Already attracting attention for their campy debut album Confident Music for Confident People, the four-piece’s set is joyous fun, thanks in no small part to the stage presence of their vocalists Sugar Bones and Janet Planet. Over at the Sounds of the Near Future stage, Melbourne dance-pop group Confidence Man are quickly drawing a crowd. Heading early to site today, all the Mad Max chaos of yesterday has temporarily been swept away as we arrive just after lunch. Sunday 10 June: Confidence Man, CHVRCHES, Vince Staples Now’s the right time for The xx to open up, and after Sim and Madley Croft go to the front to play their famous Intro, they dedicate the last song Angels to Manchester’s LGBT community – a classy end to an enjoyable first day. Like last year, the set peaks with a thumping four-song run of Fiction, Shelter, Loud Places and On Hold as Jamie xx gets the crowd moving, complete with a laser light show. The moments of that ‘nearly’ are pretty triumphant though, from the heartfelt singalong of I Dare You to Infinity’s thunderous upgrade of an ending. It’s The xx’s first Parklife as a band – not for Jamie xx who will play a strong closing set the following night – and when Oliver Sim and Romy Madley Croft say they’ll "try their best" on consecutive songs it’s frustrating to see them so nearly but not quite there. Here, they begin confidently with a no-chitchat opening to the set, their slinky older material like Islands and Crystalised still feeling intimate yet increasingly muscular. As they showed during their stunning set at Rock en Seine last year, the trio are getting more comfortable with their growth in stature since last year’s excellent I See You. Saturday ends back at the Parklife Stage with The xx. As the Moroccan-influenced Bambro Koyo Ganda explodes and volcanoes erupt on the screen behind them, it’s clear they've tapped into a great cross-cultural power. ![]() Bolstered by singer Szjerdene, who is dressed in a candy-striped suit, producer Simon Green and his band effortlessly move from trip-hop to world, building moods over minutes before satisfyingly releasing them. ![]() In terms of both heat and atmosphere, Bonobo’s set of breezy electronica is far more relaxed than the whirlpool of people outside – exactly what we needed on a sweltering Saturday evening. We’re sad to miss Jon Hopkins’ set due to a clash, but over at the Sounds of the Near Future stage, Bonobo is the next best thing. Whether it’s moody older cuts like Tennis Court and Royals or the Melodrama rushes of Supercut and Green Light, her set goes down a storm, and The Louvre ends with her dancers joyously throwing her in the air and carrying her around on a handmade throne like the pop royalty that, at this point, she undeniably is. Whether she’s sharing intimate moments with fans in the front row or busting out her notorious dancing moves, Lorde’s triumph is in remaining down-to-earth and honest, looking not like a pop star but someone living the dream pretending to be one. ![]() Looking laid-back in a three-piece piece pink tracksuit, the New Zealander is an assured presence on stage, with a troupe of dancers helping to liven up her nostalgic electro-pop. We hang around at the main stage for Lorde. ![]() He wins out in the end though, closing with his touching solo song (No One Knows Me) Like the Piano, then a jittery, desperate rendition of Blood On Me. With his haunted voice and dark keyboard tinkles, Sampha’s unsettling R'n'B is engaging but a little too sedate for an afternoon like this: 'It’s so hot I’ve been melting out here,' he sings in the xylophone-inflected Plastic 100C, and we’re inclined to agree. The Londoner’s debut album Process won the Mercury Prize last year and he looks the part dancing around the stage in a full red suit. We catch Sampha first on the Parklife main stage.
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