NAPTON FESTIVAL 2018 - ROCKING IN THE SUN
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Hottest ever Napton Festival weather wise (in my years covering the festival anyway) and the music was just as hot this year with possibly the best overall line up of performances I have seen at this wonderful event.
I am afraid I missed a few acts on the Saturday as I was one of those that had an extended lunch break to see Englands fantastic world cup win over at The Folly but what I did catch was top draw stuff.
A special mention to two really young bands who lit up the main stage over the weekend ‘Stupid Boots' and ‘Park Lane' both full of energy, fine musicianship and impressive songwriting on their originals and well chosen and played covers.
Keeping this old rocker happy on the Friday were space rockers ‘Visitation' (particularly loved the Quo number with a touch of Hawkwind) and the AC/DC set by ‘DirtyjACkDC' full of the classics and a vocalist who nailed Bon Scotts vocal delivery.
Again a real highlight this year was ‘Matilda Pratt' with her third Napton appearance (and only 16 years old!) and her angelic vocals again lit up proceedings as she performed numbers from her debut EP and more and as we walked to the footy I could hear her wonderful version of Radioheads ‘No Surprises' serenading us to watch the match and I also really enjoyed the perfect for a summers afternoon set by the always cool and stylish ‘Kate And The Mooncats'.
Only caught one set in the Hall Stage this year and that was an acoustic performance by ‘The Rushmore' and I was impressed how much their uptempo, melodic indie music worked in this format.
To close the festival two cracking sets first the full of fun ‘Chaos' bringing their own colourful, bouncy style to numbers by the likes of ELO, Abba and many more and what a start as they threw massive red blow up balls into the crowd at the start of the set during a cracking version of Nena's '99 Red Balloons'.
Finally a set of Oasis classics by Oas-is and boy does the bands Liam look and sound like the real thing (the rest of the band also do a great job) as the crowd rocked the night away to the likes of ‘Roll With It', ‘Rock N' Roll Star' etc only dropping the pace for a sublime ‘Champagne Supernova' for the encore.
So many highlights this year and a treat for me hearing two versions of my favourite Abba track ‘Does Your Mother Know' and likewise a brace of covers of the Specials version of ‘Monkey Man' (another favourite of mine) over the weekend.
Next year has a lot to live up to and thanks as always to the Trust, bands/artists, volunteers and all that attended and made this once more such a special weekend on the local music calendar.
Andrew Lock
**** "ROCK AND ROLL DREAMS COME TRUE - THE LIVE MUSIC PHOTOGRAPHY OF ANDREW LOCK 2008-2018" PHOTO EXHIBITION AND SALE - THE OAK HOUSE SPORTS AND SOCIAL CLUB, LEAMINGTON SPA WEDNESDAY 17TH OCTOBER 2018 7-10-30PM, ALL PROCEEDS GOING TO ZOE'S PLACE BABY HOSPICE AND THE CINNAMON TRUST***
