The Great Escape Day 2 – Best Coast, Warpaint, Egyptian Hip Hop

Back on the pier for the second day of Radar’s tenure at the Great Escape. It began with a veritable deluge of Los Angeles lasses. First-up Best Coast brought her bare-bones lovelorn buzz-fi all hot and heavy. Winding up what’s been a landmark first UK visit:

Afterwards I tackled the hot-topic of grand coastal claims head on:


Just when we thought we’d got all the Cali boho indie chicks out the door for one day, uh-oh. Look who shows up. Thankfully Warpaint were absolutely jaw-dropping. They pulled the biggest crowd the venue had seen after Darwin Deez. Live, these guys truly have to be seen to be believed. There’s something utterly spell-binding about their free-spirited, jam-happy joy-ride of psychedelic post-punk. It veers just the right side of head-back progged-out and head-nod rock-on. Ok, I’ve said too much. Enjoy (and watch out for a rather pleased with ‘his gals’ Geoff Travis in the crowd, grinning at the end of the set):

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Outside on the terrace the girls serenaded a few of us with a special (almost) a capella Billie Holiday rendition, which was kind:

It’d been a while since I’d checked in with the Egyptian Hip Hop chaps. So it was nice to see they were just as gloriously ramshackle and ace as ever. Still unsigned, Radar counted the MDs of at least three major record labels from its vantage point of the right speaker stand:

I’d been mentally planning all sorts of arcade-related novelty interview themes for EHH -what with them being bonafide teenage boys ‘n’ all- but it got too late and they’d shut-up shop. However, on talking to them, it was reassuring to see that my plans hadn’t been as naffly patronising as I’d feared they might be. It was quite an amusing interviewing in the end, actually. Not least because we were close to being physically ejected from the venue right in the middle of it:

Frankie And The Heartstrings headlined, and did a sterling job of it too. Sadly my camera was playing up whilst they were on. But I did manage to catch-up with Frankie (sans Heartstrings) before an idyllic back-drop after the show:

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