CARLING STAGE - ROUNDUP

Following on from Blood Red Shoes brilliant showing on the Carling Stage, things go one stage further with Cajun Dance Party. The band are universally tipped for big things when their debut long player drops early next year, and on this showing, it’s easy to see why. The London five piece have only released a couple of 7 inches, but already the stuffed Carling Tent know every line, with favourites “Amylase” and “The Next Untouchable” going down particularly well.

When Reading first locked eyes on the Subways it was a full 4 years ago, when they’d just won a new band competition to play at Glastonbury and earned themselves a spot on the Carling Stage. They were lovelorn couple Billy Lunn and Charlotte Cooper along with drummer Josh Morgan, barely out of school; they played fast paced indie pop and were a lovely heart – warming story for all musical hopefuls, hell, the Subways were cute. 

So when the band bound onstage onto the Radio 1 Stage pretty much the whole tent’s jaws fall to the fall. Gone are the t-shirts, string vests and youthful haircuts, they’ve been well and truly ditched. Cooper’s sporting dyed red hair, a knock em’ dead style dress and bright red tights, Lunn’s topless, seriously buffed up and, get this, swaggering. Lunn was too nervous to get his words out properly, let alone talk between songs, now he’s telling us “to sweat out every last drop we have.” The Subways have grown up and we like it! Course, none of this would make any difference without some great new tunes and they have them in abundance, new cuts “I Won’t Let You Down” and “California” sound like their earlier material drenched in lighter fluid. The crowd lap em’ up, as they do every word, every strum and every second of the band’s all too short set. Roll on the new album!

For true devotion though there’s only one band today and that’s Brand New. The New Yorkers are making their Reading debut this year and are greeted by a fanbase so well versed in the band’s lyrics that the whole of the Radio 1 Tent turns into a huge chorus. Mainly showcasing their newer material the band nonetheless are greeted by universal approval, with “I Believe You, But My Tommy Gun Don’t”, “Jesus/Jesus Christ” and “Millstone” all finding the crowd in fine voice. Having kept a relatively quiet presence in the UK until now, this could be the performance to spring Brand New into the nation’s collective consciousness.

Tom Goodwyn