Winter's End 2023 review with Elles Bailey, Von Hertzen Brothers and Kris Barras Band

FRIDAY:

It’s only the distant call of an occasional seagull that reminds you where you are. “You know where you are? You’re by the seaside, baby,” as someone very famous didn’t quite sing.

In every other sense, Planet Rock’s Winter’s End festival is like coming home – not only to Planet Rockstock’s long-term base of Trecco Bay in Porthcawl, but also in the sense of a return to the route map of our lives; the certainty that the rock world we hold so dear is once again firing up, rejuvenated, its revival ongoing. And, of course, it is your dedication and passion that has made it that way – our role this weekend is to put those bands on a stage and, crucially, to provide a platform for the new artists that are gonna be shaping our future.

And that’s kinda where we come in on the Friday. If you haven’t seen Beth Blade and The Beautiful Disasters, you’ll be wanting to correct that this year. You might think you don’t know Beth, but you do – she’s sung backing vocals on the last few Thunder albums – and given the wings to fly in her own band, she takes off like the proverbial rocket. While last album ‘Mythos, Confessions, Tragedies and Love’ represented purgative recovery from hard times, the band’s short set tonight is an explosion of simpler pleasures. Songs like ‘Give It All You Got’ and ‘Down and Dirty’ are as fuel-injected and fun as the titles suggest, and just when you think Beth’s voice can’t get any bigger, she floors you with a vocal uppercut you didn’t see coming.

“You don’t wanna be in my head,” sniggers Gypsy Pistoleros frontman and affable ringmaster Gypsy Lee Pistolero, grinning (we think) from behind his black-on-white Day of the Dead-style face paint. Actually, it might be fun, given that he’s the mastermind behind one of the hardest things to achieve in music – a unique sound. It’s sleazy rock, Jim, but not as we know it – not unless you’ve heard it done flamenco-style. ‘Bandido’ is an infectious gallop that’d be just as at home in a Mexican saloon of ill repute as it is here today, while ‘Wild, Beautiful, Damned’ is a rampant singalong with a slice of lime protruding from its bottle neck. Endearingly spicy, they leave you wanting more.

Connor Selby’s approach to his art could hardly be more different – he plays a studied version of a genre known to all. It’s lucid, languid blues with heart firmly on sleeve. Selby himself looks lost in music, eyes closed throughout, but there’s great interplay with organ player Stevie Watts, one of so many notably gifted musicians on stage this weekend. ‘That’s Alright’, new single ‘The Deep End’ and their relatively perky take on Ray Charles’ ‘My Baby Don’t Dig Me’ seem to have time-travelled their way to Winter’s End from the Mississippi Delta itself.

At festivals there are certain performances that stay with you – moments that appear pivotal when you look back at them months and years later. Tonight, Kira Mac completely and comprehensively nail it. So enjoyable is it that their set seems to speed past as if driven by Lewis Hamilton. The well-established songs, the ease of performance, the stage coverage, and Rhiannon Hill’s commanding, A-game vocals – it’s the complete rock package. By mid-set Bret Barnes’ bass guitar has acquired a fan’s lacey red knickers, but underwear is the only thing dropping for this band; everything else is fast track rising. Guitarist Joe Worrall later confides that he was moved to tears by the sense of distance travelled, but he’ll soon get used to it - the time it’s gonna take Kira Mac to headline stages like this is now measurable in months, not years.

It takes a class act to follow such a ram-raid, and thankfully Elles Bailey is exactly that. The Planet Rock presenter is possessed of a voice and a stage presence that is the sole preserve of the great. Opening with the double whammy of ‘The Game’ and ‘Stones’, she soon has a mesmerised crowd in thrall, and her band – including guitarist Joe Wilkins – are standout talents. ‘When I Go Away’, for example, isn’t just a smooth, sexy blues rocker but features multi-part harmonies involving all six band members. The chanteuse herself, meanwhile, is an engaging host with plenty to say. Songs are dedicated to the other women on today’s bill, while ‘Cheats And Liars’ recalls the manner in which the government “sold the arts down the river” during the pandemic. Musical alchemy, and a fine way to end our opening night.

SATURDAY:

Saturday openers, Northern Ireland’s The Forged Heart, regale early comers with a wholesome dose of classic rock. ‘Stupid Games’ addresses the perils of social media, while the slide guitar led ‘Route 66’ seems birthed from the same DNA that created Kira Mac, no bad start for this relatively new project.

Untamed Silence are also worth a look, seamlessly combining progressive and alternative sounds redolent of Soundgarden with more traditional classic metal. Debbie Wade’s powerful voice and slightly unnerving stage persona ensures attentions do not wander, as does ‘Deadspeak’s weighty guitar bulk and mesmeric rhythms.

Not many people look as happy to be where they are as Alice Freya, singer and guitarist (one of three!) with Last Flight To Pluto. The band may be from “just down the road” but Alice tells us she used to hang around events like these handing out flyers, dreaming of the day when she might be in here looking out rather than out there looking in. Today her band’s honeyed, mellifluous rock takes centre stage at last. With its gentle crescents and waves it’s more of a welcome caress than a punch.

It's Austin Gold, though, that bring today’s first real swing of the latter. It’s rock and soul and blues all concertinaed into a delicious whole, the songs not just connecting in terms of power but also reaching us with blows heavier still, at a primal and deeply human level. New drummer James Pepper makes an impressive debut but frontman David James Smith is the uber confident band linchpin, belting out skyscraper hooks and incendiary flashes of lead guitar as if there’s nothing to it. ‘Mountain’ is the anthem that stays with you, but it's the setlist’s strength in depth that will take them higher up bills than this.

Daxx & Roxane, despite being lumbered with one of rock’s most bizarre band names, have crammed much into their tenure on the planet (including multiple weeks on Planet Rock’s playlists). From high profile support slots to sweaty dive bars, the Swiss-born rockers consistently deliver back to basics, high voltage rock n’roll, the kinda thing Bon Scott might’ve appreciatively nodded his head to. Tonight, replete with bursts of harmonica, the quartet kick out jams like ‘Give It Time’, decelerating only for the more considered ‘Heal’, the latter ably sung by mainman Cedric Pfister.

This is all fine – until Cardinal Black take the stage and put everything into perspective. Guitarist Chris Buck is a guy you’d happily introduce to your mother, and yet at some point he must have made a pact with the devil – where else has that tone, that phrasing, that note-making come from? That exquisite necromancy isn’t even the whole story – it’s really the alchemy between Buck and vocalist Tom Hollister, a man who recently sang a verse at the Royal Albert Hall without a microphone and still sounded great. Tonight, even without usual set highlight ‘Jump In’, theirs is a kind of sensual sound bath; the sort in which you just lie there and soak.

Former RavenEye frontman Oli Brown admits he’s nervous – his new project Oli Brown and the Dead Collective is taking its first steps, and whenever something that’s close to you is revealed to others, there’s understandable tension. All of that dissipates as this powerful trio, strangely without a bassist but boasting Sam Wood (Wayward Sons, Black Star Riders) on second guitar, unleash their epic, deeply felt, consciously emotional rock. A fascinated audience drinks it in. There’s a sense of scale here, a windswept grandeur that elevates every move beyond the ordinary. ‘I Won’t Leave’ and the haunting, multi-part ‘Home Sweet Home’ are tender of melody while being hung heavy in feeling. Early days it may be, but there’s much here to mentally chew on.

And hasn’t that always been the case with headliners Von Hertzen Brothers? It’s rare for humble gig reviewers to receive assistance from the stage, but tonight it happens. “It sucks that we’re so hard to categorize,” concedes frontman Mikko von Hertzen, “so if you’re going to describe us on social media, please call us ‘epic rock’.” With their usual wry sense of humour, and happy absorption in the fact that they can make just about anything happen on stage, the Finnish epic rockers rock out in epic fashion.

They’re fascinating to watch, with Mikko’s bro Kie sometimes hunching over hand drums to tap out percussive beats with two guitars simultaneously strapped around his shoulders. Then they’ll go from the heart-breaking slowburn of ‘All Of A Sudden You’re Gone’ to exultant, freewheeling pop rockers like ‘New Day Rising’ and ‘Long Lost Sailor’. The latter inspires the ever-sanguine Mikko to recall a trip to local hostelry The Jolly Sailor, Porthcawl’s oldest pub. Good cheer and unorthodox tune-wizardry inspire similar positivity from this packed venue, and the Von Hertzens sail off to their next stop in a happy storm of reflected smiles. Yes Mikko, epic.

SUNDAY:

After early risers have attempted to revive their grey matter via Bernard Doherty’s well received rock quiz, Sunday openers Silverkord are sadly without their bassist, but display “balls of steel” to fulfil their slot. With lurgee-ridden frontman Will Miles somehow evoking vocal comparison with the great, late Chris Cornell, the band’s lurching, grinding alt metal isn’t typical Winter’s End fare. That, though, is one of the great things about events like this – the chance to absorb styles, perhaps even entire genres, that you might not otherwise have considered.

Then it’s local band WYNT who bring a different iteration of modern rock to the stage. Underpinning that, buried deep in their DNA, are more classic flavours, a touch of the Allman Brothers maybe, or The Marshall Tucker Band. They’ve got beautiful guitar tones, and dreamy songs that reflect on lost friends (‘Wonderful Life’) or bite back at those who devalue the arts (‘What About Us’). More performances of this quality and you can swap the word ‘band’ in ‘local band’ for ‘heroes’.

Winter’s End gets its blues shades on next – but The Zac Schulze Gang aren’t moping about lost love; their take on blues rock tears around with its arse on fire. ‘Ballyshannon Blues’ is a zesty walkin’-the-dawg rumpus, while a cover of ‘Going Down’ salutes Jeff Beck whose own version did much to popularise this old rock n’ roll standard.

Oh, to think that London rockers The Karma Effect nearly slipped under the radar! That’s because they first unfurled their banner in that terrible year of 2020, the annum that no educated time traveller would dream of visiting. Yes, occasionally you will come across rock characters as compelling as frontman Henry Gottelier and guitarist Robbie Blake – but those occasional characters are already in a band called Rival Sons, so it sure doesn’t hurt to have some more. ‘Testify’ and ‘Steal Your Heart’ transform Winter’s End into a clapping, singing, smiling nirvana – watch this band go.

After the traditional late afternoon break, which allows those staying on site some time to freshen up or grab some food, slide guitar supremo Troy Redfern, the coolest dude in this or just about any house, rips into his crowd-pleasing set. Ably accompanied by bassist Keira Kenworthy, ‘Sweet Carolina’ and ‘Come On’ hump their way in via libidinous rhythms with every other moment sandblasted by Troy’s visceral six-string sneer. Latest single ‘The Fever’ brings swathes of coruscating slide and the killer hook that has unsurprisingly landed it on Planet Rock’s playlist. ‘Waiting For Your Love’, from 2021 album ‘The Fire Cosmic’ brings yet more swagger, Mr Redfern’s sound so loaded with groove you could lose your phone down the middle of it.

People in the audience pause to exchange ‘are you seeing this?’ looks when Keith Xander rips out the first of many solos during his performance fronting Xander and the Peace Pirates. He plays using a plectrum held in place by a prosthetic limb – you think it can’t be possible till you see it for yourself. “Clap hands if you’ve got them,” is how our genial host introduces ‘Fire’. His band are a soul-inclined retreat from heft and pace, with ‘Rain’ in particular sounding as gentle and cleansing as its subject matter can be in high summer. Their cover of Prince classic ‘Sign O’ The Times’ sees them extend an already funky backbone, and like most great things in life, the end comes all too soon.

After such calm comes the storm, tonight breaking in the form of The Virginmarys. Eliciting an almost unbelievably huge noise for a duo (singer/guitarist Ally Dickaty and drummer Danny Dolan), they play Winter’s End as if someone is standing at the side of the stage pointing a gun at them, daring them to slow down. It’s all or nothing, and in full flight it’s majestic. Perhaps they’re the Mötorhead of punk (although arguably Mötorhead were the Mötorhead of punk), piledriving through the full frontal ‘Lies Lies Lies’ and ‘Devil Keeps Coming’. Dolan even occasionally rises from his drum stool, simply to smash his cymbals that little bit harder. Despite this rage, blue-haired frontman Ally is endearingly humble between songs, and quite taken aback it seems by the reaction. You’re welcome.

It feels like a family affair when headliners Kris Barras Band bring everyone together, rounding out what has been a memorable, funny and at times emotional weekend. Kris and his cohorts, now including new bassist Frazer Kerslake, have never sounded more honed or professional, and with last album ‘Death Valley Paradise’ having dented the charts, they’re also now equipped with their best ever set of songs. This is date 11 of a 28-stop tour of the UK and Ireland – nobody can accuse them of not touring ‘properly’ – and from this roadwork emerges a performance from a band that’s perfected its art.

The big songs are all there, the sinewy, hard rock muscle of opener ‘Hail Mary’ and ‘Dead Horses’, but the consistent brawn doesn’t prevent Kris from speaking with great candour about his late father, who sadly died aged just 54, not living to see his son’s success in music. ‘Watching Over Me’, dedicated to him, is accompanied by a sea of raised phone lights, and the cathartic, hugely hooked ‘My Parade’ seems like a final, determined salute both to those lost and to all we hold dear. Same time next year anyone?

Winter's End 2023 in photos:

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• winter's end
• elles bailey
• von hertzen brothers
• kira mac
• kris barras
• kris barras band
• troy redfern