The Great Escape 2018

Anyone going? My first time… loads on that I like, so a weekend ticket for £70 was too good to turn down.

Who are you seeing? Any recommendations? My Saturday’s a bit quiet at the moment…

I’d quite like to see Girlhood but clashes galore there :frowning:

Will let you know my hot takes when I finish listening to the line up.
Picked a good year for a first time, the headliners are really strong and not behind a paywall like previous years. Also the outdoor bit on the beach seems like a fantastic addition, especially as the weather is meant to be nice. They aren’t putting so much money on the top of the bill and it’s enabled a better spread of more established names to help anchor the new music.

Do try to make a fairly robust plan as venue hopping later in the day can be risky, especially on Friday and Saturday. Tomorrow I will post the runs I think look very appealing

Here ist concept art

Not sure how it’ll be in the flesh, but it’s historically been a very well run festival so I have high hopes

Just going to leave this here

I’ll be there. Saturday is definitely the sparsest day for me in terms of bands on my plan, but that’s actually for the best since I have got some childcare responsibilities.

Another tip is to look at the Alt Escape line ups - there’s a few gems in there and a lot of bands that play the main festival also play the Alt Escape too.

Thursday I’m most looking forward to Orielles, Virginia Wing and Goat Girl. Friday is all about 77:67 and Superorganism (if I can get in), then Saturday I’ll hopefully get to see AK/DK and the Go! Team.

There’s loads of other bands I’ve written down, but can’t remember what they sound like so hopefully lots of good surprises in store!

They’re on my list, although it does mean staying up until past midnight when I’ve been at gigs from mid day.

Yeah the Saturday is really quite uninspired compared to the other two days. Considering how ridicously stacked Friday is all day I’m annoyed they didn’t spread more of the diverse acts found on Friday out a bit. Because Saturday is just lots of guitar, singer songwriter and trap

To be honest, I’m not too fussed. There’s still loads of stuff to see, and actually it’s really handy for me that I haven’t got anything between about 4pm and 7.30. Also, seeing so many bands is pretty overwhelming (for me at least) so an easier day is welcome in that respect too.

I mean it’s not awful, I’ll still get a full day out of it, but just disappointed because Friday night in particular is a nightmare for clashes so anything to spread that out a bit D:

On the plus side Horatios on Friday afternoon is a stellar line up and anytime Horatios has a stellar line up it ends up being the highlight of the festival. Something oddly endearing about that venue, and it never gets close to being crowded due to the stricter rules on a pier about how many people u can have in a venue

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which caused all sorts of problems at last years secret Slaves gig IIRC.

If you can get in early, then great, but everyone’s tipping Say Sue Me, and Orielles are one of the bigger bands on the line up, so I reckon it’ll be in high demand.

Wasn’t that meant to be an outdoor show and the weather made it dangerous, as opposed to it being in Horatio’s. Never had issue getting into Horatio’s EVER unless don’t turn up until the band start’s, then it’s a bit touch or go. The Slaves gig was gated by a showcase ticket so it wasn’t the case of the venue filling up, rather that the weather was god awful, especially for an outdoor show.

Yup outdoors

So I quite enjoyed that…

HIGHLIGHTS
The Orielles
Haley Heynderickx
Sons of Kemet

GOOD
Girlhood
Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever
Franc Moody
Nilufer Yanya
NAO
Ady Suleiman

OK
Puma Blue
Poppy Ajudha

Other thoughts:

  • Driving to and from Kent was a bit draining - wish I’d found somewhere to stay but I did book my ticket at short notice
  • Sound quality was pretty much spot on at most stages/venues - didn’t have the usual problem of putting in earplugs and the vocals being hard to pick out. Everything was loud and crystal clear
  • Patterns is a weird set-up isn’t it? I did get a good vantage point from the back though. I’ve been to The Haunt twice and I’m not a fan - feels like a stage has been bolted onto the end of a bar and after the first five rows/after the sound desk everyone’s up for a good natter during a set
  • Sound quality helped ignore it for the most part but there weren’t too many sets that weren’t populated with people talking or generally being knobheads unfortunately

The Korean Showcase at Patterns Saturday afternoon was stellar. Think that may have been my fav run of bands at Great Escaoe.

The new outdoor area was really good, really well ran for first time effort, crowd seemed very well behaved… at least at the stages I went to. Could hear a pin drop during the Korean showcase for all the bands/

The J-Pop at Arch was really fun, Dream Wife much better live than on record… that was a really good night too!

Hello Maude were fantastic at horatios and Audiobooks were delightfully weird. Had to bail early Saturday as felt ill but good year