We took our annual all-day music party back to our spiritual home, The Windmill, and even a perpetual downpour couldn’t dampen the spirits of a crowd that were enjoying the eight bands and the superb BBQ (provided by Adel, the chef from Hell, proprietor of our favourite South London eatery The Alchemist).
Joyfest veteran Stephen Evens kicked things off in the early hours of the afternoon, his blend of dark humour, deeply personal lyrics and sparse psychedelic guitar proving a winning combination once again.
Next up, we were delighted to welcome back The Bridport Dagger, who after a couple of years on hiatus are back doing what they do best, crafting malevolent rockabilly murder ballads and transporting audiences to a sinister Lynchian other-world.
After the dark, as they say, cometh the light, and Without Fidel blast a hole in the rainclouds with their wonky lo-fi pop, amiable flights of lyrical fancy and easy-going charm.
What can we say about Oh! Gunquit‘s explosive set? High kicking, hula-hooping (and simultaneously trumpeting) rumble-bop action that thrilled from the first moment to the last.
Dolls were faced with the unenviable task of following that, and the grunge-punk duo took to the challenge with relish, pounding the drumkit into submission and rocking out with the crowd.
Poeticat are a constantly shape-shifting beast and since we last caught up with them have added a muscular rock punch to their punky spoken-word mash-ups. Vocalist Cat is in her element, spitting out angry politicised rhymes and thrashing her head with whiplash inducing intensity.
Dirty White Fever take us deeper into the night, whipping up a bluesy garage rock tempest with elastic frontman Dominic Knight at its centre.
Rounding things off in style, The Midnight Barbers storm through a set of breakneck rock & roll with Ben Rowntree’s gravelly tones growling over Jack Pepper’s runaway beats, leaving us to walk home with tired dancing feet and grinning faces.
Review by Paul Maps
Photographs of Dirty White Fever, Dolls and Oh! Gunquit by Keira Anee: facebook.com/keiraaneephotography
All other photography by Paul Maps