“Oh, no here we go again.  I’m off my face another mucky weekend”  Dub Pistols – Mucky Weekend

Believe in dreams my friends. OTT reads like a fantasy wish list, where for a few short days, everything you could ever want in a late summer bijou independent festival awaits you. Wonderful chilled people, a fantastically unique location, and a brilliant atmosphere. Do it. Make your own wish list – then tick off the following…

The event is held at Donington Park Farm House in lovely Derbyshire. The farm is heavily diversified, and the festival is held in old farm buildings centred around the old farmyard. Those same farm buildings host a permanent, year-round pub and diner!  No. Really. Now, imagine that your favourite pub held a festival all weekend, packed out with good friends and fellow kindreds, excellently curated, with cracking bands, and splendid food and drink. Also imagine a large, on-site permanent year-round camp site, with excellent shower and toilet block facilities, where the atmosphere is as good as inside the festival.

The festival centres on the large courtyard Marquee Stage and various outbuildings and barns surrounding the courtyard itself (all under cover). The farmyard and stackyard are full of tables and chairs for that alfresco feeling! 2024 even boasted good weather. Don’t forget that the pub building also has a large diner selling a variety of goodies all weekend, including venison (if that’s your bag) from the farm’s own estate. There is a real ale & cider festival, healing zone in the fields, enough stalls and the like, and plenty for the kids. It’s an old cliché of FFA’s – but OTT is really more House Party than festival.

Music wise, 2024 witnessed the likes of the Peatbog Faeries, Dub Pistols, and The Beat taking centre stage, but it’s often in the side stages and lower down the bill that OTT excels. The guys behind OTT have been booking artists for decades, and they consistently manage to serve up a feast of relatively unknown crackers for your delectation. As always, there is an excellent late-night scene across the stages, and the gaff is kicking until the early hours.

But Listen Up, the best festivals are multi-faceted jewels; if you think festivals are solely about the bands – you’ve been going to the wrong festivals. Sure, the crowd, and artists, and location, and facilities, and, and… matter. Course they do. But what turns an event into a wonderful experience is when all those disparate threads magically combine together to form a VIBE.  OTT has it in spades, always has, and with organisers Andy and Boz at the helm, it always will. You can taste it, feel it, touch it as soon as you approach the site. The air crackles, the spine tingles. It’s a rare and wonderful thing. Many established festivals remain little more than bands in a field, as good or as bad as their next line-up. Not OTT.

For this old wizened Reviewer, the one key component that sets OTT apart is its people. From organisers, to helpers, to crowd, one is blessed to spend time with these people. It’s a lovely caring sharing community, and the sense of comradery is so strong it hurts.   The place buzzes. It’s an old school festival experience, but with all the creature comforts. You may travel further, and fair worse, as my old gran used to say. Probably.

We’ve said to before, and we’ll say it again, OTT really is an unsung jewel in the UK festival crown. It’s been like that since 1988, when this show first hit the road.

Our FFA Reviewers thought 2023 was special (Read the FFA Off The Tracks 2023 Review), but our guys thought 2024 managed to better even that for The Vibe. Trust us on this one. This isn’t once a century fantasy Brigadoon – This is a yearly reality at Off The Tracks!

And so… to the wonderful musical malarkey. This Reviewer would constantly propose that at the GREAT festivals, and certainly OTT is up there, the musical offerings are secondary to the scene itself - it’s just one facet of a much bigger festival whole. That’s not to say that OTT’s musical journey is anything but excellent of course. These guys just know how to book and schedule outstanding bands. Year upon year upon year, OTT delivers, and 2024 was no exception. Let’s be honest, this Reviewer knew little of the artists lower down the roster, but in virtually every case, they were frankly outstanding.

Now don’t expect a list, there’s the Programme for that. What follows are some snippets of an excellent musical weekend that took FFA’s fancy. Many fine acts didn’t make the cut – either through space constraints, or, more likely, FFA would be elsewhere, away with the fairies, talking bollox. In fairness, FFA would argue that’s what OTT is all about! We saw plenty. We missed more. This is what worked for us…

Friday

Some bands are festival staples for good reason. A promoters delight. Always value. Always putting on a great show. The Beat ft Ranking Jnr. are such an outfit. The Beat have been working the circuit for decades, but there is no hint of weariness – no going through the motions. There is a twinkling of the eye, a broad smile. These guy love what they do, and its infectious… the gaff was bouncing. Amidst all the mayhem, Ranking Jnr. took time out for a rather moving tribute to his dad. Their shared love of music, the power of the medium to bring joy to the world. They were amongst kindreds at OTT that night. Everything bonded. Artist and audience as one. As it should be. Splendid vibe.

Over to the Black Barn for the Psychedelic Rock Pantomime that is a Babal set. This really is a cracking band. Fine musicians all, but the interplay between Langley’s hypnotic vocals and Williams’s spaced guitar heroics was an absolute delight. It’s been a long seven years since FFA were blessed to see this band live, and ye god’s, they are even better than we remember! A stonking version of ‘Volunteers’ ended a wonderful set of rock & roll theatre. If this band happened to pass you by, then do go and check ‘em out.

Talking of great festival staples; Ladies and Gentlemen, OTT bring you - Dub Pistols. Ashworth and his merry men, unsurprisingly, once again did the business. Ashworth the rabble rouser. Ashworth the showman. The responsive crowd was whipped up into a gyrating frenzy as these guys cut the mustard. An absolutely excellent live band, perhaps even topping the hi-energy shenanigans of the earlier Beat set. The Marquee was rocking as the band laid down a blisteringly skanky version of ‘Boom’, followed up by the somewhat debauched singalong that is ‘Mucky Weekend’. It was noted that Ashworth made the point of praising the independent festival sector in general, and OTT in particular. Fine words from a fine band.

Some things never change, with FFA spending an increasingly blurry and hugely enjoyable few hours buzzing between an excellent Hard Rockin Amigos set in the Stackyard, the delightfully insane Dr Trippy beats in the Black Barn, and some sweet roots reggae of DJ Edgie in the Threshing Barn. OTT Friday nights are always special, but 2024 was one of the best FFA can remember in many a year.

Saturday

There were some great unsigned/lesser-known artists appearing throughout the day on the Dreams Stage, but special note to Phil Cudworth & Boz. Funny, good stage presence, and lovable personalities. But behind all the merriment of this stripped back set, there lies a bedrock of cutting social comment and razor-sharp observation in the lyrics. Top stuff.

FFA caught the Black Pig Morris at various intervals throughout the day with their larger-than-life performances – but you want it dark? Look no further than arguably one of the sets of the weekend from Galdorcraeft. This Reviewer adores what he can’t classify. What are this band – Norse/Celtic mysticism meets Folk-Goth? No idea, but FFA thought them exceptional. Deeply melancholy, and yet hugely uplifting. A mixture of the modern and the ancient in both tone and instrumentation. FFA left dazed and bewildered, but deeply moved by the emotional impact of it all. Delightfully strange and yet another OTT lesser-known outfit to savour. 

The Po’ Boys… get in! Lil Jim’s accordion playing excelled in a fine band, and their home spun Cajun take of ‘No Woman No Cry’ perhaps song of the weekend. Beautiful. The Karma Effect! They’ve got the looks, got the moves, got the style and got the material. They should be massive. What sets them apart from other excellent guitar-based rock bands is the addition of some superb keyboard fills and overlays, generating a richer, fuller soundscape. Saturday was shaping up to be a great day! Oh Lordy – it’s the Roving Crows. Another exceptional band difficult to pigeonhole (always a good thing.). Composed, mature, and happy in their skin, this musically excellent outfit put on a truly splendid show featuring jaw dropping a cappella, pizzicato violin, and stomping Celt infused folk-rock. Throw in a powerful tribute to all those suffering in the ongoing Slaughter of the Innocents in Palestine, and it was all very special indeed, with the heart on yer sleeve ‘Move Over’ taking the absolute biscuit. Yet another contender for band of the festival.

Peatbog Faeries were back for another heady dose of Croft Music. The band had the place jumping with their multi-genre mashups. It was a brilliant OTT atmosphere once again. By the time ‘Folk Police’ kicked in, it was bedlam. A great headliner. FFA lost ourselves for hours in the Silent Disco totally blissed out by a staggeringly good OTT Saturday extravaganza.  

Sunday

The whole day was a triumph of band scheduling. Proving that the OTT organisers know their audience and can read the mood music; Chill Out to start, some Good-Time Rumba & Salsa (yep. That’s right), to up the ante, some belly laughs and general lunacy, then a thumpingly good folk-rock outfit to end the bash on a real high.

String Beats calmed the frayed weekend come-down with some beautiful Indian classical meanderings as the appreciative crowd sprawled on the (carpeted) marquee floor. It really was excellent, and just the ticket. Grupo Lokito’s world music serenade sure got ‘em dancing with Afro-beats and Latino foot stompers. A inspired choice from the OTT schedulers and a splendid band.

The Bar-Steward Sons of Val Doonican ALWAYS entertain. Cue daftness, crowd surfing, and sing-alongs. The Leylines closed the festival with a great set, particularly as orchestrator Mitchell had surrounded himself with some excellent guest musicians, not least Mad Dog Mcrea’s violinist Nicki Powell, who excelled. Some damn fine punky folk-rock and a front man who speaks from the heart.

All that remained was an emotional speech from organiser Boz, championing the independent festival scene, all the good people that make OTT happen, and particularly his partner-in-crime and fellow organiser for nigh on forty years, Andy Cooper, who made a unique on-stage guest appearance (No autographs. Please!). As the man said – a festival is nothing without an audience. This festival IS its crowd. Keeping music live. Keeping the faith. Keeping living the Dream. Ensuring that small independent festivals like OTT not only survive in a tough world, but positively thrive.  Long may it continue.

Article by Barrie Dimond

Photography by the always excellent Mr Graham Whitmore