Almost literally, nothing happened...

Playlist

Cloudland Blue Quartet - Starlightnight

Bischoff - Audio Combine

Bersarin Quartett - II

The Knife - Tomorrow in a Year

Rihm - Piano

Greg Haines - Where We Were

Thomas Koner - Nunatak

Thomas Koner - Teimo

Thomas Koner - Permafrost

Various - Aloud Music Sampler Vol 3

Another beautiful but cold morning...

Out and into it post breakfast...

An hour later than yesterday but I wouldn't be spending said 60 minutes in a queue with vinyl geeks today...

More planes...

Our future street again..

Marchmont...

A likeable chimney...

Russell Square..

Past the top of Tottenham Court Road again...

Down to Seven Dials...

...and on, to Covent Garden...

..and more planes...

Inside, they were still setting up...

...including at Jamie Oliver's restaurant...

Punch and Judy had not yet arrived...

No show without Punch... 

To the National Portrait Gallery, where these impressed...

Out and round to the National Gallery...

...to my favourite part, the Sainsbury Wing...

Back out into the sun...

...and walking "home"...

...via Chinatown...

..and Phonica (with all their sellouts from yesterday), including the VU LP...

A coffee in Soho...

Your correspondent watched the world go by...

On through Russell Square...

..past the British Museum...

...for my sins, I did not go in...

To the hotel just before two and prep for today's nine hour extravaganza...

The stage was set...

First on, Talvihorros - comprising electronics and drum-kit, with the latter being used sparingly until towards the end of the enjoyable hour-long set...

Today was a bit more laid back than yesterday - quite literally for many in the audience, who were lying around the floor for the next two performers, pianist Carlos Cipa on grand piano - shades of Debussy and Satie...

..and James Blackshaw on (mostly open tuned and hence raga stylee) 12 string guitar...

If I'm honest, neither of these provided me with much in the way of excitement or entertainment, although they were both well received by the crowd... 

Greg Haines however was a different story - his use of laptop, grand piano and percussion was superb and he seemed to actually achieve that for which a number of the performers over the weekend were striving - and that was despite the questionable use of a melodica at one point - for me, I'm afraid, one of the most naff and annoying instruments ever invented... 

So good was it in fact that, immediately following the conclusion of his brilliant 60 minute opus, I bought his new album "Where We Were" from the merchandise stand in the foyer...

Thomas Koner was next - I had said to the guys outside that I would wait to hear him before deciding to shell out £20 on one of only three available copies of his rare 3CD set of his albums "Nunatak", "Teimo" and "Permafrost"...

Within a couple of minutes of him starting to play though, I nipped out quickly, bought the set and nipped back for what was my favourite set of the weekend...

Almost literally  - nothing happened - the screen behind him changed image at glacial speed while his soundscape involved minimal movement in volume or tone throughout his performance of his latest album, sadly not available on the night...

So little was happening that the sound man took a break...

Brilliant...

What a glorious beautiful bleak racket Mr K made...

Poppy Ackroyd could only have come as an anti-climax after that but her set of short piano pieces with electronics comprising entirely of samples of her playing or bashing her violin, was still pretty good indeed - in fact much better than I had expected...

Her visuals too were probably the best of the weekend, looking like she'd actually taken some time to put something specific together... 

Out for a break...

...only to find on my return that the audience had been turfed out of the hall while William Basinski, unlike anyone over the entire weekend, kept us waiting an extra half hour while he set his gear up in private...

Once we were finally allowed back in, what followed was an hour of two tape loop based tracks during which nothing really happened...

Which, as with Koner above, is just fine by me...

These appeared to be being created using what looked like the actual tape loops recorded some considerable time ago...

Ironic then that also on his table was an Apple Mac with which he could presumably have created exactly the same pieces...

A certain amountof showmanship then from the Texan, although still entirely enjoyable for anyone (like me) raised on Fripp & Eno's "Evening Star"...

An excellent end to an excellent weekend which went without a hitch apart from the wait for the final act - which meant a few people leaving without hearing Basinski's famous tape loops...

You can find links to every artist who played at the fest here...

I headed back to the hotel and listened to my newly purchased Koner and Gaines discs into the early hours of the morning, a happy bunny indeed...

Highlight of the Day : Koner and Gaines...