Let’s begin with a disclaimer: the complex power dynamics of the Sziget photo pit results in only the apex predators being allowed in for pictures to most Main Stage headliners, with a few notable exceptions. As such, this coverage will not include concerts that we did enjoy, such as Florence and the Machine and Billie Eilish, but from a safe distance. Climbing over the crowd for a decent shot or two is an effort I was never young, enthusiastic or well paid enough to make.

Foals, Thursday, August 10, Main Stage

In an absolute manifestation of first world problems, I spent a good deal of time on Thursday thinking about how the Foals concert came too early in the schedule. It was one of the concerts I was looking forward to the most, and it would be over almost as soon as Sziget started. A bit of an anticlimax. I was also a little cross with the programmer for landing them in an early afternoon spot, which meant they could only play a fast paced, compact festival show. Which is something they are great at, in fact, and delivered accordingly. Yannis aptly described the atmosphere as ‘proper scrummy’, and they packed the set with those bangers, like ‘My Number’, ‘Inhaler’ and ‘What Went Down’ which will get a still fresh and lively festival audience going even in the earlier hours of the afternoon. But personally I was left, as I’d expected, with a slight feeling of unfulfillment, a yearning for those slower paced songs that they save for arena shows. Which is my problem, not theirs, and ultimately they came, they saw, and they delivered exactly what they were supposed to. A class act.

Sam Fender, Thursday, August 10, Main Stage

Sam Fender was scheduled to play the Main Stage last year, but had to cancel last minute due to laryngitis. It’s no wonder that he gets laryngitis every now and then: there are few performers out there who belt out songs quite like he does. He’d made me think of a Geordie Bruce Springsteen even before he covered ‘Dancing in the Dark’- when he did, I felt it was one of those things that were simply meant to be. Speaking of Geordies, in my usual ignorance, I did wonder why everyone was running around in Newcastle shirts on the Thursday, only to have the penny drop once people started flocking to the Main Stage area before the show. This may have been a better year to have Sam Fender play Sziget: fueled by some petrodollars, Newcastle had one of their best seasons in recent memory and qualified for the Champions League. The current feelings of the fanbase resonate perfectly with Fender’s music, who is an ardent fan: a mixture of hope and despair, a love for your place of origin even if it often breaks your heart. As the show began, Fender had the slightly haggard look of a man who’d just woken up, but slowly but surely he hit the right notes and the performance picked up the pace, propelled forward by the enthusiasm of the sea Magpies in the crowd.

Bonobo, Thursday, August 10, Freedome Stage

Bonobo is my musical chicken soup. And that’s a compliment. Every now and then, when I am lost as to what to listen to, I will go for ‘Black Sands’, which has a perfect combination of being both somewhat unobtrusive, a whiff of elevator music, combined with the spice of intriguing melodies that transport you. He’s also great at delivering the same experience live- not a spectacular performer, but a steady one. He just puts on good, well balanced shows- with electronic acts, you’ll sometimes get a live show which either veers off to much into a trance party, or tries to hard to be more sophisticated than it is. Bonobo strikes the right balance. My enjoyment of the show was also elevated by the fact that it was breezy- while Florence, in my humble opinion, is a great headliner, she doesn’t have the pull that Imagine Dragons had on Friday. This worked in the favour of those of us who like the comfy Sziget experience- making it to the first row of the Bonobo show without much effort, reminiscing of the days when being stuck to the fence was the default mode, and getting an hour’s worth of thoroughly enjoyable music in return.

Yungblud, Friday, August 11, Main Stage

As opposed to Bonobo, I don’t believe I’ve ever listened to Yungblud. Or at least, not on purpose. He would occasionally land on a release radar mix, or some other type of musical concoction the Spotify algorithm assumes I might like. An the algorithm was right, Yungblud was perfectly ok, it’s just that I never felt I want more of it. He is, however, a performer who is wonderful to watch, and, musically speaking, his tunes seem to have been written specifically to be screamed passionately from a festival stage. By the man, and then by the crowd, back at him. He darts up and down like a possessed goblin, or a particularly incensed chihuahua having the zoomies. And the audience loves it and responds with matching enthusiasm. By day two, temperatures were on the rise, and the crowd was nicely packed in front of the stage. Mosh pits sprung to life and faded away, pints of beer drew arches as they flew through the air- no danger there, Sziget uses only plastic cups. But the vibe was perfect- Yungblud was made for festivals, and festivals were made for him.

Loyle Carner, Friday, August 11, Freedome Stage

There is always one of these shows on Sziget- the niche favourite who delivers in the Freedome (formerly A38) tent. A few years back, it was Fauve from France, taken aback by their following abroad- truth be said, it was mostly the French Sziget crowd packed in the tent, but the atmosphere remained electric. Tom Grennan also put on a great show in the wake of his first album- the vibe of which he couldn’t match this time around, but more about that later. Loyle Carner’s audience was mainly composed of Britons, plus the random continental eccentric drawn to sounds off the mainstream radar. There was, as such, an intentionality in the crowd which is frequently missing from festival audiences- every so often, there is a core of hardline fans surrounded by a sea of people just wandering in without a frame of reference, happy to hang around without much purpose. But most of these idle fans were gravitating somewhere around the Main Stage, where Imagine Dragons were due to start, so Loyle Carner was left with a small, compact and enthusiastic crowd that carried him through one of the most atmospheric sets of the whole festival.

Ben Böhmer and Jamie XX, Friday, August 11, Freedome Stage

While it could have been an interesting proposition, Ben Böhmer and Jamie XX didn’t, in fact, play together, but they were part of an excellent late night electronic double bill on the Freedome Stage. Böhmer acted as a bit of a palate cleanser after the intensity of Imagine Dragons on the Main Stage- since I mentioned it, I found their headline show to be extremely well thought out and executed. But I am simply not on their wavelength- I enjoy a couple of their songs, mostly as part of my ‘house cleaning’ setlist but that’s about it. So walking into a tent resonating with electro that is so straightforward and efficient that it could count as easy listening was a welcome relief. Jamie XX brought edgier stuff. Ideally, perhaps, he should have come first, with Böhmer as the wind down set, but as things stood, they both worked in their allotted time slot. I found it a bit of a pity that everyone is holding out for ‘Loud Places’ during Jamie’s gigs. And then I found myself waiting for it, and punished myself by leaving early to try and avoid the crowds at the exit. I failed.