I’ve been attending Infest since 2000, and this was my twenty-fourth edition (including the two mostly-online editions, one of which I DJed at, and I contributed video interviews with bands to both of them). It’s seen a lot of change over time – both as styles of music within the wider alternative/electronic/etc scene have come […]
Just four months ago, I was beginning to be resigned to the August Bank Holiday being devoid of one of my favourite events of the year. So when we finally set foot in the new venues, it was very much a feeling of joy that we’d got there at all.
One of the obvious casualties of COVID since early 2020 was live music, both in the form of gigs, and festivals. For many, both 2020 and 2021 were almost entirely devoid of the kind of communal joy that these events can bring, and parts of my life certainly felt that bit emptier without them – […]
Somehow, despite the feeling I was just getting started, I’m already home, (mostly) unpacked and finishing this write-up of another great edition of Infest. It has long since become far more than just a music festival that I attend because I want to see a few bands – it’s an extended family.
Twenty years of a festival existing is nothing to be sniffed at. Sure, bigger festivals have existed much longer (Reading dates back into the sixties, while Glastonbury is a few years younger), but in the current crowded festival environment, a smaller festival lasting twenty years is an extraordinary achievement. Particularly when the twentieth edition is […]
All it took was arriving in Bradford on Friday, and I knew that I still loved this festival. There was that familiar buzz of anticipation as we stepped off the platform, looking forward to the fun to come, however this year was tinged of course with a bittersweet sadness over what was going to be […]
Over the weekend of this year’s Infest, there was some discussion over the current state of the industrial (and wider) scene. In many other scenes – or indeed in “mainstream” popular music, there is an air of nostalgia as record labels struggling with new sales, are relying heavily on reissues of the old, particularly on […]
Christ almighty, this year has passed really fucking quickly – we’re already heading back into autumn, which means I’ve enjoyed my fifteenth Infest. While perhaps not a lineup with too many “marquee” names this year, it was certainly one that had some treasures in it, and away from the bands was one of the maddest […]
A sign I’m clearly getting old – this was my fourteenth Infest. God, time flies. This year was perhaps a bit special for a number of reasons, though, at least partly down to the fact that this edition very nearly didn’t happen, and in the event it is a damned good thing that it did […]
For the tenth time – I started writing a seemingly ever-expanding review of the annual festival in 2003 – here goes with my coverage of Infest rundown for 2013. As usual this is mainly covering each of the bands in turn from my point-of-view, with a few other opinions as we go, and I’m well […]
Probably one of the weekends of the year I most look forward to is the August Bank Holiday Weekend.
In a flash, that is Infest over for another year already. A weekend that shot by – of fifteen bands, a good many DJs, many more friends new and old, some silly moments, some serious moments, a fair bit of wonderfully cheap booze, and whole lot of fun and silliness (and thanks to assisting Tails […]
I think it took until the dawn of this year’s Infest until I realised just how much I missed the festival in its year off last year. All it took was a few minutes of being back in (nearly) familiar surroundings, of which more in a moment, with various familiar faces of friends new and […]
This weekend was so fucking good – like, to the level of best Infest ever – that I when I started to write this I was wondering where to start.
So where exactly to start? This year marks of course ten years of Infest, a festival that has changed in subtle ways over the years. This one was my eighth, and it was fun the other week unearthing all the memories of past events before I forgot them forever. And as always, this year brought […]
Infest has become, in the now seven years that I have attended, the one thing that gets pencilled in first for each year no matter what. It doesn’t really matter who is playing, I know that whether I like the bands or not I’ll have a blast as most of my friends made across the […]
OK, so where do we start? Well, overall, this year’s Infest has been fantastic fun. As always, it is so much more than the bands – the friendly atmosphere and time to catch up with friends ensure that. But the bands are generally well worth seeing. Didn’t catch all of them this year, and not […]
[First appeared in Black Harvest issue #6 October 2003]
That what started out as a hastily-scheduled event to celebrate the life of Jamie Duffy has turned into a large, multi-day, multi-city festival over the past decade is something of wonder: but what is also great is how it has fostered a wider family of sorts, one of multiple groups that come together from all […]
In ten days time, and a couple of years later than originally expected, I will be attending my twentieth Infest. I first went along thanks to the invite from a friend to most of Infest 2000, when I discovered a particular love for In Strict Confidence, and I was so hooked that from then on […]
