ATP I'll Be Your Mirror 2012: Orc 'n' Roll

The hottest day of 2012 so far brought an army of Orcs marching up the hill from the little rail station to its Mordor for the evening (Alexandra Palace - Day 1 of ATP's I'll Be Your Mirror). Oh, if only Mr Tolkien had thought of dressing Sauron's grotesque footsoldiers in Slayer t-shirts. It was a spectacular sight, and the two old blokes having a quiet game of pitch-and-putt obviously thought the same - they put their clubs down to watch the grim procession go by.

Napalm Death - on a bumbag. Honestly.

You can't really argue with Slayer. They do what they say on their thrash tin - loud, relentless, juggernaut metal. I've not seen hair windmilling at a gig for years. The last time was the Metalhammer Awards - we were invited guests on a pirate ship down the Thames (true), had to wear an eye patch to gain access to editor Alex Milas's private party (scary but true), where the lovely viking rockers Amon Amarth gave the best display of hair windmilling I've ever seen (completely true). I think this was the night that my pal Blondie patted Kerry King on his head. She patted King Slayer on his bald head. Blondie got balls.

King of The Orcs.

(I qualify windmilling as 'hair windmilling' because windmilling has many connotations, and only some of them relate to Mick Channon's famous football celebrations of the 1970s. Some of my other faves are right here: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=windmilling)

The second day of ATP became hijacked by football, with Huddersfield Town's visit to Wembley for the League 1 play-off final. A valiant attempt to heighten our home town's footballing achievements, gaining us access to playing teams in the Championship (bring on Millwall). In true HTFC fashion, it went to extra time, penalties, sudden death, then their goalie missed, ours scored. Triumph. Apparently, New Wembley has no pies but you can get a pizza with rocket on it, which Washy suggested was all "a bit bent".

Leaving the footy euphoria behind, my Day Two highlight was seeing Aidan Moffat and Bill Wells. Aidan Moffat is a wordsmith. He has a truly excellent beard. And he introduced one of his songs thus: "This song's about children. Cunts that they are." Aidan - marry me. (I saw him in the crowd later on. I think I may have told him I loved him, but I'm not really sure. Perhaps I just said "you were really great earlier".)

Oh, Aidan. You shouldn't have.

Following a large dose of Mogwai's wall of sound antics, my aching feet and I were heading off for sleepytime when I bumped into lovely John Doran of Quietus. He tells me his children (who I'm sure Mr Moffatt doesn't include in his aforementioned description of small folks) listened to a lot of Mogwai whilst in the womb and he thinks that's why they're so calm. Nothing to do with having a big, gentle Treebeard for a Dad at all, I'm sure.

When Day Three dawns, the scorching weather is clearly here to stay, and none of us have the oomph to be inside when there's lazing around to be done. What started as a party of six has dwindled to two, and the two are struggling to do anything other than lie on the grass, and look up at a stunning blue sky and the majesty of Ally Pally.

We manage a spot of Tall Firs (good) and Sleepy Sun (also good). And then there was one.

Being the last (wo)man standing came as a surprise. But I rose to the challenge by taking in a bit of The Make-up - WTF?!? Quite honestly, I wasn't really aware of The Make-up in the 90s, so definitely wasn't prepared for the preacher-man-Billy-Graham-meets-James-Brown antics of Ian Svenonius. He's fascinating to watch - I half-expected a spot of speaking in tongues.

Quite some finale followed - red velvet drapes are hoisted, an enormous mirror ball is positioned centre-rig, and The Afghan Whigs take the stage in a blaze of soulful rock glory. Greg Dulli is a superb frontman - a louche man-in-black, and the fella has some belting pipes on him. It's a Greatest Hits set, and when they finish with a rendition of 'Faded' which segues into Prince's 'Purple Rain', I find myself singing along with a high-pitched 'whoo-hooo-hooo-hooo".

It's a superb ending, and I know I've witnessed something pretty special, and I'm pleased and proud to still have the prerequisite staying power at my ripe old age.

Then, I went home for my Ovaltine.