Latitude Festival

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. As an excuse I am currently on a sojourn from the rat race and basking in the heat of Barcelona for a few days. The rest of the blame can be placed on work as well as a temporary inertia scuttling through my brain over the past week or so.
It's thanks to work that I managed to land a last minute ticket to Latitude Festival which took place this weekend past in the rather splendid setting of Suffolk's Henham Park. I had a troupe of lady friends by my side and all in all an excellent time was had, in rain and shine (lots of shine thankfully). I even found time - sheltering from the rain - to stop in and listen to a Radio 4 recording of festival stories featuring Dylan Moran whom I like to describe as 'scruffilicous'.

Musically I enjoyed in no particular order:

Andrew Bird
The National
Cold War Kids
Elvis Perkins
Final Fantasy
Camera Obscura
Guilty Pleasures*

I think they've been trying to pitch Latitude as some of sort of miniature, middle-class version of Glastonbury. Personally I thought it was a fantastically organised affair. I've become increasingly loyal to smaller festivals; the ones where you can find your friends if you lose them, get between stages within minutes rather than hours and, more importantly, remember where you pitched the tent. Latitude made the grade for me but only just. Increase its size (as many festivals are wont to do these days) and it will lose all its charm.

So yes, I urge one and all to go to Latitude next year, so long as they don't go making it as large as Glastonbury...

* shamefully, it is mostly because of my 70s-disco-sized crush on Sean Rowley, although he does put on a fantastic club night.