Wireless Festival London - Day One

United Kingdom | by Steve McConville21 June 2006

First up on the Main Stage are The Like and while their singer Z-Berg resembles the ghostly vision of Geena Davis in the film Beetle Juice, complete with white face paint and deathgown, all morbid fascinations are put to bed as soon as the band unleash their sugar sweet West Coast pop, the perfect warm up for the gathering afternoon crowd. All that's lacking is the summer weather, with looming clouds putting a slight downer on their summery singalongs.

If we're liking The Like then we're loving Gogol Bordello. Taking over the stage like gypsies in a disused car park, lead singer Eugene Hutz drives this colourful collective throughout the set, accordian players, violinists and guitars coming together in a crazy cacophony of Ukrainian punk mayhem. Having been together for more than six year, Gogol Bordello have perfected their live show - but you can't imagine two ever being the same.  

Dirty Pretty Things arrive next and give it all the power, pace and energy that are becoming the trademark of their live shows. From opener, and fan favourite, ‘You Fucking Love It’ through ‘Gin and Milk’ to the climax with first single ‘Bang Bang You’re Dead’, they have a brilliantly raw and chaotic vibe that may not best be suited to a big stage like this one, but goes down a storm nonetheless. Swapping glugs of beer and whisky in between songs, Carl Barat leads the band through their debut album before treating the dusty, teenage moshpit to a blazing version of The Libertines' 'Death On The Stairs'. 
 
If there is a criticism of Dirty Pretty Things then it’s that their crowd banter is virtually none-existent, a problem shared by Jack White and Brendan Benson of The Raconteurs, who are up next. When you’ve got music this good, though, you don’t need a witty anecdote every five minutes to keep the punters happy. Drawing on virtually every heavy blues band to come out of the 70s – Led Zeppelin, The Grateful Dead, The Small Faces – The Raconteurs deliver an uncompromising set that leaves you gasping for air. Only the slower track ‘Blue Veins’ offers any respite in a set that’s non stop pure guitar power.

It’s a fairly baffling decision by the organizers to follow this pair with the laid back, ultra mellow sound of Belle And Sebastian. While the Scottish strummers might work perfectly on a sunny afternoon at The Big Chill, tunes like ‘The Stars Of Track And Field’ and ‘Sukie’s Graveyard’ are too much of a contrast with the rest of tonight’s line-up and there is a visible lull in the crowd during their set.

So it’s over to The Strokes to pick things up again and it takes them a fair while to get anywhere near the momentum of Dirty Pretty Things and The Raconteurs. Singer Julian Casablancas tripping over an amp as he takes his position probably isn't the best start but it's not until five songs in that The Strokes seem that bothered about anything. As a band that rose so quickly, The Strokes have rarely seemed at ease performing to massive crowds – their overriding sense of ‘coolness’ seems to hold them back from ever being stadium-rock gods. This remains the case this evening, with only their well established anthems coming across particularly well with the audience. Everyone can have a dance to ‘Last Night’, ‘New York City Cops’ and, to a lesser extent, ‘Juicebox’ but the meandering and slurring ‘End Has No End’ is a bit more difficult to get excited about. Their nod to fellow New Yorker Lou Reed with a cover of ‘Walk On The Wild Side’ should be the highlight of their set, but again it feels too lazy to provide any real emotion in the crowd. When they’re playing to an audience of 500 or less in a trendy theatre venue, Casablancas and co. sound like the most exciting band in the world. But tonight they are put in front of thousands, and again they suggest that they’re still failing to live up to that tidal wave of hype they swept in on back in 2001.

Click through to the next page for the best of the action from the two other stages at Wireless...