fence halloween @ stereo

Glittery globes and cardboard cacti transform Stereo and its half-finished lane-neighbour The Old Hairdresser into appropriately galactic settings for a Space-Cowboy Halloween; Buzz Lightyear and Marvin the Martian mingle off-stage, while Fence alumni thrill onstage. James Yorkston hasn’t played live for a while due to experiencing “the year from hell”, but he successfully converts an atmosphere of glum reverence into an airy pleasure, best encapsulated by a closing improvisation that has him sheepishly scrabbling for rhymes to the delight of the crowd.

Said punters have translated the costume theme in some unexpected ways, with Space-Prawn and Santa With Oven Gloves particularly perplexing. Glitter-trews aside, Lord Cut-Glass and band have interpreted the brief more traditionally. Their saloon band garb suits their sound: a solid mid-afternoon set that aids the knees-up atmosphere no end.

Across the alley, the mid-renovation Old Hairdresser hosts Randolph’s Leap, who sing about crisps and squeamishness and infect all in the vicinity with their twee wit and silliness. Upstairs, James Acaster reacts to fake doughnuts and wears the wrong day-of-the-week socks for our amusement, but the sound of The Pictish Trail starting up beneath us is difficult to resist. When we make it back through the courtyard, a solo Johnny Lynch is proving a stand-up hit in his own right, guiding us through synth presets and airing thirty-second compositions like the uncharacteristic noise-nugget Sweating Battery Acid.

Johnny pops up again during King Creosote’s second set of the day (his first lost out to humus flat-breads in the early afternoon battle for attentions), helping turn a high-energy Happy into today’s highlight. Kenny leads his band of udder-bearing man-cows and cone-headed wizard-creeps through a sterling set that could contentedly top the night if weren’t barely nine.

For a Halloween bash, there have been few spooks and scares – until we venture back into a deserted and dilapidated Old Hairdresser to find the Fence film playing to an eerily empty room. Back downstairs, John B McKenna reliably delivers further top tunes, though by now there’s a craving for something from outside the guitar-toting mould. Silver Columns sate the hankering with a brash set of beat-heavy electro-pop, with Johnny Lynch once again at the heart of today’s unqualified success-story. As he pushes the crowd through towards the final furlong, Fence adds another superb day to its events roster in style.