ABERFELDY FESTIVAL

Verious venues, Aberfeldy

Star rating: * * * *

Its set-up is perhaps atypical compared to a more traditional music festival, given that the guests performed in the day time open air amidst a small craft market on the town square and then during an extended concert at the Town Hall in the evening, but it’s a cosy format which was thoroughly welcomed in the cold, crisp November air.

Selected by crime novelist 
and noted fan of contemporary Scots music Ian Rankin, the 
line-up was excellent.

Friday night saw Edinburgh’s Meursault and two of Chemikal Underground’s finest artists Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat and the Phantom Band play, while Saturday was a mini Fence event, the Fife label and gigging collective having apparently chosen to forego their Flamin’ Hott Loggz event of Guy Fawkes’s night last year to 
crash someone else’s party.

The gang were all here, with a full band set from Withered Hand and the acoustic Kid Canaveral warming the frosty air during the day, and appearances by Fence capo Pictish Trail, hauntingly minimal folk singer Rozi Plain and noisy art-rockers FOUND in the evening.

As exemplified by King Creosote’s Saturday night headline set – played by 11 people and a lively affairs, far removed from the delicacy of Diamond Mine – Saturday was just like a typical Fence event, except transposed by about 
75 miles north-west.

Even the ubiquitous branding of whisky firm Dewar’s, a large but local firm, was just another recommendation for the area.