gigs & glitter.

The glitter was well and truely hauled back into action last weekend as TRNSMT Festival returned once again to Glasgow Green, and we got to head along to catch some of the best bands around right now!

On Friday afternoon I had the pleasure of having a chat with one of Glasgow’s hottest up & coming bands at the moment – Dead Pony! Straight off the back of their performance, I caught them backstage and had a quick chat about all things inspo, festivals & the future…

Other Friday highlights for me included Tom Grennan & Saint PHNX… we went to catch the end of the Nile Rogers & Chic set after that Dead Pony interview and I won’t lie to you, I didn’t know what to expect, having never seen them live before but WHAT a show they put on. The entire crowd at the main stage was bopping along to all the hits that you’d have no idea that Nile Rodgers had anything to do with if you didn’t know any better. His little anecdotes explaining why each tune was on the setlist gave the crowd an insight into the inner workings of his extensive catelogue.

Friday evening belonged entirely to Sam Fender & Beabadoobea for me; two artists I’ve seen rise up from the smaller stages over the years.

Sam’s set had the whole of Glasgow Green captivated from the moment he set foot on stage. If you’d wanted to be anywhere near the front you had no chance of getting through those crowds – a fiercely loyal fanbase had filled out the front pit in the hours before the set started. Not to worry though, Sam’s no longer a stranger to a massive festival crowd and played a set of dreams to every single person standing in that park.

Beabadoobea headlined King Tuts stage and having last see her play in actual King Tuts, there was an air of full circle about her performance. Full of crowd favourites, and thatttt song that went viral on tiktok. A beaut way to close the first night of the festival’s second biggest stage.

We headed back over to the main stage for Friday’s headliner – Paolo Nutini! A very much anticipated, first offical home town performance in almost eight years! He played a beautiful set, filled with tracks from his new album, ‘Last Night in the Bittersweet’ – which had gone to number 1 in the charts earlier that day. Fan favourites, ‘Jenny Don’t Be Hasty’ & ‘New Shoes’ were woven into a medely with a cover of Teenage Kicks and then Paolo was left alone on the stage with his guitar for a lovely acoustic moment playing ‘These Streets.’

His four track encore included a cover of Don McLean’s ‘Caledonia’ and he had the whole crowd singing along in unison.

Recovering quickly from Friday’s excitement, we made our way back to Glasgow Green on Saturday morning for another packed day full of brilliant music.

Kicking our day off with Dylan’s set on the main stage, a quick run over to the King Tuts Stage to see Retro Video Club & back again for the incredible Griff’s set – the day was off to an extremely good start, with all three acts providing stellar, crowd pleasing performances. I’m fully obsessed with Griff at the moment, and getting to see her play ‘Shades of Yellow’ on a massive stage in the sun was a whole moment! Wet Leg have taken the industry by storm recently, so it was no surprise the main stage was packed out for their stellar set – which you could see they enjoyed every moment of playing.

Nothing could have prepared us for the tidal wave of a crowd that Example brought to the main stage though, and going by his reaction, it was almost unexpected for him too. Appealing to the younger generation of the festival mostly; chants of ‘here we, here we’ were met with ground shaking levels of crowd bouncing!

Medicine Cabinet’s set on the River Stage was definitley one of my most anticipated watches of the weekend & they absolutely did not disappoint. The crowd bounced along from start to end & I caught up with them afterwards…

An almost unexpected Saturday highlight for me was Kennyhoopla. I’ve loved his music for a couple of years now, but hadn’t quite expected the level of energy he brought to his live show! We were absolutely entranced the entire time he was on stage; during his set, he played through my favourites ‘smoke break,’ ‘hollywood sucks’ and ‘estella’ – complete with actual backflip!

Self Esteem & Maximo Park held our attention at the King Tuts stage with brilliant sets to watch with a drink in hand in the glorious sunshine, before the set I was most excited about seeing the whole weekend…

King Tuts was headlined on Saturday night by one of my favourites. Jimmy Eat World took to the stage around 8.30pm and after managing to secure a spot close to the front, we sang our hearts out from the moment they came on stage, until the very last song – ‘The Middle.’ Watching them play ‘Hear You Me’ as the sun was definitely what is described these days as a “core memory” for me!

Having never seen the Strokes live before, I was really excited to see Julian Casablancas take to the stage in Glasgow Green. An excitement he didn’t quite match unfortunately. Their setlist was brilliant, full of fan favourites, but you could tell Casablancas was disappointed with their performance, and the crowd in general – ensuring us he’d rather ‘play the barrowlands next time…’ which I mean, I’d be keen for either way!

The Strokes are a band that have been around for as long as I can remember, can still pull off a headline festival set, filled with absolute bangers; and get away with complaining about it in the process!

Sunday morning saw round two of pealing glitter out of my eyelashes before starting all over again, and we made it to Glasgow Green for round three… with a tad more suncream this time!

Mae Muller was our first stop on the King Tuts stage. An artist I’d heard a few things about, but since seeing her perform live, I’ve listened to more and more of. Alfie Templeman took to the stage after her set, in the absolute height of fashion – an actual king tuts tshirt. Spot us all flying over to tuts’ to get our own matching ones in the near future!

Mimi Webb took to a packed out main stage & played hit after hit. ‘House on Fire’ popped off in the sunshine and she bounced straight off of the stage into the crowd to have a wee party along at one point. You could see the sheer joy in her face the entire way through the pop-tastic set. Bets on her selling out the hydro in a few years time!

A failed attempt to get anywhere back near the king tuts stage, had us watching Jamie Webster from a bit of a distance, but I’m glad we perservered because out popped Brooke Combe for a live version of their collab cover of Talking Heads!

Sunday evening for me, was centred around seeing Wolf Alice play the main stage, but before we got to that, Australian band, DMA’s – who are no strangers to the festival & mental Glasgow crowds – rocked onto the stage to a massive, excited, welcome. Playing through a set of crowd favourites, complete with a cover of Cher’s ‘Believe,’ Tommy, Matt & Johnny had the crowd in the palms of their hands for the entire set.

My favourite set of Sunday began shortly afterwards, as Ellie Roswell & the rest of Wolf Alice took to the stage. We’d secured our spot in the pit at the front and the excitement buzzed through the crowd. Having seen the band live a few times before, I knew the set would be a blinder no matter what, but they blew the whole crowd away, playing through tracks from older albums, and the newer album – Blue Weekend. From seeing them play an early, start of the day slot, at 2018’s TRNSMT to seeing them pack out the main stage before the festival weekend headliner was a massive step and you could tell the band were grateful to be in the situation they are now… having also just played the likes of Glastonbury.

The crowd was rowdy for the bouncy tracks, and stood enchanted by the quieter ones. Rounding off their set with their biggest hit to date – ‘Don’t Delete the Kisses’ – the band left the stage to massive cheers and applause.

Sunday’s headliner was Glasgow’s own, much loved, Lewis Capaldi! Again, if you’d wanted to be anywhere near the front for this, you should probably have started camping on the Tuesday before.

There was no chance of getting close to the Bathgate superstar, but not to worry, his jokes and anecdotes could be heard around the festival with ease.. never mind the tracks themselves. The crowd sang along to every word and his set ended the festival with an explosion of fireworks at the end of ‘Someone You Loved.’

TRNSMT 2022 was a music packed, glitterfest of a weekend and Glasgow is the perfect home for it! Roll on next year!!