Review: Deer Shed Festival, Baldersby Park, Topcliffe, North Yorkshire

Our visit on Sunday opened at the cosy In The Dock tent with Falmouth’s Holiday Ghosts, whose rama-lama indie rock ’n’ roll has much to recommend it. Drummer Katja Rackin, guitarists Sam Stacpoole and Charlie Fairbairn and bassist Ryan Cleave take turns on vocals, and songs such as Bright Lights, Big City are fun with a scruffy C86 feel.

On the main stage English Teacher show why they are currently one of the most promising up-and-coming bands from Leeds. Frontwoman Lily Fontaine’s half-sung, half-spoken vocals are as distinctive as her lyrics, and gritty songs such as A55, Broken Biscuits, Albatross and R&B are driven by bass, drums and scratchy alt-rock guitars.

At the In the Dock stage, Plastic Mermaids, a septet from the Isle of Wight, provide one of the day’s highlights with an exuberant set strong on melody, hooks and interesting arrangements that combine elements of pop, psychedelia, prog and funk. In Life’s a Colourful Thing When You look At It Right they suddenly break down into five-part harmonies while Elastic Time sounds like a beatific cross between Metronomy and the Gallic pop of Sebastien Tellier. “It’s been a while since we have played up north; we forgot how nice everyone is up here,” says frontman Douglas Richards. On the strength of this, they should do it more often.

Down on the main stage, Gwenno takes neoliberalism to task “because it’s proven to be rubbish”. Her songs, sung in Welsh and Cornish, fuse the grooves of German kosmiche musik with 90s dreampop and frequently impress, not least when she manages to get the audience to sing along in Cornish to a number that celebrates her love of cheese. “Don’t forget your heart is in the revolution,” she tells them as she exits the stage.

At In The Dock, the tent looks fit to burst with a large crowd gathered for The Mary Wallopers. The Irish seven-piece deliver a raucous set of traditional Irish roots music that recalls the youthful days of The Pogues and The Men They Couldn’t Hang.

Things are rather more relaxed on the main stage, where The Big Moon perform assorted highlights from their three albums. The likes of Barcelona and Sucker Punch are pleasant enough, but it’s hard not to wish that they had a few more punchier numbers of the ilk of Daydreaming and Your Light in their repertoire.

They’re perhaps not helped by the early evening rain, which by the time The Delgados step onto the stage at 9.30pm has driven all but the hardiest festival-goers home. It’s a shame because the newly reunited Glasgow indie band are in excellent form. Augmented by a string quartet and a flautist, their set is a best-of and includes the likes of No Danger, Everything Goes Around The Water, Pull The Wires From The Wall and a particularly impressive I Fought The Angels.

Co-vocalist and guitarist Emma Pollock remarks that the reformation is “as much a surprise to us” as their fans, adding that the last time she had played at Deer Shed as a solo artist she “had not a Scooby what would come next”. With new material promised, this is a reunion that deserves to run and run.

It’ll be intriguing to see what surprises Deer Shed brings us next year too.