Scarlet Ridge. photo: Martyn Boston
This year’s theme was ‘beach party’ and the event certainly stuck to it with buckets and spades hanging from the ceiling, a life-sized donkey to sit on, and even a shack-style set-up for the outside stage. There were also inflatable beach balls flying all over the place as people were getting taken in by the beach party theme.
As per usual, the Under the Tree stage outside was the busiest during the day due to the beautiful weather, and to match this, the line-up was jam-packed with catchy and talented acoustic acts. From the fun, toe-tapping sounds of The Breakfast Club playing one of the earlier slots in the day, who managed to warm up the already sweaty crowd. Later on, we had the more country sounding yet powerful music of Ryan Farmer who has already made it into the iTunes blues chart at number one for Worries and Troubles. After the sun started to set, it moved on to the softer yet infectious band of four, Scarlet Ridge, who not only showcased their talent as songwriters but also as a live act, spurring the crowd to join in and feeding off them the whole way through. This stage just seemed to gain more and more momentum as the day carried on, even after the sun had gone to bed.
However, this is not to say the two inside stages, LefLion (downstairs) and Castle Rock (upstairs) had to wait until the night time to get really busy. Not to say that each stage didn't manage to gain themselves a crowd, even with the blazing sun outside. Although the Leftlion stage had a crowd from the get go, they seemed to keep getting busier with every band that graced the stage, and with the line-up they had you can understand why. Bands such as Luxury Stranger proved their ability to take over a room with their exciting and full sounding music getting every head in the room banging. The Barnum Meserve also showcased their true talent and proved you don’t need a large amount of members in your band to get a crowd going, with just three guys, they still managed to unleash perfect sounding tracks from a trio of very talented musicians.
Three Girl Rhumba. photo: Martyn Boston
The Castle Rock stage may have been upstairs but it certainly mustn’t be forgotten, with the ever-growing crowd getting into the flow of things. Three Girl Rhumba was just one of the earlier bands to play on this stage, and although they have played to larger crowds, they still got a momentum going with their catchy and fun music; there were even some fans in the audience singing along. As acts such as Crosa Rosa and Bendigo ended the live music portion of the event on a high upstairs, and with the mighty Grey Hairs loudly ending things downstairs, the party just didn’t want to finish upstairs, downstairs, or outside.
As Waterfront Festival enjoyed its fifth birthday, the event on a whole was a complete success and the atmosphere running throughout the whole day and night was so infectious, no one wanted it to end. Not only has loads more cash been added to their ever growing bucket of charity money, but as always, the event was a sell-out. They proved just how popular this Nottingham festival is becoming, so if you missed out, make sure you get your tickets early next year!
Waterfront Festival 2015 took play at the Canalhouse, Nottingham on Saturday 15 August 2015.
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