Kelburn Garden Party is unequivocally the best small festival in Britain (even the world): a hidden gem on the west coast of Scotland that exceeds expectations year after year. Its first outstanding feature is its location. Nestled in the Kelburn Estate, with its 1,000-year-old trees, waterfalls and idyllic views over the islands of Cumbrae and Arran, there are few festivals that can compete with walking through the surroundings of one of the oldest and most colourful castles in Scotland. Art exhibitions pepper the “Neverending Glen”, and the Thursday before the festival began in earnest was the perfect time for a sunny sneak peek at Kirsten Tingle’s eerie human mycelium sculptures (which had bulbously bloomed by the end of the festival) and Neve Pearce’s interactive tree puppet, Gronto.
Kelburn’s equally exceptional feature is, of course, its music: perfectly curated stages around the beautiful site bristling with every imaginable genre. With Friday afternoon remaining clear, a hike up to the Boat on the Hill stage was a must. Dancing to Glasgow DJ duo Lezzer Quest’s queer electro euphoria while gazing out across the Firth of Clyde on a giant tugboat is an unusual thrill. New stage Giant’s Castle, set in the grounds of the Secret Forest (a children’s maze like no other), was spookily spectacular, as Italo house DJ Peeve set the ramparts alight. While Kelburn is well known for its EDM, rock and punk have started to make more of an appearance. The main Square stage welcomed Edinburgh funk rockers Bikini Body and eco-punk outlanders Snapped Ankles, both of whom never fail to win over a crowd. Meanwhile, the Skinny’s Pyramid stage hosted breakout punk grungers Soapbox for the best mosh pits of the festival, as bodies slid around (safely!) in the gathering mud to “Private Public Transport Sucks!”.
But the wildest moment came when live techno ravers Dogshow, while playing synth and drums in a cart-cage, asked the crowd to spin them around. The result was bizarre: two circle pits erupted around the moving cage, a chaotic human whirlpool that even the band themselves hadn’t anticipated. A chiller time was had with alt-trap Glasgow DJ Iso Yso, who kept the Saloon raving amid Wild West-themed children’s slides. At the Landing – Kelburn’s largest stage for dance music – Jen Cardini’s global beats blew revellers away, from the front of the stage all the way to the colossal log that provides the perfect vantage point of the dancefloor.
Saturday dawns somewhat wetly, so Glasgow DJs Duende and their tropical reggaeton at the Boat are the perfect rejoinder, unless you’re waylaid first by Mungo’s Hi Fi’s incredible secret set in the small surroundings of the Hometown Corner jungle tent. The furthest-away stage in the glen, the Beech Plateau, is the next place to catch techno legend Neil Templar, despite stomping in deep mud to get there.
Coming down from the glen, it would usually be time for a swim, as the deep pools littered along the river (the Kel Burn) are a haven for wild swimmers. This year, the wild weather (caused by two heatwaves either side of the festival that turned the estate from a temperate to a tropical rainforest) means the river is too high for such shenanigans. But despite this, the spirit of Kelburn never dampens.
That spirit is awoken once more when Joshua Idehen, the standout new act of the festival, makes his debut. Political spoken word overlaying house beats (alongside eclectic dance moves that keep the crowd engaged and dancing throughout) is a tricky balance to strike without instruments or even much singing. Idehen, however, does not blink, cruising through his set. “Your Mum Does the Washing” is the absolute highlight, but his crowd-pleasing Talking Heads cover of “Once in a Lifetime” gets hips shaking too.
Other Saturday night-time highlights include indie rockers Tina Sandwich, brass beauties Esa’s Afro-Synth Band at the Viewpoint — another jaw-droppingly pretty stage — and, amusingly, Folkcore DJs at Sheela’s Tent, who fuse happy hardcore with Celtic favourites like “Rattlin’ Bog”; very appropriate for the bog encroaching outside said tent.
Sunday squelches into view with little let-up from the rain, which means it’s time to explore all the wonderful indoor places Kelburn has to offer, including cabaret and music tents, cafés (with real toilets!), and the Blundabus. In the early afternoon, the Blundabus is an unhinged jam tent where shelterers from the rain are press-ganged into playing instruments they don’t know how to hold. This chaos is charming, as one punter sings in an operatic voice: “We’re all in a jacuzzi, we don’t care about the weather…”
Meanwhile, baile funk DJs Femme45’s uplifting rhythms and Bemz’s talented hip-hop are the perfect way to enjoy the sliver of sun on offer later. Sunday night is folk night at Kelburn, meaning anyone who leaves early has sorely missed out on some of the most innovative trad tunes on offer. Here, electro-trad act Valtos are the stand-outs of the festival, drawing a packed-out Square stage as it pours with rain – no easy feat, as shown by how this poor reporter’s phone got so wet during the set that it broke and left them without one for a week! Valtos’s Celtic EDM though never lets up throughout. Perhaps the band had planned to play slower, haunting songs like “Beinn” about reclaiming the Gaelic language, but seeing the rain they went high-energy from the start, with “Ceòl Dannsa” and Peatbog Faeries’ electro-trad cover “Marx Terrace” sending the crowd bouncing. With plenty of shout-outs to the Scottish energy of partying despite the weather, and the world, it was the perfect way to end the main stage.
But Sunday’s other standout act had to be Huartan in Sheela’s. A radical Irish Heilung, fusing Celtic paganism with electronica, this act is a festival must, and one to watch. Finally, is it really a Scottish festival if Mungo’s Hi Fi don’t close it out? Ending by mixing “Rules of the Dance” with Fatboy Slim’s “Born Slippy”, the soundsystem crew never disappoint, and never fail to leave us wanting more.
It was a cruel twist of fate that the first sell-out Kelburn since before the pandemic was also the wettest Kelburn for many years. But the organisers, the bands and the ticket holders refused to let that spoil another magical revel in the glen. In Joshua Idehen’s words: “Don’t let it get you down” — and no one did. One festival-goer (just returned from a sweltering festival on the continent) remarked upon how preferential the rain was to the heatstroke-inducing conditions seen abroad, where bands play during the day to a few people huddled in a tiny bit of shade. With the climate oscillating between a burning laser in the sky and monsoon season, you could do far worse than visiting a shady forest on the west coast of Scotland for an amazing time with the most indomitable people.
Yes, we have our tickets for next year already.