Lewsberg | M.U.G. | Waterschade | Elias Elgersma | Dishes
Winsummerfest, Various Venues, Winsum
13th July 2024
Richard Foster ends up in the deepest, darkest Groningen countryside to watch the bright lights in the new Dutch punk wave and Rotterdam’s Lewsberg play their last show (for now).
Winsum, a village just north of the city of Groningen, is not the first place that springs to mind for an alternative music festival. Winsum was voted the prettiest village in the Netherlands a few years back. Here, churches and windmills are the order of the day. On the day of the festival, Winsummerfest goers and church-hopping fans, both on their respective weekend pilgrimages eye each other up uneasily, dodging showers that can only be described as Biblical…
“It used to be just a few local bands in a pub, now it’s changing fast into something else.”
That’s the view expressed by a number of heads in the Jolly Cat pub, which hosts two of Winsummerfest’s stages. Apparently, Winsummerfest is that good, it’s in danger of becoming trendy. City types from – clutch your pearls – Amsterdam are here. They jostle round the members of Amsterdam’s Naive Set and throw uneasy glances around this classic bruin café. Maybe they feel marked out for some Wicker Man-style ritual later in the night. There are a lot of gauche and louche Rotterdammers here too, no surprise as M.U.G., Lewsberg, AC Berkheimer and Library Card are slated to play.
Amazingly, given the size of the festival and a number of line up clashes, I missed out on what are reported to be great sets by Autorijdend Nederland, Library Card and AC Berkheimer – and all the metal I wanted to see, which is unforgivable. Groningen’s music scene, famously bohemian, demands I catch up with members of long-lost and legendary Grun bands like Vox Von Braun, Propellor, KIN and Krontjong Devils. I lose hours.
The Dutch punk scene has been on something of a roll recently. It’s a very diverse, young and seemingly endless scene full of pissed-off freaks who just want a roof over their heads, world peace and a chance to dismantle the suffocating, small-minded boredom that rules this increasingly dull country. The sounds range from no-holds-barred diehard punk and noise acts to those who could be seen as more power pop. It’s also a phenomenon that is already getting marketed as something it’s not. Luckily, we have the likes of Waterschade and M.U.G., both of whom rip up the De Hoogte Klein stage in sweaty displays of bravado and humour. Waterschade are from Haarlem and don’t mess about. The vox, screamed out in a high register, builds pressure brilliantly against the relentless tub thump of the drums and low buzz of the guitars. Waterschade are great at giving orders; the crowd may as well be a rookie platoon being square bashed into the dust by a mad and FEMtastic sergeant major.
Somewhere in the press of bodies, Waterschade.
M.U.G. are a fabulous live act, maybe a heavier, grungier take on the attitude Tedje en de Flikkers would spit out back in the 1970s. There’s a fair bit of cabaret in their punk marching music; and singer Timo Croes – late of legendary Roffa punks Pig Frenzy – isn’t afraid to make everything into one huge mosh. Middle-aged villagers and grotty young punks oblige. At times the sound shifts between a glam-smeared Sweet-like punk and low-rent MC5 rock. Timo’s gravel-spattered voice barks out orders all the way through: it’s perfect for the band’s stomping beat and clashing guitars.
Elsewhere, radical punx Dishes put on a great show in the Jolly Cat; plenty of vim and vigour courses through the rhythm and lead guitar lines, the tempo is kept upbeat and the lyrics – dealing with the all-round heaviness of the world we live in – manage to stay appealing and insightful. Good stuff. Much later on we manage to catch the last 5 minutes or so of Paracetemøl in the Jolly Cat, who, on this evidence, make an enjoyably spaced-out slush of various Hawkwind and punk-metal riffs. It’s intense, and I am intrigued.
Those wearing soft shoes and scarves get their musical kicks from a number of more established names. The Homesick’s Elias Elgersma plays a glorious set of dismembered electronic chanson in the organic wine bar* known as De Kleine Kapper. The spaced-out sounds made by his tableful of gadgets populate the spaces between Venus, Mercury and Brian Wilson’s brain. Elgersma pulls some shapes and cuts some rug. His shirt becomes somewhat looser. A small gaggle of young, well-appointed Groningen kroegtijgers ogle approvingly and bounce around to the beat.
Over in the Green Cat, Naive Set lay down a set of sparkling pop songs, shot through with sehnsucht. The beat bounces along here, too, creating a light but firm base for the pleasing soufflé whipped up by the guitars. Singer Mikey Casalaina’s melancholy dreaming is really something to behold, parts Veedon Fleece Van Morrison, part I, Jonathan. The new album songs sound complex and sinewy, like galvanised steel wire.
Time for Lewsberg’s last show with their current line up. Bassist Shalita Dietrich and drummer Marrit Meinema are leaving, making space to continue their other, fabulous, musical projects. It’s not the first time Lewsberg have had a lineup change; I think this is the fourth iteration of the band. Still; it’s a sad occasion, though, typically, co-singer Arie Van Vliet acknowledges the fact with a display of polite, oud-Hollandse reserve. Their dry, observant music sounds more atmospheric than previous, and at times it is almost anthemic as slow burners such as ‘Cold Light of Day’ snake along the rafters.
The classic village hall-style setting of De Hoogte really suits their waspish-but-generous, Modern Lovers tub-thumping. Dietrich’s bass throbs and thrums, and Meinema somehow conjures vast hinterlands out of the most basic of drum fills. Dietrich and Van Vliet’s commentaries are brilliant cosplays of two people looking out from behind the net curtains and cursing the world. No band does “analysis” better than Lewsberg. Throughout, Michel Klein’s guitar runs, alternately pearlescent and screeching, bore holes in the room’s infrastructure, like some annoyed kid carving his name on a tree trunk. As befits the band’s raison d’etre, there is no real compromise on material, the latest record Out And About is front and centre in their set, and understated beauties like ‘Without A Doubt’ get an airing. We do get a few oldies like ‘The Corner’ and ‘Through The Garden’ at the set’s end, and people sway and bop in a mildly defiant manner. I miss the encore (‘Terrible’) but I am betting they’ll be back.
(*Yes, sorry.)
All words and pictures by Richard Foster. More writing by Richard can be found at his author’s archive. Richard runs the Museum of Photocopies.
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