Godiva Festiva is awash with bright, vibrant, dazzling costumes

Godiva Festival is one of the few free ticketless festivals in the UK, and over the last few years it has booked bands that went onto bigger and better things, bands such as Biffy Clyro, Kasabian, The Enemy, and The Noisettes have all played the Godiva Festival before they became the household names that we know them as today.

This years festival had secured headliners The Christians, Ash and Joshua Radin, each day separated into certain categories. Friday night was 80's night, Saturday night was rock night and Sunday was singer/songwriters day.

The organisers of Godiva Festival try to ensure they have a good balance of well known bands and not so well known bands. They also put on various other displays as well as the famous Carnival procession, which is always a vibrant, dazzling display of costumes and floats.

As we walked into the arena Kid Creole and the Coconuts were halfway through their set and even after all of these years Kid Creole still knows how to entertain an audience.

The stage was then set for Martin Fry (ABC), who instantly hit it off with the audience by opening with 'Poison Arrow', which had the vast majority of the crowd signing along to it, admittedly many of them being left with nostalgic memories. This set included most of ABC's greatest hits, including 'How To Be A Millionaire' and 'Look Of Love'.

Martin Fry was certainly impressive to see live, he's still got a good voice and rather than relying on gimmicks or stories to fill the time, he just let his vocal ability speak for itself.

The Christians were up next to bring the first night to a close, now I can't remember them so I was rather amused that they had been selected for a headline slot, but as soon as they started to do some of their better known tracks it was clear that they were one of those bands that you know the songs but not the band, so songs such as 'Ideal World' were a blast from the past as well as a couple of cover versions such as Cat Stevens 'Where Do The Children Play?'. The Christians were worthy headliners and as I looked across the crowd it seemed as everyone was left with a smile on their faces.

Saturday at Godiva Festival includes the arrival of the carnival procession with bright, vibrant, dazzling costumes and floats that start off in the city centre and make their way to the war memorial park. A tradition that has it's roots in the Great Fair of 1678. This year a lot of the costumes and floats were based on the olympic games and the colours used for that. This year was an impressive display and the amount of effort that must go into making the costumes is incredible.

The Godiva Festival not only has music but they put on displays of falconry and free running as well as numerous other displays. The only downside is that you have to miss the bands that are playing if you want to see the displays, which are situated in the fairground part of the festival.

The first band we caught on the Saturday after watching the procession arrive was The Primitives. Again this was one of those bands that I really wouldn’t be able to tell you what they sang, but as soon as they played 'Crash' I remembered their music with some fondness.

The bands and music seemed to flow smoothly with bands such as Senser and Detroit Social Club providing the entertainment and keeping the crowd more than happy. Then it was time for Badly Drawn Boy to perform, now I appreciate he is a very talented songwriter but his live performances just send me to sleep. I just don't understand why he would be picked to play on a day that was titled 'rock' day, and by the way the audience quickly left the main arena it was pretty obvious I wasn't the only one thinking this. Maybe a name change is required - Badly Drawn Out Boy! By the time I had awakened from that 'slit your wrist' performance by Badly Drawn Boy, it was time for the headliners Ash to try and at least spark some life back into the crowd...

Thankfully Ash were fully prepared for the job at hand, and opening with 'A Life less Ordinary' created a wave of pulsating fans. Ash certainly moved the pace up a gear and ploughed through their set with their brand of melodic feel good rock music. Their setlist covered a good selection of their new and old material including 'Oh Yeah' and 'Kung Fu' as well as the crowd favourite 'Girl From Mars', and 'Burn Baby Burn' which was left until the very end of their set. Sunday had a completely different atmosphere to it, the Friday and Saturday night had been packed to the rafters with a young energetic crowd, however the Sunday crowd had a more gentle feel to it, with people being able to sit down and watch the bands without being pushed and shoved. The crowd was about half the size of the previous night.

The highlight of the Sunday was a band called I Blame Coco fronted by Coco Sumner (yes the daughter of Sting). Thankfully I Blame Coco are very talented and have a unique sound to make them stand out from the other music that is currently out there. Although I'm sure somewhere in the near future critics will start to either like or hate this band purely because of Coco being related to Sting as opposed to judging just the music.

If I was a betting man I would place a large amount of money on I Blame Coco moving onto bigger and better things in the near future.

Godvia Festival 2010 as always was extremely enjoyable and is one of those special gleaming jewels in the festival crown. However it did feel that it is at that point where it is in danger of becoming too big and losing that family feel that it currently has. Now if only Coventry council would show other councils in Britain how to put on a festival this good, then the world would be a much better place.

Bring on Godiva 2011...

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