‘I noticed the same thing about people partying at Lido Festival’ | Music | Entertainment

Strolling into Victoria Park from Hackney Wick, I soon found my noise cancelling earphones being penetrated by the bass of the Lido Second Stage. Instantly removing them, the rest of the dance music forced its way through the woodland, pond and play park until I reached the green 10ft wall shielding the festival from the rest of East London.

Using the same plot of land that’s seen All Points East pull in thousands of music fans over two weekends every August, Lido Festival launched on Friday, June 6 with headliners Massive Attack. We rocked up on day two of five with Jamie XX heading the billing. As for the remaining three days of Lido, you’re looking at Outbreak Fest, Charli XCX and London Grammar. And I’ll admit without hesitation, I am very jealous of the weather forecast next weekend with the festival set to be baked in 25C sun.

If you couldn’t guess, that envy stems from the torrid time we had of it on Saturday, which certainly felt far worse than it was thanks to my lack of jacket. Although the entrance was identical to that of All Points East in years gone by, wandering around it was soon clear that the site was smaller with fewer stages and fewer people. The result made for a super laid back, friendly atmosphere, summed up no better than by John Glacier’s performance.

It was by chance that earlier in the week I came across her work and immediately added Ocean Steppin’ to my 2025 Spotify playlist – a song featuring Sampha who I hoped would join John to perform it. As it was, he kept us waiting until his turn at 6pm.

Unassuming, shoeless and casually vaping between tracks, John Glacier isn’t your typical star in the making. It took a few songs for the crowd to respond with an outpouring of applause – at which point her confidence visibly soared. Hers is a sound so fresh and new, there’s a reason the crowd grew rather than dwindled in the rain. A tech issue with the sound led to moments of confused silence but such is John’s chilled nature, it was like water off a duck’s back the way she saw out the final songs of her set.

Of course, it’s easy for a festival to feel spacious and underpopulated when dry but it felt like half of Hackney was attempting to seek sanctuary in the Second Stage tent.

First it was cramming into Shy FX followed by Jamie XX back to back set with Nia Archives. Not until the crowd emptied at the end of the set to brave the elements did we gaze down at the thoroughly trodden ground and realise just how wet it had been. Unbeknown to us we’d been standing in a shallow bog but deep enough to swallow a fallen cap. The Salomon army were finally giving their trainers a taste of what they were designed for – mud.

Sampha on the main stage was a delight and gave far more of a party energy than I’d expected thanks to the singer really working the stage in a marshmallow-like white T-shirt and vibrant baggy trousers. His remarkably smooth and versatile voice in all its range is unmistakable but almost as alluring was the warmth of the orange screen behind him. Joined by what may just be the most attract four-person band assembled, there was a brilliant drum break with the group huddled in a circle creating a beat even the stiffest spectator would tap their toe to.

Lido certainly isn’t short of food options, both in variety and sheer volume. It was a grilled kebab wrap for me before hunting for what transpired to be a unicorn-esque coffee van.

After queueing for 20 minutes at the festival’s only coffee stall (£5.20 for an Americano) to chase my disappointing £3.95 jam doughnut, the heavens opened once again. This time there was absolutely no chance of squeezing into the tent for Romy. With Mid Air, the former XX vocalist released my favourite album of 2023 so this was a set I’d been looking forward to for weeks. Impressively, Romy somehow managed to leap across stage and frantically wave her harms at no detriment to her voice. Even live, 35-year-old was able to not only match her euphoric dance melodies, but punch through them with all the emotion one could hope. Whether it was The Sea or One Last Try, my smile listening to Romy wasn’t going anywhere.

It was at this point when the caffeine hit harder than any pint of Peach Jubel – the only lager on draught – that we sucked it up and danced in the rain. We weren’t the only ones as those without umbrellas unable to get inside, made do with what shelter they could find either on the tent’s periphery or beneath tree cover towards the loos. Top marks for the adequate number of urinals, by the way.

The trickling of people leaving the tent all shared the same expression and comments to their friends. It was like they’d escaped a warzone given how tightly packed they’d been. For the first time we were grateful to be outside, what’s a bit of rain compared to the panicked sense of struggling to breathe?

The exodus for air from Romy turned into a five minute walk for the day’s headliner of Jamie XX whose set started moodily with nothing but darkness on the stage screens. Then came the transition to a joyous evening of sing along floorfillers both new and old courtesy of a The XX reunion. There were no big animations taking over the screens, rather artsy slow motion live shots of the crowd being lit up by strobe and disco ball lights.

Leaving the festival we couldn’t help but remark how – in spite of the weather – Lido Festival’s unfortunate forecast could not deter its joyous attendees. We could only spot the happy, friendly faces of the dance music fans who had hit Victoria Park for a more relaxed experience than that of the August Bank Holiday.

If you also fancy seeing if the new kid on the festival block is for you, check out the line-up for this weekend. 

Buy tickets to the remaining dates using these links:

VIAGOGO – Buy Lido Festival tickets here.

TICKETMASTER – Buy Lido Festival tickets here.