Edinburgh rocked on Day One of the Connect Festival

★★★★★ (5/5)

For the second year, the Connect Festival kicked off in Edinburgh’s Royal Highland Showground. It turns out that the showground, normally used for showing cattle, makes a great festival venue. Plenty of space for four gig locations, tons of food stalls and bars and the many chill-out locations.

There was a distinct Scottish feel to day one with two Scottish giants unleashed in Franz Ferdinand and Primal Scream plus smaller acts like Glasgow musician, Belly Rachel at The Gardener’s Cottage and Craig Smith DJing at X by Glenmorangie.

A small crowd enjoyed the early gigs and sets but things started to warm up when Scottish indie rockers, Franz Ferdinand took to the stage in front of an excited and growing crowd to run through their greatest hits. Singer, Alex Kapranos seemed delighted to be playing Scotland in the middle of a tour that’s taking them around Europe. “Damn, it’s great to be home!” Looking sharp and excited the band opened with their 2004 single ‘The Dark of the Matinee’ and the audience reaction was immediate, with the throng bouncing and singing along to the lyrics.

FRANZ FERDINAND PERFORMING AT CONNECT FESTIVAL 2023
PHOTOCREDIT: STUART WESTWOOD

As expected, the band were excellent and the show, whilst full of fun and amazing musicianship was drum skin tight. They seemed to be having a blast. Highlights included the super hooky, ‘Do You Want To’ with its infectious chorus perfect for getting the audience involved and of course their breakthrough, Grammy nominated, ‘Take Me Out’ which was delivered in a breathless explosion of fun.

The audience responded very positively to every tune, some breaking out dance moves that had obviously not seen the light of day since the early naughties.

The set finished with the high energy belter, ‘This Fire’, leaving the crowd catching their breath.

The audience broke up to grab more beers, cocktails and food and were back to catch the set from Scottish rock royalty, Primal Scream. This is the 30th anniversary of their iconic 1993 album ‘Screamadelica’ and the album was the keystone of the gig with the band playing it in its entirety.

The House Gospel Choir walked out onto the stage, quickly followed by the band who kicked off with the first track of the album and a huge crowd pleaser, ‘Movin’ on Up’. Bobby Gillespie holds a special place in Scotland’s rock history – a National Treasure – and the audience erupted when he took the stage resplendent in his trademark Screamadelica suit.

HOUSE GOSPEL CHOIR PERFORMING AT CONNECT FESTIVAL 2023
PHOTOCREDIT: STUART WESTWOOD

The stagecraft, musicianship and lightshow were consistently at an extraordinary level, with the crowd, a mix of those not born when the band were in their prime and 90s ravers grooving along. There were many highlights over the 90-minute set.

‘Loaded’, it’s opening lines set the 90s scene. Just what is it that you want to do?/Well, we wanna be free, we wanna be free to do what we wanna do/And we wanna get loaded and we wanna have a good time/And that's what we're gonna do (away baby, let's go)/We're gonna have a good time, we're gonna have a party!’ And party is exactly what the crowd did.

The super trippy ‘Inner Flight’ and grooving ‘Come Together’ were excellent but ‘Higher Than the Sun’ was the show-stopper.

The encore saw a piper stride out onto the stage playing the opening notes of ‘Loaded’ it was a unique highlight which the bustling, excited crowd loved and the energy was wild.

This ran into the crashing guitar opening of the Americana ‘Country Girl’ which saw Gillespie channelling Jagger in the vocal. One of the group’s most successful tracks went smoothly with Bobby cajoling and demanding more from his followers as they belted out the chorus.

The final track of the day was the 1994 ‘Rocks’ whose chorus of ‘Get you rocks off, get your rocks off honey!’ was belted back with the dial turned to 11. A great end to a superb set.

So, a quality start for the festival which set the bar high for the rest of the weekend.