Review: How We Relived The Early-Noughties With Busted And Feeder At Godiva Festival 2019

Godiva Festival (5-7 July 2019, Coventry) // Words: Saam Das

Headlined by The Levellers, Feeder, and Busted, Coventry's popular music festival Godiva courted controversy this year by increasing the cost of entry. To the princely sum of £2 a day. It didn't stop over 75,000 people attending the formerly free-of-charge extravaganza in the UK's 2021 City Of Culture. And we were one of the many, many happy customers.

Download: Grant Nicholas - Soul Mates [New Track]

Words: Saam Das

I'm pretty sure the first time I heard Feeder was on the coach to play football, with my school friends Will and Simon. I remember being somewhat incredulous that 'Buck Rogers' didn't seem to feature any mention or reference to the TV show. Frontman Grant Nicholas supposedly had written the track for another band before being convinced that it could be a Feeder hit - almost a decade down the line, he's now stepping out on his own.

FEEDER

Pretty much out of the blue comes the new Feeder track, 'Miss You'. The title didn't feel me with much confidence, some of their schmaltzy material has been painful. Rather surprisingly though, this represents a return to the harder, rockier roots of yesteryear. But is it a return to form?

Even after repeated listens, I haven't quite made up my mind. At first, I thought it was bog standard rock, then I began to suspect that 'Miss You' was the new Boy Kill Boy single. While it has grown on me, I don't think they've quite struck the balance between pop and rock that they have so successfully done in the past. Tracks like 'Just A Day' and 'Buck Rogers' exhibited such craft but in the last few years, things haven't been quite the same.



Perhaps I'm being overly critical and it is nice to hear new material, considering the band's dormant state over the last year and a half. However, I can only imagine what one of my favourite bands (and one of the first bands I ever saw live) would be like had drummer Jon Lee not committed suicide in 2002, when Feeder were really progressing significantly.

Let me know what you think of the new track anyway, which is a preview to the new album, due out later this year. Feeder are also making some festival appearances, including Isle Of Wight and T In The Park. Consult their [MySpace] for dates and to hear some of their older tracks, like the ones mentioned above.

Feeder - Miss You [Yourfilehost d/l link]//Also available at feederweb.com

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Just a reminder to everyone that my new podcast is out and can be listened to/downloaded here [#6], while my first ever one will be removed from its server on March 31st so download that too [#1]. Bands on that one included Johnny Foreigner, goFASTER>>, Help She Can't Swim etc and even two bands that are now sadly no longer with us. Snap it up while you still can!