August Bank Holiday is always something to look forward to. For the muso’s it signals the start of the annual Reading and Leeds Festival. For everyone else, it’s a well-earned three-day weekend.
On Friday, Leeds Festival returned to Bramham Park, bringing another stellar and eclectic line-up. And whilst it should have been music that made the headlines, Thursday’s overnight strong winds brought about by Storm Lilian caused havoc on site. The result was a delayed start to Friday's programming and the closure of three of the event's key stages including the BBC Radio 1 stage, along with two of the festival’s newest features The Aux Stage and the ground-breaking Chevron Stage.
However, as the old saying dictates, the show must go on. And at around 3 pm UK drum and bass star Bru-C got Friday’s main stage programming underway. Later in the afternoon, a euphoric performance from Pendulum fired up the audience and lifted their spirits after what had been a challenging start to the day.
Emerging acts like Alessi Rose, Irish folk/rockers Kingfishr, Hak Baker and Rachel Chinouriri were some of the highlights outside of the main stage on Friday afternoon.
A huge crowd was present for US rapper 21 Savage. A late arrival on the main stage resulted in Savage’s hype man DJ Marc B providing the entertainment until the hip-hop star made his untimely entrance. The artist was up against the clocks, and subsequently, 21 Savage delivered a truncated set under challenging circumnutates. There was no chance of his set time overrunning due to the main stage’s tight schedule and the impending arrival of the headliners.
Hailing from not too far down the road from Leeds versatile Barnsley-based nu-gen star Delilah Bon topped Friday’s bill on the BBC Introducing Stage. The artist’s fierce and somewhat theatrical set was a further highlight of the day’s programming. Based upon Delilah’s Friday performance alone, perhaps the UK rising star will be moving up the ladder to the event’s main stages in the not-too-distant future.
Catfish and the Bottlemen made a welcome return to Bramham Park. The band recently announced a string of UK stadium shows along with new material. Their comeback single 'Showtime' contains the lyrics “Back to the fields again. When I’ve headlined Leeds I’ll be back my friend,” illustrating the importance of this event to Van McCann and company. And the indie rockers were certainly a sight for saw eyes for the Leeds fraternity. Songs like Kathleen, Homesick and Twice had the Yorkshire audience singing at the tops of their lungs.
Main stage headliner Liam Gallagher was always going to be the perfect way to round out Friday’s proceedings. Celebrating the milestone 30th anniversary of Oasis’ debut album Definitely Maybe provided a treasure chest of anthems. Liam’s set featured classics from the Oasis repertoire like Supersonic, Live Forever and Shakermaker, to name but a few.
The frontman was joined onstage by original Oasis guitarist Bonehead. And whilst there are no signs of an Oasis reunion at present a Definitely Maybe singalong with the band’s iconic frontman is about as good as you can get. Just like the opening song of the set Liam Gallagher is a true Rock and Roll Star.
Liam's set was evocative, timeless, and most importantly enjoyable. He may hail from a bit further along the M62 but Gallagher’s Northern fanbase was Mad For It on Friday night.
Leeds Festival continues on Saturday with the likes of The Prodigy, Blink 182 and Gerry Cinnamon all featuring.
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