Waterpop 2013: Holland's got talent!

For the first time I went to the Waterpop free festival in Wateringen, a village close to The Hague. Drawn by Sunday Sun, the band that featured regularly on this blog in the second half of 2012. The weather was not good and not bad, overcast and the temperature moderate and fine for a festival. The road to Wateringen was easy to drive and parking as close as a few 100 meters from the park. Things could be a lot worse.

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I arrived, led by the music in the distance with the sunny sounds of Jon Tarifa. Funky soul played in a modern way with a lot of people on stage, two background singers and Jon singrapping to to us. To heighten the festivities, it was his 30th birthday, so the whole band wore partyhats. Not my kind of music, but played supple and well. A band to check out if you like this sort of thing.

Sunday Sun was on next. But first I have to make a compliment to the logistics and sound. Each act  followed the next swiftly on another stage. Hardly any waiting at all, while the sound was perfect for an open air festival. From the start of each gig and that is something I have never heard before. Always tweaking was necessary and here it only took taking the bassdrum of The New Shining down later in the day. Chapeau people at Waterpop!

Sunday Sun delivered as I had hoped they would. The perfect pop melodies were well played and well sung. The two, three and four piece harmonies went down perfect. Sunday Sun has made three excellent EPs in 2012 and is able to play them live just as good as on record. With hits like 'Everybody knows', 'Ordinary love', 'Now is now' and 'Don't want to lose you now', things can't go wrong. Still, and I have to mention this, the band has to work on its stage presence. It's a bit chaotic and at times not positive. Trust on the quality of the songs, they do the work for you. For the rest, tops.

Jungle by Night surprised me most, I guess. Nine super young kids making music that holds a mix of Santana, U.S. funk-soul bands of the 70s, African rhythms, jazzy improvisations and energy. Loads of it. This is music I would never play at home, as I can't even take Santana in in large quantities. At Waterpop I started out quiet sceptic and found myself starting to move to songs called 'Kiwi' or 'Cyclin''. Warm organ and Hammond organ sounds, a high end funky guitar, deep end bass and drums. Two percussionists and three horns doing most of the spectacular stuff. Some outspoken and some laidback members, but as a whole they got soul. Great fun.

The most chaotic show came from Hausmagger, but it's intended this way. A super young (well, from a distance) rhythm duo. A hippie, hard rocker lead guitarist and, yes, well, what? A streetpoet, declarator, foul-mouth, hoarse singer. It was loud, punky, rocky, with ultra short poems/jokes in between. All read from scraps of paper as the singer was not one to know lyrics by heart.  It all didn't matter, Hausmagger came and won. Lyrics are all Dutch, sorry one Deutsch, and e.g. are a perfect diabolic reverse of "You walk like an angel": "You walk like a gay". It all ends with "But I don't care, because we are friends". Girlfriends that left the singer lead to very direct translations of his feelings. "I feel #@$%". And still, some of the melodies could allow Hausmagger to be played on national radio. Hausmagger is something special. There's no other word for it.

Tessa Rose Jackson played sweet girl music. The contrast with the 50 something, I think, leading Hausmagger and the pretty and very young Tessa Rose was so huge. It was nearly impossible to make the switch. I managed to do so from the second half of the show. Again a huge band on stage, 7 people. With one guy playing everything a song needed extra and singing as well. Impressive! Tessa Rose's band played well and allowed her to present herself in a very positive way. The multi-layered vocals certainly added to the whole. With a song like '(All the) Kings horses' she comes quite close to the songs and quality of Mister and Mississippi. Some other songs were too far away from my taste, but as a whole the show was good and worthwhile watching. Tessa Rose Jackson certainly is a talent to watch.

And again the switch could not be a lot bigger than what we got next. Groningen-noord's pride and joy Traumahelikopter took off and left a trail of swirling air and dust. The first audience participation of the day could be noted in the form of a moshpit. The leader of the whole even was thrown a can of beer from the stage as thanks for his troubles. Traumahelikopter has two sorts of songs: one lasting under and one lasting over two minutes. For the rest it's one-two-three-four and let's go. Two guitars, one minimal drum that takes care of the bass without a bassdrum is enough. With the singer in the moshpit for one song and the lead guitarist trying to crowdsurf things really got wild. Also a veni-vidi-gone.

The New Shining played a very decent set. Melodic and well built up. The songs got better with each turn, ending with a new song that is bound to receive airplay. The band seems in transition somewhat. The acoustic side seems here to stay as Xander Stok plays an acoustic guitar for the whole show. Leaving the lead duties to Evert Zeevalking. Together with bass player Arjan Nijman the three harmonise in a great way, again showing that melodic music is on the way up. And the Mumford & Sons sort of folk music. The blend The New Shining is looking for, melodic rock and pop songs in a rock setting is one to watch.

With ominous dark guitar soundscapes from an Islandic heavy metal band I left the festival to go home. When I reached my car they were still waiting to finish the first song, producing more noise than all others together. After a long afternoon at Waterpop I can only conclude that the quality of Dutch popmusic is definitely on the rise. All acts, no matter how diverse, are good, have the right sort of songs and know how to play them live as well. The records that have been reviewed on this blog in the past months don't lie. Check them out as most bands deserved to be better known. Sunday Sun even with an interview as well.

Wo.

* All photos by Wo.

1. Jon Tarifa
2. Sunday Sun
3. Jungle by Night
4. Hausmagger
5. Tessa Rose Jackson
6. Traumahelikopter
7. The New Shining