Connect 2008 Episode V: Late of the Pier live up to their name

After much setting of alarm clocks, brushing of teeth and donning of wellies, we were left with much checking of watches in the field before the Oyster Stage early this afternoon. A steward (or someone articulate enough to do the job) could have told us that Joan As Policewoman had missed their flight, and that Late of the Pier were now taking their place. Instead it was left to LotP singer Samuel Dunst to casually inform us after an hour of supposed sound-checking.

Just as well Late of the Pier live up to the pre-festival hype then. This is basically a chance to road-test their recent debut album Fantasy Black Channel, and most of the curious crowd are left mightily impressed by the young band's effortless musicianship, and a stylistic range that spins wildly from French glitch-house to 70s prog - and everything in between.

They are a bit like the musical equivalent of jelly beans: garishly-coloured, tongue-tinglingly sweet, but too much and you might just feel a little queasy.

We do manage to keep our breakfast down, so it is with a skip in our step that we head for the Guitars & Other Machines stage for the similarly touted Friendly Fires. Again, this was a follow-up to their really rather good self-titled debut LP. Singer Ed Macfarlane is the main source of entertainment, dancing crazily in skin-tight clothes, a maniacal glare in his eyes, firing off plumes of confetti in all directions.

Comparisons to The Rapture are easy to make - the cowbell features prominently - but songs like Jump in the Pool and Photobooth show that Friendly Fires are pretty incendiary in their own right.