Secret Garden Party: Day Three

Photo: Rachael Wright / Secret Garden Party
Following last night’s showers, it’s Sunday muddy Sunday and a sense of melancholy drifts across the Abbots Ripton site. But not for long. As if to counteract, a sea of white-clothed people are flocking to the Great Stage in preparation of the annual Secret Garden Party paint fight. Stretching right back to the edge of the arena, all the way up to adjacent bars and tents, one of the largest crowds of the weekend is here to bear witness.

Nearly every photographer is perched on stage, as the Head Gardener arises and yammers, “Are you ready to get sexy with colour? Get ready to fight!” The audience steps back and is instructed to split into two groups: freshers versus veterans. A 20-strong team of officials line the divide with buckets filled with bags of powder paint. Bags are grabbed, war cries are made, there is genuine glee. The countdown begins. And bang! The sky is shrouded in purple, green, blue, red and yellow anew. It’s a stunning sight. Old skool hip hop plays on the stereo before David Rodigan MBE takes to the decks. Now a little claustrophobic, we escape to avoid being brushed against by painty people.

Taking refuge in The Living Room, we examine the selection of books which pack out the bookshelf beneath the bar. Our most bizarre finds include works such as ‘Intermediate Pure Mathematics’, ‘Ships Log’ and ‘A Surgeon’s Life’. We grab a coffee and mull over some disputable Engels. Where else could you do that?

Fortunately, we also have some proper live entertainment in the form of Nottingham singer-songwriter Joel Baker, who plays songs from his new EP ‘Long Sleeves’, released the week before, whilst we read. He plays with a cool composure and enduring charisma. When he unplugs his microphone and guitar, only to stand on a hay bale in the middle of the tent and get everyone to join together in a singalong, we’re floored.

Back in the Crossroads tent, we subsequently discover a crowd of cross-legged, paint-splattered youths waiting to see Sam Smith. Backed by a trendy set of session musicians, the man himself comes on, and boy, that voice is something extraordinary. Of course, we knew this before, but live he comes into his own.

His fluttering climbs of scales in a near-falsetto, the pounding bass rhythms, an offbeat piano chill, the overarching funk, the soulful, ballad-based pop… everything dead rings for a male Adele. In fact, one song, ‘I’ve Told You Know’, even starts out with a bluesy vocal chant just like the one in ‘Rumour Has It’. Maybe he’ll meet similar success, maybe he won’t, but perfect, downtempo versions of Naughty Boy Number One ‘La La la’ and Disclosure feature ‘Latch’ certainly go down a treat. His cute rosy cheeks set up a future as a teen girl pin-up, and today there’s so much swooning.

Similarly swoonsome but disparately affective is Luke Sital-Singh, whose set veers from tender, hushed moments of subtlety and restraint to potent, cathartic explosions of beauty. Just man and Telecaster, his variable vibrato and intricate finger-plucking recall Jeff Buckley at his most emotional. A song about “homosexual bestiality love,” which details the story of Luna, a whale who got lost from her pod, and imagines cheerless yearnings between her and a lover, is a highlight.

Continuing and concluding the reggae theme over on the Great Stage, meanwhile, a 7-piece band backs the legendary Big Youth who appears with the byline ‘Reggae Hero’, quite rightly, after much praise and propaganda from his own personal hypeman. With a mini, blue top hat covering his grey dreads, a cowboy sash and a larger-than-life lily-patterned shirt, he definitely looks the hero. And he sounds it too, as he rattles through songs from his own back catalogue, as well as Bob Marley and Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes covers. The best thing about him, though, is his spasmodic dance moves which entail the running man, jogging in circles and simple air-humping. He’s a joyful presence and provides wisdom aplenty: “Music gives the brain therapy, jah know, physical therapy.” In total, supreme command, he’s just what we need to close the musical end of our remarkable weekend, skanking into the night.