Tramlines 2016: Day 3 – Eliza, Catfish, Marika Hackman, Gaz Coombes

Day 3…

I awoke on day 3 of Tramlines in a red hot flat in Sheffield on a really uncomfortable airbed with a stinking hangover. Rather than feeling excited for another day of music, I found my only desire was to drink milkshake and weep uncontrollably until nightfall. As the morning progressed however I buoyed myself and I arrived back in Sheffield around 2pm ready to give Tramlines the send off she deserves.

Eliza and the Bear kicked things off at the Academy and I was surprised to discover that none of them are called Eliza and there wasn’t a bear in sight. The London five piece had a surprisingly massive crowd and they rose to the occasion with an energetic set. My hungover clung to me like wet toilet paper which meant I watched most of Eliza and the Bear from the back as the oppressive heat meant that getting more involved wasn’t an option. Frontman James Kellegher even joked that this was the first time the band had played a gig directly in the centre of the sun…

Eliza and the Bear’s big song is ‘Friends’ and the massive chorus was shouted back at them by the Sheffield crowd. A solid start to the day from a promising band. Next up was another trip to the Folk Forest and my lowest point of the weekend as even a beef burrito couldn’t lift me from my alcohol induced malaise. A dreary set by C Duncan didn’t help matters either. This was the folk forest at it’s most folky. Yawn. My wife insisted on waiting around to watch Marika Hackman though, so I sat and sulked for a bit but to be fair the London songstress has a great voice and even the more maudlin songs were powerful.

We rushed back to the main stage to arrive in time for Catfish and the Bottlemen and were delighted to see there was barely any queue. The Tramlines organisers promised more bars, more toilets and less queue’s at the main stage this year and they have emphatically delivered. There is a world where I would have enjoyed Catfish’s set. If it was on Friday instead of Sunday or if I wasn’t so damn tired or even if I was just a bit nearer to the front. In reality though I found it hard to get excited even though it was my first time seeing them live. Catfish are a decent band but I’m not sure what has been responsible for their meteoric rise. There seems to be a lack of straight forward indie pop bands at the moment and Catfish have capitalised on that. You get the feeling if they had dropped at the same time as The Kooks, Razorlight, Arctics etc then they wouldn’t really have stood out. Having said that, for a band that haven’t been around all that long, songs such as ‘Fallout’ and ‘Cocoon’ already seem to have become unstoppable live and frontman Van McCann had no trouble getting the crowd going.

The only thing missing from the festival experience so far had been rain, so when the heavens opened during Catfish, it was actually a blessed relief. So with Tramlines finally nearing it’s end, we made our way to Leadmill for the last time, for Johnny Lloyd and Gaz Coombes. Lloyd was formerly the singer in indie rock band Tribes and it is surprising to see that he has gone solo to write songs that sound exactly the same as his previous band. The first few songs passed me by despite Lloyd’s undeniably strong voice but the last 4 or 5 were a big improvement.

Johnny Lloyd was just a precursor to the main event though and when a resplendent looking Gaz Coombes strolled on stage, we knew it was going to be a good night. Coombes’ most recent album Matador is perhaps the most underrated of the last five years and whilst it is difficult for one man to replicate such a sonically varied album, the stripped down versions of songs such as ‘Seven Walls’ and ‘Buffalo’ had a certain charm. I never managed to see Coombes’ former band Supergrass so it was thrilling to see Coombes play an acoustic version of Supergrass single ‘Moving’.

Gaz Coombes never ages…

As is customary Coombes came back out for an encore of ‘Matador’ but the crowd were scratching their heads when he said he still had one more to play. A short intro about how this song was about a run in with the police made it clear that he was about to rip through Supergrass’ first single, ‘Caught By The Fuzz’. The crowd went appropriately wild. I have grown up listening to Supergrass and it was a thrill to see one of my favourite songs played live. A great end to an unforgettable festival.