11

A Great British Hit Machine

This year was my fifth V, and every year there is a classic indie act appearing in a prominent place on the line up. Echo and the Bunnymen, Inspiral Carpets and The La's have all filled this role in previous years, and in 2007, the nostalgia trip was provided by reformed Manchester indie hit machine James.

In the time allowed it would be impossible to please everyone given the size of the James back catalogue of singles, but for the most part this was a well balanced collection of instantly recognisable hits and lesser known fan favourites. The absence of 'She's A Star' may well have disappointed some however.

'Born of Frustration' opened the set, followed by 'Tomorrow'. Then, somewhat surprisingly they played 'Sit Down', it's almost accepted that a monster hit like this should be left for the end but James got it out of the way early. The odd one or two left having heard the one song they knew and seemed happy to ignore the countless more great tracks they would miss, for the rest of us this would turn out to be one of day 1's highlights.

'Ring My Bell' came halfway through, and is hugely popular with the James die-hards, although made an almost non-existent impact on the singles chart. They also took time out during the middle of the set to mention the Manchester music legend Tony Wilson, who died of a suspected heart attack earlier this month.

As the set drew to it's close the big guns came out in the form of 'Getting Away With it', 'Laid' and the mighty 'Sometimes'.

The indie club classic 'Come Home' brought this gig in the rain to a triumphant end, and James departed having left a lot of people with massive smiles on their faces. How long this reunion last's remains to be seen, but it's been fun so far.