Saturday 24/06/06 Day 4 @ Wireless Festival, Hyde Park, London

Rays of sunlight tinged with corporate sheen pervade.  It’s a beautiful day, and having waded through the droves of advertising and got over the excitement of the impending James Blunt, the day promises to be pretty dam good.  A blagger’s paradise looms: despite never having met anyone on O2, freebies galore await with a little bending of truth and morals.  Oh, and did I mention James Blunt was playing?!  Cockney rhyming slang aside…..

Swiftly whacking a great big dull cloud over the glorious sunshine is The Upper Room.  Although, as most of the Wireless crowd would undoubtedly testify, shades are the ultimate in cool, even their modish eyewear doesn’t elevate them from a dull stroll through drab indie.  They manage a tepid cover of U2’s ‘I Will Follow You’, and although lyrics tell not-so-earth-shattering tales of quitting their jobs, their less than bohemian and rock n roll take on performance tells a rather different story.  They’ve quit their jobs, but for their sakes, you’ve just got to hope they haven’t burnt their bridges.

Beth Orton is up next, injecting a modicum of raunch to her rather placid set with a fine get-up of green dress and hold ups.  Offsetting the relaxed festival vibe with her breaking point voice and Joni Mitchell-esque stance, she plays a sublimely pretty set with vocals almost at breaking point.  ‘Worms’ is the piano fuelled highlight, and she ends with the oddly titled but surprisingly good ‘Shopping Trolley’.  Thankfully she has a befringed edge on the Katie Meluas of her unfortunately bland genre: wrists are nowhere near as limp, and it’s great to hear something a little more impassioned.  It sounds like she actually cares about what she sings: sweet relief from the frequent coffee-table veils of acoustic plaintives.