Planet Notion - Indian Summer/Victoria Park/Glasgow

which was a bit of a godsend considering the weather. I was slightly concerned that a taxi driver who had worked in Glasgow for 25 years hadn’t heard of Victoria Park but we got there in the end. And it was raining. The park was tiny with a scattering of picnic benches and even a bowling green. The weird (and good) thing was the total lack of garish sponsor’s banners and branding everywhere – well, except for the Southern Comfort tent. Guillemots were...nice but, (and I’m not sure if it was all due to technical difficulties) slightly disappointing. Hot Chip’s live performance was fantastic and the crowd went wild with ‘Over and Over’ and ‘Boy From School’ being the obvious highlights. The Fall were up next with two bassists (one looking like he should be in Korn) and the obligatory vixen keyboardist. Would it be a shambles? When would Mark E Smith finally take to the stage? All fears were soon abandoned with a sound that must have had the surrounding residents fearing for their windows. Yeah Yeah Yeahs were the closing act for the Saturday. Karen O was back to her former glory with an unformidable stage presence. Despite ‘Show Your Bones’ being a meagre follow up to their debut, the songs stood up live. Sunday saw everybody trudging back with their shoes still muddied from the previous day. After complaints about the lack of toilets, lo and behold more had been ordered for the second day which led to everybody standing around trying to work out if they had been there the day before. Tilly and the Wall were first on (who should have been much higher up the bill) and made the sunshine come out. How can watching this band not warm even the stoniest of hearts? Other highlight of the second day was seeing the much hyped (and worthy of it) Tapes N’ Tapes, an atmospheric live show from the 10-piece version of Broken Social Scene and a headline show from Antony and the Johnsons. A shivers down the spine performance including comedy divaesque turns from Antony. Whether it was a one-off or ends up being a regular spot on the festival calendar, I’ve got the t-shirt to say I was there.