Last weekend we took the yearly pilgrimage to the shire of Beat-Herder for one of the North’s most magical festivals.
The three-day event which takes place in the picturesque setting of The Ribble Valley plays host to a community of 12,000 raring to go thrill seekers.
There’s something about this local gem of a festival that really is addictive, and this year the crew behind one of the UK’s last remaining independent festivals managed to go above and beyond the levels of fabulousness achieved in previous years with surprises and pop-up performances galore.
A particular highlight was the psy trance tent, which was expanded ten-fold this year. Not listed in the programme, we stumbled across it on our travels to find an area kitted out with stunning lasers, psychedelic decor and UV lights. The atmosphere was powerful and the vibe reminded me of many European psy festivals such as Boom, Ozora & Modem. Andy Mason and Amethyst showed the shire what proper psy trance really was and the crowd were loving it!
The psy tent was just one of the many examples of the effort that the Beat-Herder crew put into this amazing festival. The attention to detail was inspiring and not just in terms of stage production – the little add-ons we came across while exploring the site made it that extra bit special. ‘Birdie’, the fab pink VW campervan, situated next to the StumbleFunk stage, has a spot for you to top up your glitter with the help of the lovely Kitty. The van is also a photo booth which has a host of wacky props for you to get the perfect Beat-Herder souvenir photo. Fun was had!
Although the rain wasn’t as much of an issue compared to previous years, it was still a predictably muddy affair (but, then again, are you even at Beat- Herder if you aren’t holding hands with a friend to try and climb your way through the mud to get to the Toil Trees?!) Mud and the rain aside, the temperature was warm all weekend and with the nights being a lot less chilly, it made for a much more pleasant camping experience.
Musical delights this year included R&B superstar, Kelis, who played all her hits – albeit with a Beat-Herder-style twist or two! Her set was so energetic, and the way she breathed new life into her well-known anthems with a variety of mash-ups and genre-flipping was something that only she could pull off!
The new addition of The Factory this year was a welcome guest stage, it played homage to the Hacienda era of house music and Max Cooper played a corker of a set on the Friday night. Other highlights included Justin Robertson, who returned to the festival once again and smashed out a pounding techno set that got the Toil Trees shaking!
We didn’t get to see much of Faithless’ DJ set on the Saturday at the Toil Trees as it was absolutely packed with revellers. There was no act on at the main stage during their performance so they were the biggest draw by far at the time. With so many people cramming into one arena, there was no space for dancing, so many people, including ourselves headed elsewhere to experience some of the more underground acts on the smaller stages, which turned out to be a great decision!
Similarly, The Ring was one of the most popular stages once again this year and sadly we missed out on some of our favourite artists because it was a bit too busy to get in at times. It must hard for the promoters to determine exactly how much space to allocate to each genre year-on-year, but the growth of the dubstep/DnB crowd at the festival is definitely becoming a trend now and seems to have outgrown the capacity of its dancing space. I predict that The Ring might get the supersize treatment next year!
Mr Scruff and Richy Ahmed pretty much stole the show on Sunday, but when David Rodigan took to the main stage, it was nothing but a masterclass in roots reggae classics mixed up with some brilliant fresh music straight from Jamaica. I really hope he makes a return to the festival next year!
As always, the last day of the festival saw the families, ravers and misbehavers gather together for a collective Sunday boogie. Smiles all round told tales of happy times shared!
The Dub Pistols finished the festival off in style and Barry Ashworth and the lads gave us a taste of some of their new tracks. It was the end of another brilliant weekend at Beat-Herdershire but we wished that it could have gone on until Tuesday!
