23/07/06 Too Hot – Air Fusion Festival, Newton Abbot
A baking summer’s day, check, a local festival, check, a green pasture to sit
on, check… now what are we missing? Oh, a ska band to pump up the atmosphere,
and fortunately that’s exactly what we got. Air fusion had various up & coming
bands from the local area and others from further a field (or as the locals say
if its past Exeter its ‘North’), honourable mentions include Morph, The Exiles,
Nixon & The Burn on Saturday while Sunday kicked off with very promising
rock/pop/punk girl band The Four Star Lovers. Also on Sunday, labelled ‘Family
Day’ included Loose Canons, who play a decent selection of multi-genre covers
finishing with Blues Brothers movie hit ‘Everybody…..’. Then came The Toretz who
have a punky style of ska and a good sense of humour, playing tunes such as
‘Dole Cheque’, ‘Your Cleanliness Disgusts Me’. Finishing their set with a chorus
consisting of “Spank spank spank the monkey, Flick, flick, flick the bean” while
it was hilarious, let the parents at the event be thankful for children’s
innocence and naivety!!! Then came the final band of said day, Too Hot, who took
no time at all to whip the crowd into a mob of ska dancing zombies, and as their
set continued the dancing mob grew further. Too Hot played an impressive set
including songs such as ‘A Certain Peace’, ‘Alcohol’ and ‘Time Flies’. As the
set drew to an end, both the band and crowd wanted to continue on, as the
atmosphere was fantastic, but due to legal responsibilities the festival
organisers had a 6:00pm deadline for cut off, and so it came to a close.
Overall, it topped an ever growing local festival very nicely, and there’s no
doubt Too Hot should be invited back next year, the event has potential, given
the right backing and will hopefully grow into more of a Devon based showcase
than it already is, we’ll just have to wait and see next year.
Links….
www.airfusion.org
www.myspace.com/toohotska
www.myspace.com/the4starlovers
www.myspace.com/thetoretz