It's Sunday afternoon in Guildford, and there are kids everywhere. Kids about 4 years old running around whining, "Can we get some vodka jelly? Please mum, please." Despite Catatonia having pulled out at the last minute, the kids have the opportunity to buy Catatonia t-shirts, which should placate their broken hearts. 'Well, I didn't see them, but I got a t-shirt, and saw Reef, and that's nearly as good.'
First up though, Mull Historical Society, who really are from the Scottish island of Mull. Perhaps all bands should be so geographically named. If Coldplay were interesting, they might sound a little bit like Mull Historical Society. The band's songs have a great sense of anti-climax, climbing towards a summit, but never quite reaching it.
Ed Harcourt and his band have an accordion, and an organ, and a bunch of songs Travis rejected as too formulaic and deathly dull. The kids wander off to buy lager as soon as Harcourt brings his banjo towards the mic.
It gets worse. Some local NIMBY activist comes on stage to lecture the few people that have lost the ability to run away, telling them that Guildford people don't want to live anywhere near the place where their rubbish is disposed of. He claims the town will be incinerated in 74 days. It's too long to wait. The kids shout abuse.
Eddi Reader will always, always be that quirky girl from Fairground Attraction. Today she's accompanied by the rather excellent Boo Hewerdine - he used to be in the Bible (the band, not the book). Boo gets the chance to play his own '59 Yards' and it stands head and shoulders above the rest of the set. Surely he deserves better than being a session musician for someone who had a rather twee hit in 1988?
Shouldn't religious rockers Delirious be in church on Sunday? What are they trying to achieve by irritating the general public with their tired pub rock? Is it punishment for our not attending today? Delirious have just been on tour with Bon Jovi. This is all you need to know. The kids kneel down and pray for deliverance.
Roland Gift starts by playing to an empty field. By the time he has finished the first song, 'Johnny Come Home', the parents of the kids have recognised it, and ambled over, and there's a sizeable crowd. Later Reef will have the opposite effect. Unfortunately, he intersperses the excellent Fine Young Cannibals songs ('Good Thing', 'I'm Not The Man I Used To Be') with other, unrecognised ones, which are presumably his later, solo efforts. They consist of him singing pleasantly, in the worst sense, over lazy soul-lite backing. Unhappily, this has infected the classic 'She Drives Me Crazy' which no-one recognises until the chorus. The kids, too young to remember, amuse themselves by buying the world's smallest kite.
Reef are the Wurzels reincarnated, country bumpkin rock without the novelty amusement factor. The car park is rammed with people running screaming to their cars with their hands over their ears, and the kids wander off to buy bus tickets.
