Camden Rocked: Tactical Naps And Newport Helicopters

Camden Town, London. Home to many a metalhead, street merchant and doggedly persistent charity worker. The district is buzzing with brightly coloured haircuts and late-morning drinking; all the toilets in the fast-food joints are strategically shut, so you have to hold your breath and brave the septic public bogs. No matter. Loads of bands are playing today and it's going to be fabulous. Camden Rocks is here to ensure that Camden, um, rocks.

12:00. We're champing at the proverbial bit to see Pink Cigar, as their name sounds like a poorly veiled euphemism for a willy. The Camden Cavern is modestly filled but we'll persevere. 

12:05. Still no sign of Pink Cigar.

12:10. Nope.

12:13. We abandon the Cavern, bereft of any Pink Cigar. They might have been the next Beatles. We'll never know.

12:35. Downstairs at the Barfly, High Hopes are pummelling the piss out of a clutch of punters. The Reading mob's caustic brand of metalcore might be a bit meat and potatoes for some, but a lot of people love meat and potatoes. Chief screamer Nick Brooks pumps his fists like he's lifting really tiny weights and he also grabs a man's beard. An interesting development.

13:02. Attention Thieves frontman Alex Green has his arm in a sling, but this doesn't deter him. In the Barfly's ominous upstairs room, hands are clapped, Hundred Reasons-esque vocal melodies ooze through ear holes and everything's suitably jolly. “This might be a bit emotional for one o'clock,” Green quips. It is, so we go foraging for food.

13:30. Chinese food has been acquired and consumed. Bellies paunchy with salty goodness and a hunger for metal, we embark on a quest towards the Black Heart to see As Lions, Austin Dickinson's new band.

13:50. At the Black Heart. There's a massive queue inside.

​14:05. Still in a massive queue. As Lions are raging upstairs, but it's all just a muffled mess to us poor droogs on the ground floor. “This is bullshit,” we say. “Yeah! It's bullshit!” another party concurs.

14:15. The queue hasn't budged, so we sulk all the way to the Electric Ballroom and watch the appropriately titled God Damn. The duo exude a salvo of sharp riffs and belligerent drumming, with anti-rich kid tune Silver Spooned conjuring a hearty dose of solidarity within the crowd. The band's Nirvana and Black Sabbath test tube baby is a joy to witness on such a massive stage, even if some of the crowd are wincing at the scathing vocals and mouthing “The fuck is this?” to their equally discomforted mates.

14:35. Perusing the stalls near the Electric Ballroom in search of a hat akin to Rob Zombie's. We have no such luck. They're all rubbish.

14:40. An overzealous charity worker accosts us, brandishing rubber wristbands and asking for a donation. We give him some spare change. He then tells us that the minimum donation is £2, so we can't actually have one of the rubber wristbands.

​15:00. Pint in hand and bums perched on comfy seats, we witness Brawlers tear the Jazz Café several ruptured new ones. This is fast, loose, absolutely glorious punk rock. There are poppy elements and it's got the crowd going a bit mad; vocalist Harry Johns feeds off this energy, hopping into the pit almost straight away. The balcony is also violated by Matthew Wright, who straddles the ledge like a rocking horse while playing guitar. 

15:47. Now at Proud, having just bought a microscopic bottle of Beck's for £13847293730.

16:00. The place is catastrophically clustered as Ginger Wildheart struts on stage, launching into a career-spanning medley that strings together the focal points of his time as a musical god. The sing-along to I Wanna Go Where The People Go is a ridiculous experience and an undying testament to the man's ability to craft a timeless rock 'n' roll tune. Amidst the cluster of classics – obviously, there's some Howling Willie Cunt in there – we're treated to stories about horse jizz, combating a monkey with nothing but a Geordie accent and being dropped by a major record label for taking a huge video budget and essentially making a porno with it. We love you, Ginger.

17:05. Following the mass exodus of Ginger fans, Proud starts to fill with crusty punk types. 

​17:30. Glen Matlock – original bassist of the Sex Pistols – is up now. To say this is the man who co-wrote most of 'Never Mind The Bollocks', he's a bit flat. A Different World scrapes at the ears with its annoying refrain but we stick it out until an acoustic, venom-free rendition of God Save The Queen sends us scampering all the way to McDonald's.

17:45. In Mcdonald's. A woman is asking for charity donations. We have no change left and feel bad, so pretend to be asleep.

18:10. May have taken the evasion tactic too far and had a little nap by accident.

18:30. We enter the fiery maw of the Underworld. From here on in, time escapes us and we plunge into a sweaty, beer-soaked congregation of reprobates. The Dictators NYC have summoned a sizeable horde and, aside from some occasionally inane ranting from frontman Dick Manitoba, the New York punks do a sterling job. Baby Let's Twist incites a gleeful sing-along and the band are an exuberant beacon of hope for all of us fearing old age – Manitoba is 61 years old and packs more energy than a ravenous pug at feeding time.

Heaven's Basement turn up and everything gets a bit silly. Guitarist Sid Glover churns out his licks with a smile the size of a watermelon, while Aaron Buchanan unleashes his brilliant bellow and sports a haircut that makes him look a bit like Joe Swash. Buchanan demands cameras be put down so as to maximise enjoyment, promptly throwing himself into the crowd and swimming through a sea of sweat-drenched rockers. And we've not even talked about the music – Fire, Fire, Heartbreaking Son Of A Bitch and I Am Electric are genuine anthems, and it's a mystery why this band isn't at least three times bigger than they already are. 

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By the time Skindred come on, there's no point trying to be civilised. Everyone in the tiny, heaving venue has become more intimate with one anther than they could ever hope to be with a future lover, and the thrusting waves of the pit cause many to lurch into positions previously thought impossible. 

Everything about Skindred is perfect. Benji Webbe is the coolest frontman on the planet – swearing blindly at the audience, rocking a furry red hat and singing his tits off are all on tonight’s agenda – and he leads them into a set that covers just about everything: the sing-alongs (Trouble, Kill The Power, Warning), the twerkable tunes (Selector) and the incomprehensibly brutal stomp of Proceed With Caution. Metal, reggae, dance and innumerable other genres collide, culminating in the legendary Newport Helicopter through the closing throes of Warning. Nobody does it better, as Carly Simon's croon affirms on the way out.

22:30. Escaped from the Underworld. Legs are numb. Eyesight is bleary. Funeral For A Friend are playing Dingwalls right now, but we don't have the strength to limp all the way over there. We're spent. It's been a day fraught with horrifying clashes, occasional upsets and charity workers of unquestionable determination, but the past 10 hours have proven that Camden does indeed rock.

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