sleaze.
6.
Jamie xx – ‘Let’s Do It Again’
It’s been a while since we got a big Jamie xx festival headline set, and since then the English producer has released some heavyweight tunes in ‘Kill Dem’ and ‘Let’s Do It Again’.
Jamie’s festival sets invariably feature a mix of classic tracks, deep dance cuts and less-obvious crowdpleasing moments, and his own productions like the euphoric dance number ‘Let’s Do It Again’.
7.
Iggy Pop – ‘Lust For Life’
The Punk godfather is 76 years of age but the former Stooges man seems as energetic as ever, thirsty for live performance and connection on stage as ever.
We can expect Iggy and his band to kick out the jams from the Stooges and his solo career, and the David Bowie-co-written ‘Lust For Life’, buoyed by its inclusion on the Trainspotting soundtrack in the ’90s has become a late-career highlight.
8.
Loyle Carner – ‘Georgetown’
Fresh from an Australian tour with Kojaque, Loyle Carner’s introspective rap style has long been a hit with Irish audiences, and recent album Hugo has deepened the English rapper’s songcraft.
‘Georgetown’ is a funky-rap banger with production by the esteemed Madlib, concerning the rapper’s mixed-race identity. The song opens and closes with a sample of the poem “Half-caste” performed and written by the mixed-race Guyanese poet John Agard.
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Niall Byrne is the founder of the most-influential Irish music site Nialler9, where he has been writing about music since 2005 . He is the co-host of the Nialler9 Podcast and has written for the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Cara Magazine, Sunday Times, Totally Dublin, Red Bull and more. Niall is a DJ, founder of Lumo Club, club promoter, event curator and producer of gigs, listening parties & events in Dublin.
