Camden Crawl 2012 In Review

Following in the footsteps of 2011, Last.fm were once again at the Camden Crawl last weekend. A multi-venue three-dayer featuring artists from all genres, Camden is overtaken with eager gig-goers checking out established acts alongside a whole host of emerging artists.

Last.fm had the pleasure of hosting The Enterprise on the Saturday and the Electric Ballroom on the Sunday. Read on to find out who we managed to feast our ears upon.

Arriving early evening on the Saturday, we made it to The Enterprise just in time to catch the Last.fm lineup. Melodica, Melody & Me opened proceedings with their quaint folk sound (download free track “Hold On” here) before Sissy & The Blisters picked up the pace with their upbeat indie anthems. Tracks such as “Let Her Go” really got the crowd moving, however in keeping with the diversity on show at the Camden Crawl, it wasn’t long before Dam Mantle hit the stage to change the mood. His experimental electronica bestowed a chilled mood onto the audience, soon to be lifted by the appearance of Bastille.

The indie-pop act, led by Dan Smith, have been causing quite a fuss lately and, with much bigger headline shows to come, this set was one of most anticipated of the weekend. Hearing tracks such as “Flaws” and “Overjoyed” in such a small venue felt like a real privilege and that sense of witnessing something special certainly spread across the audience.

The next day featured a Last.fm pub quiz with A Question Of Scrobbles - the perfect way to start another day of music. Heading over to Koko we managed to catch young noise-niks The James Clever Quintet and Rolo Tomassi, before Kids In Glass Houses commanded a pack out crowd at the relatively early time of 5pm.

It was then over to the Electric Ballroom for the stellar Last.fm lineup to bring the weekend to a close. First up was Ghetts – a live grime band that managed to shake off any hangovers the crowd might have been feeling from the night before. Next up was Dog Is Dead, another act making serious waves lately. Their Local Natives-inspired vocal harmonies had the crowd swaying side to side and even breaking into dance with tracks such as “Glockenspiel Song”.

And So I Watch You From Afar probably haven’t had many DJs perform just before them before, but that is exactly what happened with the appearance of Youngman. The dubstep DJ brought in a whole new audience with him, with the Electric Ballroom transforming into a nightclub as soon as the first bass note dropped.

And then to our headliners. Last year the Northern Irish instrumental four-piece And So I Watch You From Afar released second album Gangs and they wasted no time blasting into that, opening on album kickstarter “BEAUTIFULUNIVERSEMASTERCHAMPION” and proceeding to play other tracks from Gangs and debut release ASIWYFA. The audience were soon in the palm of their hands, with the riff-heavy “Set Guitars To Kill” and the more restrained “7 Billion People All Alive At Once” showing how diverse they can be. If Camden Crawl needed a band loud, heavy and fun to draw the weekend to a close, it was And So I Watch You From Afar, and they accepted with aplomb.

Check out our photo album of the event on our Facebook page.