All Points East 2024: Day 4

Another year, another stacked edition of All Points East. After running the gauntlet of brand activations, drinking my body weight in complimentary Coke Zeros, and failing to claim a free White Claw sweater, I’m more than ready to get stuck in. All around the site there’s a specific kind of exhilaration in the air - the type that occurs when a promised deluge has failed to materialize.

I’ve been burned by Frank Black and his Pixies before. Still, I’m willing to give them another chance, and my forgiving nature is rewarded by a setlist that’s heavy on the classics and mercifully light on anything released in the last decade. The band is playing with more energy than I’ve come to expect from them, and songs like “Velouria” sound like they’re being beamed directly into my skull by a UFO. We could do without the second version of “Wave of Mutilation”, but hey, it’s better than anything off “Indie Cindy”. We even get to hear the band’s cover of “In Heaven” (aka the Lady in the Radiator song from David Lynch’s Eraserhead). A sprightly “Here Comes Your Man” raises the temperature before the embarrassingly sleepy crowd finally rears into life for “Where Is My Mind”.

In the run-up to this year’s festival, the organisers said they’d invested loads into improving the sound quality. For the most part, this claim actually holds up. It’s still a London day festival, so don’t get too excited, but nobody is being done especially dirty by the volume limits this year. Now, if we could only do something about all the chatters…

Having been witness to Jai Paul’s first-ever UK show last year, I’m excited to see how it translates to an outdoor setting and a less partisan audience. I’ll admit to having harboured some reservations in the past (the words “emperor” and “new clothes” spring to mind) but I’ve since been converted. There’s just enough substance behind all the idiosyncratic mystery, and of course, his immense talent as a producer has never been in doubt. Backed by his very accomplished band (with Fabiana Palladino on keys) and sheltering in the shadow of a giant stone monolith, Jai cuts quite an imposing figure on stage. At times it almost seems like he’s channelling the spirit of Prince. The setlist is pretty backloaded, to say the least, but that just makes for an exhilarating crescendo. “Jasmine” (“the ultimate afters song”) casts a bewitching spell and flows into “BTSTU”, reverberating bass shaking the field all the way to the back. Closing things out with “Str8 Outta Mumbai”, Jai sends everyone on their way back to the main stage with the vocal hook ringing in their ears.

Fueled by brandy and soju, we work our way to the front for the headline act, LCD Soundsystem, who have thankfully been granted a proper 2-hour set. They open with “Us V Them”, and it’s immediately clear that they haven’t come to mess around, as their trademark disco ball explodes into life. An early airing of “Tribulations” hits like an armoured tank, while “Oh Baby” is a lovely surprise nestled in the middle of the set. James Murphy takes a moment to acknowledge a friend of the band, Justin Chearno, who died the previous day. “We’re all fucking destroyed. We’re trying our best.” The throbbing synths of “Someone Great” start up, and the band pours out an incredible rendition of their most affecting song.

Any nitpicking to be done? I’m not a huge fan of their “Jump Into The Fire” cover, and it breaks up the momentum of what could have been an incredible final run. But really, this is a top-tier set from a band on fantastic form. A good litmus test of an LCD set is how hard the “Look around you, you’re surrounded” line in “Home” hits, and tonight I see bodies on shoulders and hands in the air everywhere, even paving the way for (polite) mosh pits during “Losing My Edge” and “Dance Yrself Clean”. Artists like The Dare and Fcukers have been jockeying for position in the New York scene, but on this evidence, the reigning champs won’t be giving up their belt any time soon.