The Great Escape, Brighton – Part One

Stricken City by Mitchell Stirling

Thursday March 13, 2010

After an evening of being regaled by reunited slackers Pavement in London it was off to Brighton with my dodgy dossier for three days of scoping out industry talent at ‘Europe’s answer to SXSW’ – The Great Escape. This year the weather was rarely threatening to reach the kind of temperatures one might find in Texas but it was an improvement on the last two years.

A sunny start was found in the lounge bar of The Queen’s Hotel with Rich Aucoin getting hung-over and cynical hacks singing, swaying along and jumping up and down to his giddy sun-kissed pop which, as a start to the weekend, was very much like jumping into a kid’s ball pit full of Skittles. We daren’t imagine how much fun they ended up having when they played a couple of evenings later. Whilst waiting for the rest of our entourage to arrive we checked out the penny arcades and many (OK no-one) watched in awe and wonder as I annihilated the top score on a whack-a-mole machine before the fish and the chips were gobbled up in the presence of ravenous seagulls.

Our first act proper was to be Let’s Buy Happiness who it seems are either shocked to be here or very tired having driven down from the North East. Lead singer Sarah Hall doesn’t really seem to have her heart in it after such a long journey, between songs at least. When ‘Works Better On Paper’ strikes up and her soaring siren call tumbles out of her mouth the crowd of seventy odd stand in reverent silence.

Summer Camp by Mitchell Stirling

We pop our heads into The Freebutt for Spectrals who we already knew we liked but the sound issues in such a small venue (“more reverb!”) prove distracting. We briefly catch Little Death playing at Hector’s House and then set off right to the top of the town for Stricken City at Prince Albert. We of course forget that despite appearances in the programme it’s not next to the railway station – it’s on a street under the approach – but we make it in time to see yet another promising new band kyboshed by sound issues.  This does start to grate after a while – as understandable as it is in a multi-act, many venue urban festival, it was happening too often over the weekend. It was particularly unfortunate in this case as Rebekah Rah and co can tell something isn’t quite right and can’t get it sorted.

Ruby Suns by Mitchell Stirling

We decamp to The Pavillion Theatre for the rest of the evening, anticipating Uncut’s re-jigged line-up. (The Invisible were meant to play, but we didn’t see them.) First to the stage are hotly tipped Long Beachers Avi Buffalo who attracted quite the crowd for their delicate Shins-y, shiny melodies, and they impressed us a fair bit. In a similar vein, their was Summer Camp and their own shimmering paeans to a misremembered childhood summer with recent single ‘Ghost Train’, seductively cooed by Elizabeth Sankey and dutifully supported by Jeremy Warmsley. Completing our evening were Sub Pop’s Ruby Suns, showcasing material from their recent Fight Softly LP as well as choice cuts from their similarly solar-flecked album Sea Lion. Taken as a set of three, the bands complemented each other well and would have worked a little better at a less dingy venue given the nature of their songs.

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