Another Form of Relief

Now that London Popfest is out of the way, it’s time to turn our attention to this year’s Indietracks festival, which will take place 23-25 July at the lovely Midland Railway Centre in Derbyshire.  Last year we covered the event quite extensively, and this year will be no different.  Previews of the bands in the run up to the event, followed by reports and a shit ton of photos of the weekend itself.  I’m not exaggerating when I call Indietracks the highlight of my musical year.  Where else can you get a non-stop indiepop while surrounded by (and sometimes on!) steam trains?

Rather excitingly, the first band announcements are now out, giving us our first 24 bands that will be playing the festival:

• Allo Darlin’
• Ballboy
• Be Like Pablo
• Betty and The Werewolves
• Boy Genius
• The Cannanes
• Cineplexx
• Fanfarlo
• The Felt Tips
• Foxes!
• The Give It Ups
• The Just Joans
• The Loves
• MJ Hibbett & the Validators
• Onward Chariots
• Sarandon
• Shrag
• The Smittens
• Standard Fare
• Stars of Aviation
• The Sunny Street
• This Many Boyfriends
• White Town
• Winston Echo

Highlights for myself amongst that lot include Allo Darlin’, Ballboy and Standard Fare, but there’s a lot there already that I’m looking forward to.  A number that I’m not familiar with that I look forward to getting acquainted with too.  No word on any headliners just yet, but announcements seem to be coming thick and fast now, so hopefully we’ll have more soon.

Update: Of course, mere hours after I post this, 8 new additions have revealed: Internet Forever, Pale Sunday, Burning Hearts, The Hillfields, La La Love You, Stars in Coma, Springfactory, Urbantramper.

Indietracks Website / Blog / Twitter

A band without any pictures at all. Not the greatest of starts when you want to blog about them.

That said, it’s hard not to take notice when you get an email claiming “equal love for Times New Viking, The Unicorns, Los Campesinos! and Casiotone For the Painfully Alone.” Seeing as I love three and a half of those, I’m inclined to have a listen.

This is the kind of music that makes the likes of Casiotone sound overproduced, which is no mean feat. Everything is incredibly rudimentary, and covered in distortion, yet it’s ultimately adorable for the two minutes that it lasts. Despite the limitations, boy-girl vocals, handclaps and glockenspiels all manage to put in an appearance, giving us a sense of what Los Campesinos! perhaps would have sounded like with only two people.

The ethos of the band seems to be built around the idea of making music in the now rather than thinking it over too much. The band’s first gig will is coming up in a couple of months. Hopefully they won’t rehearse too much.

Internet Forever will play their first gig on December 11 at the The Lexington in Angel. Which is in London.