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The Cardiff multi-venue festival is back with highlights including Pypi Slysh, Shaking Hand, Bathing Suits and Westside Cowboy. |
| Words: Marty Hill | Photos: Sŵn Festival |
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The occupants of one particular carriage of the 11:30 from Manchester Piccadilly and Cardiff Central are as follows: a fifteen-man strong stag do and I. There aren’t many viable locations for them on the line, because nobody has ever had a lairy stag do in Crewe or Leominster. It is immediately, depressingly obvious that I am stuck with them for the full three hours and fifteen minutes. The pretty disappointing novel that I’m reading is chucked in my bag and I test my ears’ resolve by putting the louder end of my current rotation on full blast. For the most part, it’s enough to transport me elsewhere. Patchy signal lets a few tidbits through the cracks, though. One of them has just paid an absolute fortune to see “the best live act you’ll ever see” Luke Combs for a second time. Another makes a comment about the relentless rain that has dogged the first half of the journey and jokes that it’ll be beautiful blue skies by the time we cross the border into Wales. Unbelievably, he was right. There’s barely a cloud in the sky when the train pulls into the Welsh capital. The sun is out, the pints are not insignificantly cheaper than they were three hours and fifteen minutes ago and we have a stacked itinerary of brilliant bands to see over the next couple of days. Sŵn Festival, the most underrated music discovery weekend in the calendar as far as I’m concerned, is here. |
Our festival begins with the gentle psych sway of Pypi Slysh. Clwb Ifor Bach’s bigger upstairs space has pretty much filled up for them, which is no mean feat before the working day is even done. Word has clearly travelled about the mostly Welsh-language group, who are yet to release any music. Rightly so too. There’s a lot to like about them, especially if you’re a fan of Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci. Thanks to Bramwell/pushbike’s Tom Grogan for the recommendation. Cerys Hafana opens up the beautiful St John’s church with their equally ornate brand of “sad welsh harp pop”, before it’s over to Canopi for long-term favourites Truthpaste. Esmé Lark designates the crowd as “unwitting guinea pigs” as her band take us through some excellent new songs, which are heavy with signature Truthpaste silliness. Owing to their impressive debut EP and some similarly great older stuff (Truthpaste, if you read this please release ‘Hey, Stop It’), there’s loads of good stuff for them to choose from. That they’re phasing out some hits already says a lot about the creative groove the band are in. |
Shaking Hand
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Dana Margolin
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20k steps in already, the fact that there’s two must-see bands on consecutively downstairs at Clwb’ is much appreciated. Shaking Hand deliver a really special set, perhaps the best of the weekend. Seamlessly weaving through spiky New Wave-isms and all-encompassing post-rock, the Manchester trio have every head in the basement nodding along to their relentlessly creative arrangements. Their self-titled record is one of the best of the year, and this was a timely reminder of that as we approach list season. Martial Arts follow with a typically raucous set. With three guitarists and two frontmen, it’d be easy for their sound to become bloated but that is never the case. Songs from their debut EP ‘From The Burnoff’ in particular are intricately arranged, allowing each politically-charged chorus to land with real clarity. There are queues down the street for both Tai Haf Heb Drigolyn and Bathing Suits’ first of two sets, so the next few hours are spent in the Fuel beer garden. The sun has long gone by now, though. “Why the fuck are we all pretending it’s not fucking freezing?” asks Martial Arts’ Jack Brown. Very fair. Inside for one more and then bed. |
Saturday begins with one of the most anticipated sets of the festival, Big Red. Fronted by The Orchestra (For Now)’s Joseph Scarisbrick, Big Red take to the Little O’Neills’ stage in the form of a three-piece; fellow TO(FN) members Milie Kirby and Charlie Hancock flanking on bass/vocals and drums respectively. The loud-quiet chaos of their other project is replaced by a more direct confessional approach. The opener, single ‘Isn’t He Funny?’ and a rousing cover of Daniel Johnson’s timeless ‘True Love Will Find You in the End’ stood out amongst a broadly very strong set. They have a record out at the end of the month that can’t come soon enough. Dana Margolin’s new work is unsurprisingly beautiful. The sprawling catharsis of her best work with Porridge Radio is used more sparingly amid a collection of tender minimalist tunes. Tesni at Canopi is a real treat. The Wales-born and Manchester-based singer/songwriter takes us through her catalogue of gently-picked and emotionally brutal songs expertly. You want to leave a festival like Sŵn feeling confident that you’ve seen somebody just before they inevitably explode in popularity, Tesni is that act this year. |
Pyncher have gone from strength-to-strength over the last twelve months and deliver a stirring set back at Fuel. Their dingier early work and the much brighter sounding new stuff goes down equally well in a crammed and sweaty room; we have to weave towards the front despite arriving with plenty of time. Closer ‘Oh Boy’ is a strong contender for song of the year and has no close contenders in the ‘bassline of the year’ stakes. Bathing Suits pack out the upstairs of Clwb with their bone-rattling exploration of where noise rock meets electronic pop, whilst the glorious synth sounds of recent Gob Nation signee Spike occupy the downstairs room. It’s perhaps the most brutal clash of the weekend, but a good time is had by bobbing between the two. |
There’s just enough time to grab something to eat (shoutout to the gyros place in Cardiff Market) before we head over to Tiny Rebel to catch one of the buzziest bands on the bill, alt-country risers Wyatt. Theirs is a contender for set of the year. Debut single ‘Morning’ is excellent but they could’ve reasonably picked any song from that set to lead with. Frontman Harvey O’Toole urges the crowd to move forward to try and squeeze in some of the tens of people who can’t physically get into the room. When you consider that this is a band who have one song to their name going up against RIP MAGIC amongst plenty of others, that goes some way to illustrating the justifiable hype bubbling around them. If you’re going to see Westside Cowboy on tour in the coming weeks, I implore you to get down early to see the band most likely to emulate their trajectory. |
Speaking of, it’s Westside Cowboy who see us home. Tramshed is obviously absolutely rammed as the band stroll through a relatively new-look setlist. ‘Shells’ and ‘Drunk Surfer’ make way for newer cuts from the record. That they can justify axing those songs says everything you need to know about how good they are. It’s also worth saying, though, that they are just a brilliantly fun live band and a perfect headliner for a festival like this. That members of many other Manchester bands — Martial Arts, Pyncher, Dogbanddog/Catbandcat, Wyatt — all flock to the venue despite having seen them play a million times says a lot about how special this band is. |
Faultlessly curated to offer both an early look at upcoming bands and a chance to celebrate the rise of some who are a little further along, Sŵn Festival has become one of the most important weekends in our music calendars. This year lived up to that and then some. There can be few more comprehensive celebrations of new music in the world, and even fewer in such a charming city. For the weekend, it felt as though Cardiff was the world capital of music discovery. All in all, we managed to catch thirteen sets across the two days we were in Cardiff. That’s a target to beat next year. Diolch, Sŵn. |
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