Review: Kurt Vile and the Manchester Pscyh Fest

The biggest psychedelic festival in the UK returned to Manchester yesterday, Saturday September 3. This year, it was bigger than ever. The festival took over venues all along the Oxford Road corridor and hosted a hub at Circle Square.

The hub, supposedly hosting ‘food from all around the world’ offered two stalls, one selling Indian food and the other: burgers, meanwhile a bar stall boasted cans of craft beers or water. Other stalls sold vintage clothes, offered screen printing workshops and sold festival merch, including bucket hats and tie dye tea towels.

The opening act of the day, at the O2 Ritz was a great success. Gruff Rhys thoroughly impressed the crowd with skilled instrumentals, absolutely packing out the Whitworth Street West venue.

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At YES, patrons were queuing up the stairs to squeeze into the Pink Room to watch Penelope Isles. Sneaking in just as the band started, the room was packed and chatty with no space to dance, queue at the bar or move.

The basement was just the same, packed to bursting but with no one controlling entry for Automotion’s deep set.

Despite a smaller crowd, Mini Trees had their audience dancing at Deaf Institute with ethereal voices played against drum machines and indie guitars.

Later in the day, Black Midi took the stage at Albert Hall, really bringing home bloke-core’s new hold on fashion. Twenty minutes into the set, no music has been played, the guitarist drops his guitar and they all pace about on stage to backing music, before walking off.

40 minutes late, the band started, a microphone swapped out. The crowd immediately got involved and the bouncing, moshing, dancing took over