Review: Wychwood Festival 2015 with headliners UB40, Boney M, Ladysmith Black Mambaza

This was Wychwood’s eleventh festival and, as always, was held at the beautiful Cheltenham racecourse site, right in the heart of the Prestbury hills. Although the buildings surrounding the course are currently undergoing some major building works, happily this did not impact on the festival at all.

A fairly major downpour and driving winds didn’t help those who arrived early to set up, although by the afternoon the skies had cleared and the crowds were able to fully enjoy fabulous entertainment. The big names for Friday were, of course, The Undertones and Boney M It wouldn’t be Wychwood without a generous helping of punk to get the party started and familiar tunes from The Undertones such as "Jimmy Jimmy", "Here Comes the Summer", "My Perfect Cousin" and "Teenage Kicks" really got everyone warmed up for the headline act.

Boney M have been dubbed the ultimate party band, and they certainly lived up to their name as the crowd grooved along to all the seventies classics ‘Rasputin’, ‘Brown Girl in the Ring’ and ‘By the Rivers of Babylon’ were belted out big time by a band who certainly know how to have a good time, despite just one original band member in the line-up.

Saturday dawned bright and sunny – if a little cold! – but as families got stuck into the plethora of activities on offer it was absolutely clear that it didn’t matter in the slightest what the weather was doing.

Those who were there for the music had plenty to chose from, from the big names on the Main Stage to the less well known bands and acoustic offerings in the Big Top tent and BBC Introducing at the Hobgoblin stage and the Pomme .

A huge crowd turned out to see perennial Wychwood favourites Thrill Collins perform their second set of the festival, this time raising the roof of the Big Top to get a great day of musical treats underway which included a fabulous DJ set from Andy Kershaw in the afternoon.

Elsewhere on the Festival site there was te usual selection of activities to enjoy. Literature has always been a huge part of what makes Wychwood so popular, and the authors’ talks in the Waterstones tent were popular with both children and their parents, many of whom were also keen to try one of the many workshops taking place over the weekend, from tightrope walking to belly dancing!

Charlie and Craig Reid, aka The Proclaimers, are always popular at Wychwood and the crowd were only too happy to sing along to "I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles)", "Sunshine on Leith", "I'm On My Way" and "Letter from America", before UB40 took to the stage for a monumental headline set.

It was great to see Ali Campbell, Astro and Micky Virtue back together on stage and the crowd were overjoyed that all the big hits, such as "Red, Red Wine", "Kingston Town", and "Rat in Mi Kitchen" , were played to perfection.

There was a sense of sadness on Sunday that the festival was drawing to a close, but a line-up which started in the morning with CBeebies’ Justin Fletcher and continued all day long with the likes of The Barron Knights, Rusty Shackle, Mad Dog Macrea and The Wonder Stuff - who performed an amazing acoustic set – kept the crowd buzzing with a marvellous mix of music.

Craig Charles returned with one of his legendary DJ sets, but it was a mesmerising performance from Ladysmith Black Mambaza which brought the Festival to an appropriately colourful end.