Garden Nef Party

What the hell is the Garden Nef Party, I hear you ask.

It's another rock festival, a bit nearer to home, in Angouleme. It's a new festival, only it's second year, and it is on for two nights. We had been uhming and ahing about whether we were up to 2 nights rocking, but decided against the Friday night, as the only band we really wanted to see were Muse, and it was the day that the pool was due to be finished.

So we decided to go to the Saturday as we wanted to see Arcade Fire and Klaxons again, and there were so other interesting bands as well.

The festival site was in a park on a hillside, a few minutes walk from the town centre. It was a bit spooky when we got there, as you got to the festival by walking up the middle of the bye-pass which was closed down for the duration. It was so quiet that it felt like the start of a zombie movie or something. It took a while to get in, as the security was a bit tight and we had to check in our camera, so no pictures this time.

The first band up were Art Brut, and English band who are a bit like the Fall but with Hugh Grant instead of Mark E Smith. They were brilliant, and very funny, I would recommend anyone to go see them as they are so entertaining.

Next up were Klaxons, who were great as usual. Unfortunately, during their last song, the bass player decided to jump into the pit at the front of the stage, to get a bit closer to the audience. He jumped down, in rock and roll style, but never re-appeared, and the lyrics of the song changed to, "I think I might need some help guys, I've done something to my ankle".

The rest of the band carried on like true professionals, finished the song, waved to the crowd and walked off stage, without so much as a glance into the pit.

We kept seeing Klaxons wandering around the festival, enjoying the beer and the music but with no sign of the bass player. The rest of the band looked like they were about 16 years old, and were much smaller than they looked on stage. We must be getting old!

Hours later, and we were enjoying the LCD Soundsystem, when the lead singer looked down into the pit and said "Jamie from Klaxons went down there, and now he's in hospital".

We had a couple of American bands next, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, who were OK and Coco Rosie who seemed to be a bit of a US/Red Indian Bjork wannabe. It was a bit like an opera recital, so we watched from a distance, as we had found some chairs and a table, so we watched from a distance. The catering wasn't as interesting as the other festival, but the wine was good and cheap, (not for me though as I was driving) but it was all very civilized.

Arcade Fire were superb again, and had changed their set a bit from last time. The only problem with Arcade Fire, is that there are so many of them in the band , with so many instruments that it took an hour to clear the stage ready for the last band, LCD Soundsystem, so they didn't get on until 1:30 , well past our bedtime!

They were worth waiting for, and the lead singer is more our age, and looks like he enjoys a beer and a pie, so he made us feel more normal.

We left the festival at about 2:30, and got home just before 4 in the morning. I thought we would have had the roads to ourselves on the way back, but far from it. It was a as busy as the middle of the afternoon. Makes you wonder what the French get up to in the middle of the night when we are all tucked up in beddy byes.

All in all though, it was a great night, and we will try to go again next year, as it is well worth supporting.