Friday afternoon at the Obelisk

Friday afternoon at the Obelisk

Amazing Baby opened my Latitude with an onslaught of deep, muddy guitar chords that sounded like the end of the world.

But despite a messy ethic and trendy look there was a classic rock core to what the Brooklyn four-piece did, with enough hooks and hidden melodies to get the early afternoon crowd tapping their feet, if not standing up.

The Broken Family Band kept the spirits up, their generic, lumbering rock large enough to translate to the arena-sized crowd, and familiar enough to keep them entertained.

The whole band dressed all in black, the simplicity of their dress mirrored that of their music, with each song a smouldering repetition of chords building up slowly to an inevitable emotional outburst.

The Cambridge quartet sounded best when they let loose with twangy, up-tempo stuff, the closer Please Yourself little more than a rampant, overcharged 12 bar blues.

Of Montreal were the perfect festival band - a childish-pastel drawing of daft melodies, crazy costumes and Technicolor animations.

Their bouncy energetic electro-pop had a nostalgically 80s-feel, like an early Nintendo computer game, while the falsetto vocals were unashamedly camp.

The big screens beamed down garish animations in primary colours and the stage was peppered with dancers in fluorescent jumpsuits and superhero capes, showering the stage with a wedding-haze of confetti.

A riotous party before our eyes on the stage they closed with a frantic finale of chaotic guitars and pulsing rhythms.