Summer Sundae: Sunday, 15th August

United Kingdom United Kingdom | by Robin Hosgood | 15 August 2004

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Upon arrival early Sunday afternoon, everything seems fine. A bit of cloud cover, but still perfect Festival Weather as per the day before. That was to change however, but not before Nottingham 5-piece Headway rock-up the Rising Stage with their self-cited Led Zeppelin-influenced guitar riffs and catchy vocals. Lead singer and guitarist David Wright poses around on stage as if he's been doing this all his life, and with so much stage presence and catchy songs, who's to say that we wont be seeing this band in a more prominent slot during the festival season next year?

Unfortunately at this point though, the heavens decided we all needed a break from the heat wave, and gave everyone a not-so-welcome drenching. Thankfully however, Summer Sundae has three undercover stages, which meant that the lesser known bands get a larger audience than they were expecting.

So, back to the girls with guitars again, and this time we have Shetland-born singer/songwriter Astrid Williamson on the Musicians Acoustic Stage. With her eclectic alternative country combination of heartbreak, love-lost and love-found songs, Aimee Mann she isn't, but with such prowess, she doesn't need to be taglined, and the audience agree. Her set culminates in an excellent cover of Snow Patrol's 'Run', and at the same time almost making it her own (much in the same way Ryan Adams recently did with Oasis' 'Wonderwall') and gleefully to the soaked, but comfortable, audience's appreciation.

Norwegian chilled-out alt.rock band Magnet take to the Outdoor stage in-between a break from the rain which thankfully holds off until the end of their set. Evan Johanssen's atmospheric lap-steel  twanging mixed with the band's Floydian composition, provide a relaxed (if not slightly wet) audience with a good excuse to come back outside and find a spot on the grass, and although Evan's 'feeling the love', his admission that he snogged A-Ha's Morten Harkett does not deflate the high that he has provided us with.

Seattle's Laura Veirs goes by without much audience attention though, which is probably due to the random intervals of the heavy Glastonbury-style weather currently passing over Leicester. 'Carbon Glacier', Laura's first album on these shores, has been praised highly by the media, so it comes as a shame that only a handful of revellers get to witness her performance instead of thousands.

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Photographer: Robin Hosgood

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