Reading Festival on Sunday, I saw:
Billy Talent - Canada's second best band. Pretty good. You would have thought they had been around for much longer than they have. Every one a good tune. In marked contrast with:
Fall Out Boy - lots of people don't like them anyway because they're emo, but by any standards this was a poor show. They came on ten minutes late, left ten minutes early, played 3 covers, one of which they didn't know the words to, and thought a fat bloke breaking a bottle over his head and then dancing around was quality entertainment. Lame.
Lost Prophets - I'm not so keen on their new stuff, but I saw them at Reading in 2004 and they do know how to get the crowd going with banter and encouraging people to jump and mosh to some tunes that deserve to be jumped to! Last Summer and Last Train were the stand outs from their set.
Nine Inch Nails - Understandably played a lot of new stuff, which does occasionally cross over into 'weird electronic noise' territory. I couldn't help thinking how amazing it would have been to see them when they were touring The Fragile in 2000. They didn't play anything from the Fragile, but did close with Head Like a Hole followed by Hurt, which was just amazing. Probably my second favourite live music moment after seeing Morrissey perform There Is a Light That Never Goes Out.
The Smashing Pumpkins - a nice blend of rock and more mellow moments, accompanied by the usual headliner light show. Did occasionally go a bit prog-rock, but mostly a good mix of the excellent new album with crowd favourites like Tonite, Tonite.
Away from the main stage I also saw
Pull Tiger Tail who were good, and
Sunshine Underground, who I've decided are not really my cup of tea after all. Sorry to have missed
Gallows, but they clashed with NIN so there was no contest...