As Sweet as HoneyFest!

Imagine, it’s only just eight pm on the opening day of Honey-Fest at the legendary Barge on HoneyStreet, and the haystack-filled marquee is already positively pumping, largely due to the energetic hoedown of Bristol’s Mr Tea and the Minions……

Too tempting not to, a double whammy with Devizes’ homemade upcoming marvels, Nothing Rhymes With Orange opening, I made a pit stop at HoneyStreet to black my nose and didn’t really want to leave!

I was intrigued as to where the £125 weekend ticket stub would go in comparison to an atypical weekend at the Barge, which, face it, is usually a mini festival itself! Though there’s no colossal stage erected, the sizable marquee makes for an apt music area, as in past events. Though this weekend there’s extra concentration angled at creating an appealing non-stop lineup for the entire weekend and as the ticket includes camping too, it is justifiable. Though, day tickets available on the gate are priced at a far more reasonable tenner; given these factors Honey-Fest is a must for the hedonistic alternative, and you will be guaranteed an amazing bank holiday weekend. It didn’t take more than half-hour for me to acknowledge this!

The Barge ends up being the spiritual home of anyone who passes through, a magic which holds in the air surrounding it. Though, if it has been this way for decades, what Lenny and his team have created recently, is the kind of environment we, as regular attendees since the nineties, would have wished it to be like back then. Ergo, Honey-Fest is a win-win, a festival within a campsite and wharf surrounded pub, which already hails the spirit of counter-culture festivals of yore, anyway!

And I couldn’t suggest a more apt act than the astoundingly fantastic Mr Tea & The Minions, I told them on Facebook they’d love the Barge, a no-brainer indeed. A headline act, I’d say, but scheduled early to fit their agenda, it was back to Bristol then onto a festival in Kent, followed by a trip to Guernsey for another.

They first came to my attention seeking out alternative forms of ska when doing a regular slot on Boot Boy Radio, an internet station designed to appease Two-Tone diehards. A desire to expand the agenda of the show from simply being retrospective led to me discovering South American ska, and Balkan. The latter so crazy and energetic, a mix of ska’s offbeat and oompah and brassy Truba, and their folk. It is a recipe certain to rub off internationally. I became aware of Bristol’s burgeoning scene, bands like the Smerins Anti-Social Club and Carny Villains and was already aware of the Scrumpy & Western folk flavour of The Boot Hill All Stars, et al. Aside the name Mr Tea & The Minions amused me, their sound was an instant love, for while others blend the influences of west country folk and Balkan ska, most adapt swing into the melting pot, or just fly off the handle of carefree loops of instrumental nuttiness. Here is a band composing structured songs with narrative within those confounds, most definably ska-folk, often amusingly but always with purpose, while still maintaining the infectious high-energy tomfoolery. I soon hurried off a review of their album Mutiny in 2019.   

Over the moon when Loz booked them for Devizes Street Festival last year, I roamed the Market Square excitedly ordering everyone to watch them, and they did, and they agreed, if I remember rightly! Gladdened they came out with the title track to Mutiny at HoneyFest and done a sublime rendition of Junkyard Lovesong from the album, but greater pleased to hear some new songs, like their latest single Twitchy Feet, and a swinging self-stylised finale cover of The Bloodhound Gang’s Bad Touch, which simply rained fun. Here is the liveliest, friendliest six-piece family band with the structure and proficiency to command any age to a dancefloor I know of locally; what an amazing start to Honey-Fest, leaving me pondering, if this is an intro, what was yet to come.

Though none of this occurred before young singer-songwriter Marley begun musical proceedings at 4pm, which unfortunately I was still polishing off some beans on toast at home for, and followed by our favourite Devizes band, the utterly awesome Nothing Rhymes with Orange, which, since missing their stint on Fantasy Radio on Thursday, was what I was making a beeline Pewsey direction for. In fact, last time I did catch them it was also here at The Barge, an intended and worthwhile detour homebound from MantonFest.

That time though they were wedged in the corner of the bar and raising its roof. Here in the marquee the sound mechanics would be greater, yet they would need to overcome the niggly issue Elijah was Lost-Voice Guy for the evening! Though they prevailed, the charismatic frontman persisted, and Sam Briggs filled in too, as unperturbed they produced their collection of beguiling indie-rock originals, including their latest creation, Cats Eyes, and wowed the audience young and old, varying degrees of hippies, tipi glampers, passing druids, the odd stilt walker and every other charming and fun oddity who will pass by you at the Barge, making it such the magic place it is!

But the showstopper was a demanded encore just when Elijah’s voice had all but given up, he asked the audience if anyone knew the words to Sex on Fire, to which a random volunteer affirmed, and Elijah asked she come on stage to assist. And she did, and it was as advertised, on fire. But more importantly, it signifies how this upcoming band are fast becoming accustomed to the spotlight, breaking the fourth wall and dragging the crowds into their banter. Something they could always do in their comfort zone of a loyal fanbase, but to rock up to a varied audience like the Barge, isn’t so simple. Their performance was in short, the essence of a blossoming phenonium.

But of course, this was all but the very beginnings of HoneyFest, and if so, the whole shebang will wow you. Hats off to the team at the Barge, not just for staging this particular extravaganza, but for the many wonderful memories there and how they’ve maintained this spirit, supported our local live music circuit and created this divine pocket of resistance from the surrounding cliquey conventional area. There’s food wagon, there’s a toy and clothes swap tent, there’s magical art displays, and crazy street theatre type crazies, but as I said, it may not be as hugely altered from the standard ethos of a weekend camping at the Barge as it could be, but it’s welcoming, it’s as wonderful as the Barge has ever been, and if it isn’t broken……

To conclude my findings, look, we’re overloaded with things to do this bank holiday, I know, it’s gone bonkers, but if you’ve no plans for tonight, this place could have your name all over it, and if not, here’s hoping there’s more annual HoneyFests. Failing any of those, of course, any weekend at The Barge is a blessing and whole heap of fun; forever recommended with festival jester’s hats on and bells on.

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