It's not rain, it's barely irrigation, it's just damp air. A weak drizzle constantly falls over Loch Ness on Sunday morning. Poorly camped tents collapse under the weight of the previous night's rain and almost everyone seeks shelter under tents in either the Go North tent or the Clash stage or any other pick of a myriad of roofed venues. Having seen Hadouken! on their previous year's excursion to the Loch and attempting to stick with my resolution to see acts I have never clapped me peepers on, I gingerly negotiate the mud outside of the arena to viddy Pearl And The Puppets and their attempt at a rain dance. The sunshine 5 piece from Kirkintilloch put on a fair showing early on the main stage but their middle of the road, innocent folk-rock feels flat against the meteorological backdrop.
Sunday is traditionally the 'hangover and bands day', this year differs not. What is different is that the first comedian to play Rockness, Kevin Bridges makes a welcome and 50% utterly relaxing alternative to total sonic onslaught elsewhere. 50% because halfway in the already packed tent is invaded by a a line of standing punters stretching all the way to the exit opposite me. Whereupon Bridges asks the audience to stand and move forward to accommodate them. It's a great performance of well known bits and improved situational humour directed at the press, at the nutter with the tarpaulin, at the other nutter at the barrier and at the obscure notion (to Rockness) of comedy at a festival. I saw Bridges at The Stand in Glasgow on New Years Eve and much of the same material was replicated here, though it was riffed on with a remarkable ability to interact with the crowd. His 'jovial yet cynical' veneer disarms most attempts to stir up festival cliches. He mocks a certain coalition of chanters doing, "Here we! Here we", etc by simply stating, "You don't sing along to jokes!" With anyone else, there may have been defiances but Bridges natural demeanor silences anyone not willing to play along.
Unedifying, was a word I heard used to describe Blondie of late and that is extreme. Uninspiring, I feel, is more appropriate here. The first of the three acts on the main sage today who come straight from Isle of Wight make it feel like they are simply pushing buttons in the correct sequence and dialing it in. We get 'Atomic', and 'Hanging On The Telephone' it's fine, but certainly a light year from awesome. It's entirely feasible that it's because of the rampant vitamin D deficiency but Doves suffer from the same affliction. Inebriated, Jimi Goodwin false starts the first track and malaise sets in throughout. Not to say that the band are terrible but the main stage lacks two things; get up and go. Doves do pull a decent showing, managing to hustle through the inebriation to belt out a welcome 'Kingdom Of Rust' and a 'There Goes The Fear', but it's really too little too late, to spin another cliche.
Thank god for Vampire Weekend who quite frankly inject some last minute adrenaline into the still heart of Rockness. It may be a mathematical fact that 'Naked' from Talking Heads plus Weezer's first eponymous record, minus distortion, equals Vampire Weekend, nonetheless their chipper major key guitar lines twiddled by Ezra Koenig himself balm the aching minds and delicate heads parked at the main stage. Material from their debut and 'Contra' both jangle in their bouncy paradises, with 'APunk' being the most lauded track of the set. I did spend most the set hoping to hear their ultra cool rendition of 'Ca Plane Pour Moi' but I am left without. There must surely be more to come for this band with the weight of the love many of their fans adorn them with, but the promise of a track like 'White Sky' merely justifies the emphasis with which many of my own good friends constantly speak of their infatuation with them.
Having seen the angry security guard sat outside their dressing room with his dead eyes formed in a stare like a guarantee, I assumed that The Strokes had been here for some time, I was right. I didn't not, however, expect them to walk out of the eighties too. A huge lighting rig which previously forced Doves to operate on half a stage, is unveiled and the production team embellishes on the 80's motif by walking the band on to the mandatory crowd interaction demanded by 'We Will Rock You'. We open with 'New York City Cops' and see Julian Casablancas engage the crowd with banter that sounded like the man was secured in his own Highland pleasure paradise for a while as he was living in Aldourie Castle for the past few days partying hard enough to render the ghost of Oliver Reed legless. Material like 'Last Night' and 'Hard To Explain' is doubtlessly the flavour of the night while 'Juicebox' trips over the spirit of rock and roll sleeping in the doorway as it walked onstage. All in all, The Strokes want to be at Rockness, even having the studded leather jacket and aviator disguised Casablancas remarks on how he feels regarding the Scots crowd, again continuing the 80's vibe by using the word "rad", a word I thought only appeared as a spasm in some sickly, studio script writer's brain. Ending on 'Take It Or Leave It', the band dive offstage into four awaiting blacked out cars, possibly heading back to that supposed hide-out they have the run of for the whole week -and I get a free curry. Result!
Photos by Louise Henderson
Words by Ross Gilchrist
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