Unlike Glastonbury, Reading is strictly one for the kids. Average age today appears to be somewhere around 15 and it seems that the festival organisers, recognising their key demographic, have decided that the average 15-year-old likes only the relentless chug of American teen rock. Over the course of the weekend they will, occasionally, be proved wrong.
It's this approach to billing that means we've missed the slightly festival weary joys of one of the greatest bands on offer this weekend, Mercury Rev, who have been given a ludicrous lunchtime slot. So, it's up The Dandy Warhols to provide at least some respite with their studied take on the Athena poster shop school of Americana. But, there's nearly as many people crammed into the Comedy Tent to witness the fried imagination of Geordie surrealist Ross Noble.
It's touch and go all the way as Noble improvises his way along a tightrope. He nearly falls when halfway into a curiously violent Craig David hate routine - which culminates in the fresh-faced soul singer 'crawling away' after a street beating - a member of the crowd offers the singer's mobile phone number. The sight of an entire tent screaming "F**K OFF" into his voicemail proves a surprisingly good start to the day.
A bad start, though, blights the opening of The White Stripes set over on the Main Stage as Jack and Meg get busy pushing out the blues to themselves because some clown has forgotten to hit the master volume. Doh! Once the sound and applause goes up we are again invited to marvel at the sheer volume of sound coming from just one guitar, at this ever so slightly creepy brother and sister relationship and at just how effortlessly the Stripes outclass almost every act on the bill.
They sound rawer than at their earlier Glastonbury show adding a desperate edge to the already overwrought rendition of 'Jolene'. The nursery-rhyme psychoanalysis of Jack White's archetypal tales of mothers and sisters is utterly transfixing, so is his elemental command of his instrument. With so many of the 'ones to watch' this weekend offering Photostat versions of their heroes - over in the Carling Tent The Datsuns are doing the best 'pub AC/DC' known to man - The White Stripes shine by virtue of their musical literacy. They may be the sum of their influences but that sum adds up to so much more.
And, of course, The White Stripes bring showmanship to their performance, something that Jarvis Cocker has been doing for a over a decade. And when Pulp emerge from the rain clouds that blighted the stalled comeback of Jane's Addiction he bounds onto the stage to strike a pose on the left monitor stack and then the right. A star, if only because he realises that there's little more to it than this.
It's a shame, then, that together Pulp tonight are less than the sum of their parts, Jarvis given too much space at the centre of the stage seems uninspired and the interaction between the band is non-existent. It doesn't help that they sound like they're wired up to a car stereo, the awfully balanced elements making Mark Webber sound like Mani. Or that, at every opportunity the crowd is baying for Jarvis to reprise his 'Stars In Their Eyes' performance of Uncle Rolf's 'Two Little Boys'.
'Common People', though, brings the first suggestion of politics to this strangely dispassionate stage and proves the catalyst for Pulp's performance as the crowd roars and Jarvis spits those immortal lyrics. "Everyone hates a tourist," he adds. Appropriately, the reaction saves the set but, especially given the later contrast with The Strokes who appear to be enjoying the night of their lives, Pulp seem a little tired. Jarvis asks us where the books are - we're at the 'Reading Festival' after all - and that's the point, Pulp are more at home at the Hay-On-Wye Book Festival. Reading is for the kids and you just can't picture Jarvis in three-quarter-length trousers doing Fred Durst on 'Stars In Their Eyes'.
