Laurent Garnier rocks Get Loaded in the Park Festival....
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….After the Röyksopp set
finishes I'm ready for something a little more techno so with a brief stop by
the festival bar I head over to the Clash stage to see a live set by Parisian
superstar DJ, Laurent Garnier. ....
Onstage he has his
trademark live brass section with trumpet, trombone and saxophone and the
trumpeter plays along to the beats Garnier is creating. There is a lot of
visual interplay between the two, with Garnier directing with hand signals,
like a conductor. ....
It's an amazing blend of
styles and has an energy that I feel was missing from Röyksopp. ....
When he launches into
Desirless from new album, Tales of a Kleptomaniac, the whole tent starts
dancing and I notice a big guy dressed in what can only have been a young girls
pyjamas throwing shapes in the corner, weird. ....
After nearly an hour, you
can see people in the crowd checking their watches, thinking about heading over
to the main stage for Orbital's headline slot but there is one track that they
are hanging on for. ....
Onstage Garnier says: “Okay
we're just going to play one more track.” To the side of the stage an official
is signaling frantically, Garnier says:”Maybe we aren't going to play that
track.” The signaling goes back and forth before Garnier comes back on and
drops the opening beat of the track everyone has been hanging on for, the
saxophonist picks up the solo and we're into The Man With The Red Face from
breakthrough album Unreasonable Behaviour. ....
As the screen behind him
shows jets of flames, Garnier is jumping around the stage alternately waving at
the crowd, adjusting the decks and instructing the saxophonist and all of a
sudden it's the mid nineties again and a tent full of people are going crazy to
techno music. ....
It's a shame when the beat
subtly changes as Garnier truncates the track from it's original nine minute
running time so that everyone can make it to the Orbital set. ....
From near the back of the
huge crowd in front of the main stage I can see the rig of decks and computers
surrounding Phil and Paul Hartnoll, the two brothers that make up Orbital. ....
It's a remarkably dull
sight after the theatrics of Röyksopp and the manic energy of Laurent Garnier
and sadly the music they are producing isn't any more exciting…..