Friday 23/06/06 Day 3 @ Wireless Festival, Hyde Park, London

Funny things, festivals. Punters are never, ever satisfied with the way things are going. Either they’re horrible, smelly, muddy cess pits or horrible, sweet smelling corporate franchises masquerading as ‘proper’ 5-day organic cider benders. In the absence of Glastonbury, the general ‘kids going native’ aesthetic of Reading and the rise and rise of the V Festival, phone giants 02 have decided to put on a series of mini-festivals in Hyde Park. Spread over five days, 02 Festival is a good idea in principal – you don’t have to camp in a tent with the great unwashed for 5 days, if the weather is apocalyptic you can stay home and once the event is over you can hop on a tube and be home in half an hour. However, it also creates a huge amount of problems. Act numbers are limited, everything starts late so city folk can get there, and the class of people you get… well, lets just say V Festival is a bit feral for them. But, its glorious weather, the line up’s strong and I’ve got backstage passes, so what can go wrong?

First up, (at 4 O’Clock?!! It’s still Pimms O’Clock round here!) we’ve got Get Cape, Wear Cape, Fly. Sam Duckworth is completely unlike anything we’ve ever seen before, an angelic 19 year old with an acoustic guitar slung round his neck, a beats-spilling laptop and a group of what appears to be classically trained musicians backing him up. While he’s been marketed as the coolest thing since Mr Frosty, Sam still seems to plough a familiar furrow – poppy, angsty male singer songwriter, tunes, good voice. He’s got enough crossover appeal to be massive, and songs like ‘Ispy’ and ‘Call Me Ishmael’ are great little pop songs, but don’t believe the hype kids, GCWCF may disappoint fashionistas in the long run by leaping on CD:UK.

We high-tail it back to the main stage to catch Gnarls Barkley, who of course need little to no introduction. Well, apart from the fact that apart from ‘Crazy’ nobody here has the faintest clue which song is which. Battling against pretty dreadful sound, Cee-Lo and his all-white clad backing band manage to put on a good show, hip-swaying through ‘Go Daddy Go’ and new single ‘Smiley Faces,’ none of which have the same kind of lackadaisical beauty as their multi-million selling debut. When it eventually arrives, an already straining Cee-Lo implores the crowd to “Get the **** up!” He raises a half-hearted cheer, and a bit of swaying from the front row. Unfortunately, Gnarls Barkley are completely out of their depth here. After an astonishing performance on Jools Holland a few weeks ago, their warm sound is swallowed up by the gargantuan arena, and, despite their best efforts the crowd remains unmoved and unimpressed.

We decide to go for a bit of a wander. 02’s boast that the festival has 5 ‘arenas’ is quickly cut down to size. On an expedition to find the Acoustic Tent, plans to see the gorgeous Shortwave Set are abandoned because the stage doesn’t appear to actually exist. Further enquiries as to the whereabouts of the stage were met with bemusement, and I do hope headliners Foy Vance were rather better at looking for it than us. Then I was refused entry to see Unkle Bob in the 02 Blueroom tent because, insolently, I had forgotten to change my mobile phone contract to the ubiquitous 02. And they wouldn’t give me a free massage, the bastards.

So, back to the main stage. Pharrell is the next in a series of increasingly bizarre line-up decisions, and the boy does well, slipping the odd “Mother****er!” in to keep parents on their toes. Disappointingly, he doesn’t bring that Chinese chap who kept hanging around in the background of his videos with him, but despite the blazing sunshine he has an entire crowd of pissed middle-class white people jiggling uncomfortably to ‘She Wants to Move,’ and ‘Rock Star.’ Pharrell has always been one of the most likeable and engaging rap stars, always eager to embrace rock and even metal as referenmces for his work. The heavy guitars and bass on the tracks, and his sheer enthusiasm puts him above most RnB live acts, but, again hampered by sound problems the former N*E*R*D star struggles to get  ‘Can I Have it Like That’ and ‘Drop it Like It’s Hot’ out of the turgid bass-overload.