Retreat! Festival 2009

“A celebration of the local musical community”

This is the essential description of Retreat!, now in its 2^nd year. I quote Bartholomew Owl, the cofounder of this most rustic and simple of music festivals alongside Emily Roff back in summer 2008, as a reaction to the complete dearth of local music in the wider programme of the Edinburgh festival. Retreat! is different this time round though. Rather than being a month long affair featuring a multitude of acts spread across 31 days, today we have a multitude of bands spread across 12 hours.

“This is the product of a certain group of musicians, plus a much larger audience plus a realisation that we could do this without any money, any promotion or input from the mainstream music industry” (Rob St John)

Originally Retreat! was conceived of as a reaction to the lack of Edinburgh representation in the fringe music programme, hence the month long staging of gigs as a reprieve from the festival’s oppressive presence. As Emily puts it though, “this year that just isn’t the case, there’s loads of stuff going on from Edinburgh, so we don’t feel as if we’re working against it”. From “Broken Records headline show, Unicorn Kid and Young Fathers at Cab Vol and Meursault opening for Frightened Rabbit, there’s a lot more going on” adds Bart. That doesn’t mean they’re resting on their laurels though, safe in the knowledge that a few acts have made it onto the bigger stage. Retreat! 2009 was a day that attracted scores of fans, well-wishers and curious Udderbelly wanderers to the gentle surroundings of the old Bristo Church on Forest Road.

Although the day began at the more gentle hour of 11 o’clock, this reviewer was not in residence until closer to 4, therefore missing out on the warped loops of Wounded Knee, the pastoral baritone of Tissø Lake and the ukulele pop joy of Allo, Darlin’ amongst others. Arriving just in time to catch the beginning of anti-folk exemplar Withered Hand’s set, I set up camp towards the back of the church, right by the tea and toast stand. Added to the bunting, handmade signs, and tangible sense of community, Retreat! could be mistaken for some sort of village fete. The difference is of course the range of musical talent on show. Dan Wilson and his band quickly built up a warm rapport with the audience through their homespun tales of honesty and innocence. Never has the term ‘endearingly ramshackle’ been more appropriate than for tracks such as ‘No Cigarettes’ and ‘I Am Nothing’. I caught up with Dan afterwards to chat about Retreat! and the surge of underground music in Edinburgh.

“It’s quite surprising really, it’s more popular than I expected! .. a lot of bands are now getting the exposure they need, something that wasn’t really there before. It doesn’t feel as if this current surge is transient either”

Edinburgh has often suffered in comparison to its musical big brother, Glasgow, but perhaps this is an advantage for the capital?

“In Glasgow, a lot of bands have this problem of a trajectory already being laid out for them, because the city has a history of producing successful bands. I guess in Edinburgh we don’t really have that, so the pressure is off and there’s less urgency.

A misconception has existed for too long that Edinburgh’s homegrown music scene was rather threadbare, especially in comparison to its bigger cousin in the West. What Retreat! has done, along with the strong collection of gig nights that go on throughout the year (Trampoline, Tracer Trails, The Gentle Invasion, Limbo and This is Music) is to provide representation and opportunities for the bands that were perhaps finding it difficult to get gigs elsewhere. The DIY ethic that is so prevalent allows all the pressure to be taken away, and thus bands are putting on gigs themselves and getting recognition without the need for the bureaucracy of managers, promoters and record labels. Events like Retreat! cement the idea that all you need is a guitar, a PA and some songs to put on a cracking show. With Withered Hand’s debut LP ‘Good News’ coming out next month on Edinburgh label SL, it’s an underscoring of the strength of the scene.

Later on in the day, Leith based, but Lancashire raised, ambient folk master Rob St John takes to the stage. Having gained much praise of late for his ‘Like Alchemy’ EP, and strengthening his position as Edinburgh’s premier folk outfit (in the absence of ‘on hiatus’ Eagleowl) with a number of stirring new tracks, it’s perhaps unfortunate that this is to be his last gig for some time, due to taking up ecological studies down South. ‘The Shipping Forecast’ is a tremendously wistful pop song, that really lets Rob’s vocals come to the fore, with the slightest hint of a falsetto. Finale ‘The Sargasso Sea’ is a frenetic beast of a rock track over which the muse of Neil Young looms. It’s a startling finish to Rob’s set, which at one time was known for being the epitome of low key.

“The community allows people to do what they want, because even if you’re good and a little leftfield, you might struggle to find an audience in a more industry driven setup. And that hinders you because you’re always struggling or striving to be a little more mainstream. Shows like today where you just put some bands on and it’s free, and 200 people turn up, it just cements this undercurrent of things going on in Edinburgh year round”

But isn’t it the case that this sort of event, and these kind of bands will struggle to generate bigger success, or is that something they would even desire in the first place? Is the idea of making money from music at odds with the DIY/locally reared philosophy?

“No-one wants to lose money! I wonder if, even as DIY as you are, you never want to make a loss. There are scales of making money though, and some people want to be a superstar and some people want just to be able to buy a pint at the end of the evening!”

And therein lies the rub, it’s about making music for enjoyment, for art, to earn a living but not necessarily to become attached to the international carthorse that is the ‘Music Industry’. “I think the downturn in the music industry has helped us really”, as Dan Withered Hand put it. It seems that Retreat! has taken on another role; as recession relief!

Bringing down the curtain on the festival for me were Meursault as alas I had to miss a now legendary moment involving the closing act ‘The Leg’, a face mask, and projectile vomit. Punk rock not folk rock! The Edinburgh ‘folktronica’ outfit have been making waves since the release of debut album ‘Pissing On Bonfires/Kissing With Tongues’, and have since added another 2 members to the original 4 piece. An electric guitarist with a plethora of pedals joins the banjo, ukulele, drums, acoustic guitar and electronics that is beginning to make their stage show look like the bridge of the Starship Enterprise. A moving version of the solo ukulele track ‘Sleet’ is a highlight, alongside their terrific new material, all omnichords and thundering drums.

Speaking to frontman Neil Pennycook earlier in the day, he reaffirmed the points made by Rob St John and Dan Wilson.

“Bands are priced out of studios, rehearsal spaces. Being in a band is really fucking expensive! If you’ve got limited means, you can really narrow in on what you’ve got, even if it’s a battered old acoustic guitar and a snare drum. If we had too much access to rehearsal space it would absolutely destroy us! I’ll never record in a studio because I think it would be the end of me. I’m fine with my old Applemac, as battered and as horrible as it is, I get on with it and I think that’s a big part of it, recording our own music and putting on our own gigs, taking a little bit of the power away from the mainstream industry.”

The theme of DIY is constantly recurring throughout the Retreat! philosophy. All you need is enthusiasm, passion for local music and heaps of goodwill and you can carry that forth into staging gigs and helping to get local music heard on a wider scale. Retreat! was a roaring success, and during this most famous and chaotic of festivals, that is no mean feat.

“Bart and Emily putting on Retreat! is only going to be a good thing, it sounds corny as hell but it’s a ‘by musicians, for musicians’ theme. We just want as many people to hear this music as possible, that’s my main drive at the moment; to get out, get heard”