TRNSMT Saturday review: 'belligerent punk and impassioned rock ballads'

Shade was at a premium on either side of the King Tut's Stage on day two of an inordinately sunny TRNSMT. Biig Piig, aka Irish singer/rapper Jessica Smyth, must have been thanking the weather gods as her vanilla jazz, trip-hop and drum'n'bass breathy invocations in English and Spanish were a suitably undemanding soundtrack for surely the hottest TRNSMT day on record, with fans the must-have fashion accessory of the festival.

The leafy glade around the BBC Introducing Stage was an equally pleasant spot to seek out Manchester five-piece The Guest List, offering unadulterated indie rock with a plaintive streak, while on the Main Stage The Kooks returned in the full glare of the sun with a rebooted line-up, a refreshed new album and a ton of old generic but catchy hits lapped up by the crowd.

The arrival of Fontaines DC felt more like a festival event, possibly because it seemed that every second T-shirt in the crowd bore their name or logo. They are a band who let the music do the talking, from the pointed intro music – Kneecap’s It’s Been Ages – to urgent anthem Boys In the Better Land and an epic Starburster. The ferocious drumming and urgent mantra vocals of Televised Mind was an early example of why this band are leagues ahead in retooling indie rock before they dialed down the intensity with the swaying catharsis of In the Modern World and departed with their customary appeal to free Palestine on their lips and on the big screen.

Back in the King Tut's arena, Jake Bugg attracted a capacity crowd for a set which ranged from the signature skiffly indie of Lightning Bolt to the guitar heroics of Simple Pleasures and anthemic soul pop of All I Need, the latter featuring belting guest vocalist Joy Farrukh. Meanwhile Glasgow’s Vlure attacked their pumped-up punk and turbo-charged rap rock closing set on the BBC Introducing Stage as if they were headlining the Main Stage.

That responsibility lay with Biffy Clyro, just about the safest pairs of hands for the job. Biffy have been leading the “taps aff” charge for years and are experts at letting it all hang out on stage while operating at an innately disciplined level.

The result was a mighty set, encompassing both belligerent punk and impassioned rock ballads from rousing opener The Captain through the choppy guitar lines of That Golden Rule with supplementary violins fighting to be heard to the bouncing but bludgeoning Who's Got a Match?

Frontman Simon Neil hailed “Glasgow Del Sol” as the band galvanised the crowd further with singalong anthems Biblical and Re-Arrange and the power rock assault of Wolves of Winter before throwing everything – stunning lightshow, pyrotechnics, confetti shower and a bagpiper – at a bruising Stinging Belle to end their main set.

However, set of the day belonged to Underworld, conducting some serious dance manoeuvres on the King Tut’s Stage. These veterans of thoughtful electronica have been rocking festivals since the early Nineties and spanned the decades and the generations with a euphoric display, cramming into 75 minutes a dance music masterclass which would normally unspool over their own three-hour shows.

Their TRNSMT mix included the trancey ecstasy of Two Months Off, the harder mantra of Cowgirl, the crunchy bass drops and pace and pitch shifting of Push Upstairs, the ravishing minimalism of And The Colour Red and the Giorgio Moroder-goes-rave strains of King of Snake.

The BSL interpreters had their work cut out for them on the access platform, signing the beats as well as Karl Hyde’s repetitive lyrics but, like the rest of the seething field, they couldn’t help moving as all roads led to a rhapsodic Born Slippy.

By this point, Biffy were encoring on the Main Stage with Bubbles, a three-course meal of a song, taut and catchy, soaring and anthemic, then cacophonic and thrilling, while Many of Horror made for a rousing festival finish with pyro on the stage and fireworks in the sky.