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Bearded Theory 23/05/25 - 26/05/25
I was heading up to Bearded Theory Festival on the Friday: it had been going since Wednesday but Friday was the first 'official' day and worked better for the people I was going with. I rendez-voused with Ketch at Victoria in the morning, then got the train down to Hove, where A had hired a car. We loaded up at her house then hit the road travelling back up to near Tamworth, where the festival is held on some private estate. The journey all went pretty smoothly but timings inevitably slipped as we hit bits of traffic and Ketch and I were keeping a nervous eye on the clock as our main must-see for the weekend was on at 5pm, but we made it to the site a little after 4 and, leaving all our stuff in the car, we got our wristbands and headed straight through to the Woodlands Stage in enough time to get a drink and celebrate having made before Gaz Brookfield & the Company of Thieves came on, giving it their all as usual and it was great to see another full-band show. When that was done, we finally located the Accessibility Campsite and an extremely-helpful steward drove A round to where we'd parked the car and escorted her back again. I was on double-duty with tent-erection but it all got done by which point we were ready for some dinner (trying out the Himalayan stall) and a wander to re-familiarise ourselves with the rest of the site.
We dipped into the Maui Waui tent and caught a band called The Mighty Flux, who had a funkiness to them and sang enjoyably unserious to dance beats, then headed to The Meadow tent for The Sisters of Mercy. I had gone in with mixed feelings: like a lot of old goths, Sisters are a totemic band for me, whose music I adore, but the one time I saw them live, probably 20 years ago now, they were a huge disappointment. Lots of others have echoed this but they still seem to sell out tours so I figured this was a low-risk opportunity to give them another go, however it soon became clear that my Kentish Town Forum experience was not a one-off: although in general their live sound is much less clean than the recorded songs we all love, the vocals are the real issue. Twenty years ago the gravelliness of Andrew Eldritch's delivery had shocked me, but that didn't bother me so much this time around (if anything it suited their dark aesthetic) but they were constantly muffled and indistinct, meaning we were halfway through the opening song (the well-known Detonation Boulevard) before I realised what it was. It wasn't awful and, towards the end, some off the other old-favourites were clearer, but for me it was still a far cry from what hearing a huge band from your youth playing some of their biggest hits should be, although others there were clearly loving it. Last time Ketch and I had come to BT, there didn't seem to be much late-night entertainment going on after the headliners had finished, but they've clearly upped that game with a Silent Disco and several smaller tents playing dance music into the early hours after the headliners, but we called it a night and ambled back to our tents.
There had been rain overnight but luckily it seemed to be done by the time we emerged on Saturday morning and, apart from a few showers, the weather was warm and dry all weekend, with a few actively sunny moments, including when we had arrived on site which felt good. After a chilled morning, we headed over to the Woodlands Stage to start the day with full-time festival denizen Beans on Toast, who was curating the stage for the day. We had seen that he was on twice and this turned out to be his family-orientated show (complete with his own daughter's participation), which I wouldn't have actively chosen but was still endearing. We headed to The Pallet [main] Stage expecting to see Man/Woman/Chainsaw but they had had van issues en route so were swapped out with Pan Amsterdam, an American duo consisting of a DJ with rhythmically-drawled, food-themed lyrics or trumpet over it, which was very chill. We headed over to The Meadow to see Man/Woman/Chainsaw, who had finally made it, then Ketch & I went back to The Woodlands for Nick Parker's funny, folky songs.
Saturday was also the day we ran into various friends who were also in attendance, both known and unknown: it's such a manageably sized festival that you can pretty much guarantee running into anyone else who might be there at some point over the weekend. A had been catching up with a friend of hers back at The Meadow and we returned there for Gaye Bykers on Acid, who I'd never known beyond the name: they turned out to be quite PWEI-esque, with regular use of samples, energetic and very danceable; they seemed to be half original members and half the younger generation. We grabbed some pizza and sheltered a bit from one of the showers while Nova Twins were playing on The Pallet Stage: they were suitably loud, but not as loud as Drum Machine, who we had taken one look at in serried ranks on The Meadow Stage and decided we couldn't cope with. While A got settled on the Accessibility Platform in good time for Iggy, Ketch & I went back to The Meadow for The Bug Club, a trio with both male and female singers, playing what had accurately been described to us as 'twee rock & roll'.
Heading back to The Pallet we watched The Mary Wallopers, whose name I've been hearing a lot without really knowing anything about and they turned out to be very much our jam: an Irish five-piece mixing (I think) traditional tunes with new songs in traditional forms; we knew we were onto a good thing when the tin whistle came out. We visited the crumble stall between sets the returned to The Pallet for headliner Iggy Pop, who was very much the reason A had come along: C & I stayed for the first 45 minutes, during which he burned through the 3 songs of his that I was aware of knowing and played with a captivating energy, and luckily the predicted rain held off. We didn't stay out of loyalty to Mr Tea & the Minions who were headlining the Maui Waui tent and we'd run into wandering around on Friday: they brought their usual silly energy and managed to attract a good crowd, despite the competition. A found us there and we listened to the last few Ash songs from outside of the packed Meadow tent (which meant Jackie Chain, Girl From Mars plus the rather less-expected Jump In the Line cover) before wandering back to camp. I headed out again by myself for a bit of a late-night wander, including a bit of a dance in the Caravan Convoy tent, but didn't stay out that long.
Sunday started at midday with The None at The Meadow, who I'd been interested in checking out as another band that the frontman from Cassels was involved in, this time as guitarist: it was a heavyish, female-fronted band with lots of angry shouting into twin mics but got me moving. We headed over to The Pallet for Shonen Knife, perky Japanese pop-punk from the 80s with twee lyrics, and stayed put there for Divorce, who I saw once at The Lexington years ago and were gentle indie with both male and female singers. We headed to The Woodlands for Manchester punks Bruise Control, who'd attracted a good crowd despite being drafted in at the last minute and brought a great energy. C and I went on a hunt to buy a programme (we'd passed a stall on our way in then never seen an opportunity again), eventually having them produced from under the counter in the Rough Trade tent.
At The Pallet we watched The Selecter, chilled out classic Two Tone, then went back to The Meadow for Osaka Ramones, which were Shonen Knife again playing a set of Ramones covers, which they raced through with barely a break between songs and went down a storm. We grabbed some dinner after that (the same Mac'n'Cheese stall as last time for me) then went to the Woodlands for Popes of Chillitown, a band I'd heard the name of for ages but don't think seen before, something I now regret as their glorious dub/ska chaos, high energy (and remarkably athletic!) from start-to-finish, was definitely my top discovery of the festival. We moved back to The Pallet for Sunday night headliners Manic Street Preachers, who it was great to be able to get pretty up close for, and gave a satisfying account of their rich back catalogue (no Holy Bible songs though). As the fireworks faded, C and I took one more trip to The Woodlands to see the end of Milly Manders & the Shut-Up, replicating the outspoken punkiness that we'd enjoyed from her at Here For the Music, then called time on our, very successful Bearded Theory experience.
We were up pretty early on Monday to pack up, although somewhat delayed by being defeated by Ketch's pop-up tent which she eventually had to go and get the accessibility team to help her with; the drive back was a bit of a drag, with traffic, a lunch stop that took much longer than planned and then a closure on the M25 but A dropped us at Sutton station and we were able to jump on a train back into London from there. I got home about 4pm, so most of the Bank Holiday had gone by and I concentrated on unpacking and settling back home, then had dinner and hung out with N in the evening.
We dipped into the Maui Waui tent and caught a band called The Mighty Flux, who had a funkiness to them and sang enjoyably unserious to dance beats, then headed to The Meadow tent for The Sisters of Mercy. I had gone in with mixed feelings: like a lot of old goths, Sisters are a totemic band for me, whose music I adore, but the one time I saw them live, probably 20 years ago now, they were a huge disappointment. Lots of others have echoed this but they still seem to sell out tours so I figured this was a low-risk opportunity to give them another go, however it soon became clear that my Kentish Town Forum experience was not a one-off: although in general their live sound is much less clean than the recorded songs we all love, the vocals are the real issue. Twenty years ago the gravelliness of Andrew Eldritch's delivery had shocked me, but that didn't bother me so much this time around (if anything it suited their dark aesthetic) but they were constantly muffled and indistinct, meaning we were halfway through the opening song (the well-known Detonation Boulevard) before I realised what it was. It wasn't awful and, towards the end, some off the other old-favourites were clearer, but for me it was still a far cry from what hearing a huge band from your youth playing some of their biggest hits should be, although others there were clearly loving it. Last time Ketch and I had come to BT, there didn't seem to be much late-night entertainment going on after the headliners had finished, but they've clearly upped that game with a Silent Disco and several smaller tents playing dance music into the early hours after the headliners, but we called it a night and ambled back to our tents.
There had been rain overnight but luckily it seemed to be done by the time we emerged on Saturday morning and, apart from a few showers, the weather was warm and dry all weekend, with a few actively sunny moments, including when we had arrived on site which felt good. After a chilled morning, we headed over to the Woodlands Stage to start the day with full-time festival denizen Beans on Toast, who was curating the stage for the day. We had seen that he was on twice and this turned out to be his family-orientated show (complete with his own daughter's participation), which I wouldn't have actively chosen but was still endearing. We headed to The Pallet [main] Stage expecting to see Man/Woman/Chainsaw but they had had van issues en route so were swapped out with Pan Amsterdam, an American duo consisting of a DJ with rhythmically-drawled, food-themed lyrics or trumpet over it, which was very chill. We headed over to The Meadow to see Man/Woman/Chainsaw, who had finally made it, then Ketch & I went back to The Woodlands for Nick Parker's funny, folky songs.
Saturday was also the day we ran into various friends who were also in attendance, both known and unknown: it's such a manageably sized festival that you can pretty much guarantee running into anyone else who might be there at some point over the weekend. A had been catching up with a friend of hers back at The Meadow and we returned there for Gaye Bykers on Acid, who I'd never known beyond the name: they turned out to be quite PWEI-esque, with regular use of samples, energetic and very danceable; they seemed to be half original members and half the younger generation. We grabbed some pizza and sheltered a bit from one of the showers while Nova Twins were playing on The Pallet Stage: they were suitably loud, but not as loud as Drum Machine, who we had taken one look at in serried ranks on The Meadow Stage and decided we couldn't cope with. While A got settled on the Accessibility Platform in good time for Iggy, Ketch & I went back to The Meadow for The Bug Club, a trio with both male and female singers, playing what had accurately been described to us as 'twee rock & roll'.
Heading back to The Pallet we watched The Mary Wallopers, whose name I've been hearing a lot without really knowing anything about and they turned out to be very much our jam: an Irish five-piece mixing (I think) traditional tunes with new songs in traditional forms; we knew we were onto a good thing when the tin whistle came out. We visited the crumble stall between sets the returned to The Pallet for headliner Iggy Pop, who was very much the reason A had come along: C & I stayed for the first 45 minutes, during which he burned through the 3 songs of his that I was aware of knowing and played with a captivating energy, and luckily the predicted rain held off. We didn't stay out of loyalty to Mr Tea & the Minions who were headlining the Maui Waui tent and we'd run into wandering around on Friday: they brought their usual silly energy and managed to attract a good crowd, despite the competition. A found us there and we listened to the last few Ash songs from outside of the packed Meadow tent (which meant Jackie Chain, Girl From Mars plus the rather less-expected Jump In the Line cover) before wandering back to camp. I headed out again by myself for a bit of a late-night wander, including a bit of a dance in the Caravan Convoy tent, but didn't stay out that long.
Sunday started at midday with The None at The Meadow, who I'd been interested in checking out as another band that the frontman from Cassels was involved in, this time as guitarist: it was a heavyish, female-fronted band with lots of angry shouting into twin mics but got me moving. We headed over to The Pallet for Shonen Knife, perky Japanese pop-punk from the 80s with twee lyrics, and stayed put there for Divorce, who I saw once at The Lexington years ago and were gentle indie with both male and female singers. We headed to The Woodlands for Manchester punks Bruise Control, who'd attracted a good crowd despite being drafted in at the last minute and brought a great energy. C and I went on a hunt to buy a programme (we'd passed a stall on our way in then never seen an opportunity again), eventually having them produced from under the counter in the Rough Trade tent.
At The Pallet we watched The Selecter, chilled out classic Two Tone, then went back to The Meadow for Osaka Ramones, which were Shonen Knife again playing a set of Ramones covers, which they raced through with barely a break between songs and went down a storm. We grabbed some dinner after that (the same Mac'n'Cheese stall as last time for me) then went to the Woodlands for Popes of Chillitown, a band I'd heard the name of for ages but don't think seen before, something I now regret as their glorious dub/ska chaos, high energy (and remarkably athletic!) from start-to-finish, was definitely my top discovery of the festival. We moved back to The Pallet for Sunday night headliners Manic Street Preachers, who it was great to be able to get pretty up close for, and gave a satisfying account of their rich back catalogue (no Holy Bible songs though). As the fireworks faded, C and I took one more trip to The Woodlands to see the end of Milly Manders & the Shut-Up, replicating the outspoken punkiness that we'd enjoyed from her at Here For the Music, then called time on our, very successful Bearded Theory experience.
We were up pretty early on Monday to pack up, although somewhat delayed by being defeated by Ketch's pop-up tent which she eventually had to go and get the accessibility team to help her with; the drive back was a bit of a drag, with traffic, a lunch stop that took much longer than planned and then a closure on the M25 but A dropped us at Sutton station and we were able to jump on a train back into London from there. I got home about 4pm, so most of the Bank Holiday had gone by and I concentrated on unpacking and settling back home, then had dinner and hung out with N in the evening.