Let's Rock Festival
Back for its second year, the retro 80s festival brand Let’s Rock returned to Earlham Park, only this time everything was bigger and better than the inaugural event. We were once again blessed by fantastic weather, the day was a sell out and whatever your thoughts on the daytime line up were, it was guaranteed to end with four of the very biggest and best 80s bands.
China Crisis were already on when I arrived, and Katrina minus her Waves played her short set while drinks were bought and a prime spot secured, although I was in place in time to be able to sing along to Walking On Sunshine. Toyah looked terrific and sounded good too with Thunder In The Mountains & It’s A Mystery reminding us why she was such a credible star in the early days of her career. Next up was a slot billed as Retrobates Party Live, essentially a 25 minute rapid fire segment featuring Fuzzbox, Hazell Dean, Nathan Moore from Brother Beyond, Peter Coyle from the Lotus Eaters and most excitingly for me Annabella from Bow Wow Wow. Cheesy as it was they each got two songs, got the crowd singing along and in some cases were gone before you’d even worked out who they were.
Stock, Aitken & Waterman alumni Sonia followed this section and despite not knowing any of her songs she had a strong voice and worked the crowd with ease. Carol Decker rolled out the T’Pau hits, swore a bit and went down a storm before Nick Heyward delivered the set of the day so far. Looking relaxed and retaining his boyish charm he did a great rendition of Blue Hat For A Blue Day before dropping a couple of Haircut 100 bangers, namely Favourite Shirt & Fantastic Day. Disappointingly I was on a bar run while Black Lace’s Conga Party were on stage, but from afar they more than did their job of ensuring everyone threw off the last vestiges of credibility. Jason Donovan was the final act of this part of the day and he shambled on stage looking like he’d just rolled out of bed, still every inch the heart throb. In fact, for many ladies in the house this was the highlight of the day and indeed watching my own significant other singing along to Especially For You was a beautiful thing.
Up until this point the gaps between acts had been just a few minutes long and the house band had played every note we had heard. No-one had outstayed their welcome and no-one in the crowd was having anything other than a very good time. After a 30 minute break to allow the stage to be re-set, the Real Thing gave an immediate step up in class. Not a band I’ve ever engaged with and from my perspective a band I most associate with the 70s, they nonetheless allowed for a slight change from what had gone before. By now we had reached 5pm and it was time to start the run for home with those four all-time greats I mentioned earlier, beginning with Heaven 17. I’ve seen them before and watching Martyn Ware & Glenn Gregory is never going to be anything less than a pleasure. Even some of their biggest songs like Crushed By The Wheels Of Industry, never fully crossed over into the mainstream, so the mass adulation was reserved for their last song, indeed one of the songs of the day, Temptation. Imagine having that in your locker? Especially as it was adorned with Billie Godfrey’s soaring vocals. ABC were the next classic group to take the stage and they completely blew me away. Martin Fry looked fabulous, oozing suave charm, and the band were sensational, none more so than on Tears Ae Not Enough which had me dancing like no-one was watching. The Lexicon Of Love album is rightly held up as a classic of the day, and it was special indeed to hear some of those songs performed live – ABC were simply brilliant.
OMD made full use of the setting sun by wowing us not only with their ground-breaking music, but also with the excellent light show. Andy McCluskey was a charismatic, amusing & self-effacing frontman, often referencing his crazy dancing, but it gave their set a real party vibe, not at all the serious electro musos I suspected they might be. Enola Gay, Electricity, Messages, the hits kept on coming. They had the whole field dancing and were my highlight of the day, a revelation in fact. The Human League were the final act and had the advantage of total darkness and a field full of people who’d been drinking since lunchtime, or was that just me? Did they deliver? Or course they bloody did. As their set was only scheduled to last for an hour, it was packed full of all their biggest songs. The difference between stark electro classic Being Boiled and dancefloor filler Don’t You Want Me couldn’t be greater, but both reminded us of what a killer band the League were in their day, and although OMD just about edged it for me, they did more than enough to justify their headline status.
It feels like the Let’s Rock festival is now a fixture on the city’s live music scene, and with early bird tickets selling at just £35 this is a brilliant value for money day out. The bar has been set high this year, musically it will take some beating, but I’ll be back next year to find out how they get on.
