After such a chaotic Great Escape Festival kicked off our festival season the weekend before– we decided that the only way to spend the second May bank holiday would be at another festival. That’s why we wind up heading to Bristol for our first ever Dot to Dot Festival.
For our first show of the day we find ourselves in a cellar beneath The Louisiana watching locals The Blunderbuss Press in a set that is a bit of a head-scratching affair. Between their one acoustic and one electric guitar the duo craft fairly innocuous alt-folk melodies as a backdrop for possibly the strangest lyrics you’re likely to ever encounter. They’re vivid tales that feel a little like nonsense poems in their construction, telling stories of the ‘Hangover Octopus’ and the like. It’s quirky and a bit daft– but you’re not likely to forget them in a hurry.
Upstairs Hanging Tree are busy dividing the opinions of the crowd. The band are not here to take this set seriously given how they have brought their most over-the-top and bombastic performance with them and they spend most of the time laughing and joking around with one another. But it’s a refreshing change to see a band that’s so loose and laid-back. Musically their set veers between bluesy rock, grunge and smooth indie jams and though at times it is a bit strange to switch tact so often in the space of a set, they certainly have a knack to craft a solid tune.
Back in to the cellar we descend, but it’s impossible to stay down there for long with the shambolic mess that is High Climbers’ set. It’s not entirely their fault– there’s enough static feedback and constant electronic crackle that even the most dedicated fause ans would struggle to get through the 30 minutes. It’s a shame because there’s something about their melodies– buried beneath the hum that sets your teeth on edge– that suggests that High Climbers could be an interesting band to unravel.
Over in The Fleece, Dark Waves is cutting a striking figure against the purple house lights. His electronic blended indie is washes over the audience, demanding their full attention. It’s dark and brooding, cinematic and theatrical– brimming with an heavy intensity and electricity that feels like the cusp of a storm breaking overhead. Nick Long’s vocals are a striking, sultry bass that only emphasises the romantic imagery and helps further make everything about Dark Waves even more irresistible. It’s only disappointment is that Long was unable to bring the rest of his band over from the USA and is so reliant on his computer– as you can imagine a full instrumental setup would be even more thunderous.
It’s a foot-stomping, hand-clapping affair that greets those that wander into Start The Bus for the mid-afternoon slot. Foreign Affairs are a local trio who specialise in bringing smile to your face and warmth into your soul. Their folk-rock melodies are anthemic, uplifting and already built for far bigger stages than the one they currently occupy. And with their natural, magnetic stage charisma it’s easy to see why Foreign Affairs will be heading to the fields of Glastonbury this summer.
Next to the stage is Alfie Connor who easily becomes one of the most surprising–and best– acts we encounter over Dot to Dot. His music is a hybrid of smooth R’n’B electronics and Ed Sheeran-esque acoustics that ends up creating surprisingly catchy tracks that you can’t help but hum along to. The icing on the cake is Connor’s vocals which switch between rich, velvety tones to saccharine falsetto and back without the slightest tremble. It’s a very impressive showing to say the least..
Flesh are a complete 180 from Connor– but still manage to keep the bar high with another one of Dot to Dot‘s highlight shows. The quartet look and sound like they’ve stepped right out of the 90’s. It’s snot-nosed indie rock at its’ very best– which is just has enough wooziness and enough grunge to keep everyone on their toes. Every track they have in their set is delivered with a punky nonchalance that brings out the rebellious teenager inside
There’s something unusual and exciting about seeing live music on a boat– so it’s doubly exciting that it’s not just any band we’ve come across to Thekla to see but a band we’ve been waiting to see live since last September. Dralms can barely fit on to the tiny stage, but they don’t let the lack of room put them off. Their indie-pop-noir sound is even more spectacularly breathtaking live– tumbling with a maelstrom of brooding, dark, introverted emotions that easily wraps you up and enchants. Christopher Smith’s vocals are spectral in their tone, mysterious and barely there– just like his stage presence, though there is something completely mesmerising about that in itself. Latest single ‘Pillars & Pyre‘ is undoubtedly the highlight; everything about it beckoning you in with dark, sultry melodies. These guys are not ones to be missed when they return to the UK in September.
Though we remain at Thekla, you could be forgiven for thinking that we’ve been transported back to the 80’s in the blink of an eye. April Towers are electro-pop to the fullest– loaded up with 80’s synthesisers and beats that sound much like Depeche Mode. It seems as though the band have only one objective here today: to make people dance. Every song is riddled with infectious beats that electrify the nerves and, whether you like it or not, will make you move.
Returning to where our day began, we wrap up Dot to Dot‘s birthday celebration in The Louisiana watching Pixel Fix strut their cinematic stuff. Everything about the set is grandiose– but not in an over-stated, pretentious way but much rather in a way in which you feel like Pixel Fix are pushing for the highest heights that their sound can possibly achieve. Ambient electronics bleed in to lucid guitar hooks to create tracks that fail to be categorised into any niche aside from vivid and breathtaking.
Dot to Dot, whilst not the biggest metropolitan new music festival on the UK scene– it still proves itself to be more than worth investigating for those whose biggest thrills are uncovering the next big musical thing. If Dot to Dot is back next year, we will be too.
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