The Big Chill 2007

United Kingdom | by Ross Purdie, Ben Murray07 August 2007

A constitutional pear cider and some improbably improv cod jazz is a comparatively civilised way to start a festival in comparison to the lager and morning mudbath that has greeted legions of people at festivals over the past few weeks. But whilst the fine Friday weather was down to luck, the ambience cultivated at The Big Chill owes more to a combination of clockwork organisation and 30,000 charming people than the Welsh border climate.

When you leave to buy some food or drink you don't feel like Captain Oates stepping into the oblivion (maybe never to see your friends again...), going to the loo isn't like an episode of How Clean Is Your House and the field underfoot doesn't resemble nuclear winter; it's less of a test of endurance, more of a weekend camping with friends and a load of bands. Even Mika cancelled, a fact met by huge cheers each time it was announced by the various stage comperes. The scene was truly set for the perfect weekend. 

Of the main stages, the Castle Stage proved the most entertaining. After the long-winded jazz of The Bad Plus (Spinal Tap would have been proud to use it if they went down the new jazz direction route again), Mr Hudson And The Library picked the day up by its collar and treated the swolen crowd to a laid back, groovy mix of regga and soulful r'n'b before New Young Pony Club shook everyone out of their sunny afternoon slumber. Guillemots almost returned the same crowd to a horizontal position with a cacophony of a performance that just about came together when they stopped showing how clever they can be.

The Open Air stage is the largest arena and the one Mika had been booked to play, if only they'd told everyone that he wasn't coming the day before then a few bags of rotten fruit wouldn't have made the
journey to Herefordshire. His replacement in Richie Havens was more than adequate, quite magnificent actually, and although he didn't play his classic 'Going Back To My Roots', he did play a long set of stripped down blues smattered with a few vintage covers such as 'All Along The Watchtower' which, ironically, harked back to original Dylan composition that Hendrix was inspired by.

Sound system duo Kruder & Dorfmeister were the biggest attraction of Saturday night with a marathon four-hour set spanning breaks, house and future dub. Their continued association with the festival (they first played four years ago) and a loyal crowd made for an atmosphere that was seismic in scale yet not
quite heaving in the same way Glastonbury or any of the other big festivals can be. This, however, is probably where the festival wins a lot of fans - you can bring your children along and not have them
trampled and you can wear something other than old jeans without them being destroyed within hours. It's chilled, literally, but not enough to make it in anyway boring.

The Finladia Vodka Bar and SoCo Fat Tuesdays areas were also big attractions, boasting some anthemic DJ sets, most notably from the Nextmen and Soul Of Man. The luxury drinking dens were most welcome after trekking up the hill to the quite civilised campsite. Actually, it was more than a hill, a diet mountain if you like - the term mountain would be reserved for the eye-popping but leg wrecking arts trail which snaked up the opposite side of the site. Art-wise, there was plenty more on flat land too. Four huge grass-like portrait paintings adorned the area between the two main stages which eerily seemed to follow you as you wander past. And, most strikingly, a small glitterball boat was moored out on a tiny lake, where Tom Middleton broadcast a radio set from on the Thursday night.

If there's one criticism of The Big Chill - and admittedly this applies to the likes of Bestival and Glastonbury too - it's that there's too much on offer. To see all the music you want to see, you really need to sacrifice some of the other attractions, like the beatbox workshop or punk rock karaoke, for instance. The beautiful weather also made it difficult to spend hours on end in the tented arena. We even had to cut short an absolutely mind-blowing audio-visual mash-up set from DJ Yoda to take advantage of the rays (there was no summer before this weekend remember!) Fortunately though, the weekend's highlight was back over at the Castle Stage where beat-boxer Shlomo was joined by the Vocal Orchestra in a set that truly beggered belief. Melodies, crystal sharp beats and heavy, vibrating basslines combined to make hip-shaking anthems - all without the use of a single instrument (other than a collection of vocal chords).

It's impossible to leave The Big Chill truly satisfied, such is the wealth of innovation and talent on display. The sunshine, the crowd and, of course, Norman Jay providing his trademark Sunday morning DJ set - one of his best in recent memory - combined to make a weekend which just flew by all too quickly, one that didn't stop for a minute as we drifted from stage to stage, quality sounds to even greater sounds. It just means we'll be inking it straight in the calendar for next year. And so should you.