5th July 2013 Main Square Festival, Arras, France

Mainstage timetable:
16:00 – 17:00 Twin Forms
17:25 – 18:25 Rival Sons
19:00 – 20:00 Biffy Clyro
20:35 – 21:50 30 Seconds To Mars
22:20 – 00:40 Green Day
01:15 – 02:30 The Prodigy

Review by Nikki Hoath:
Over on the Main Stage Green Day received the best response of the day of any band, violently wading through their back catalogue to the obvious glee of the packed arena. They threw in an intro to AC/DC’s “Highway To Hell” and a mad sax rendition of The Theme From The Benny Hill Show amongst hits such as “Basket Case” and “Wake Me Up When September Ends”. It was a truly mental, but utterly brilliant set, which was topped off by a stunt they have employed before where they pull an audience member up onto the stage and have him sing and play the guitar before giving him the guitar.

Enter Shikari’s assignment was a mammoth one. They were tasked with following up Green Day’s performance over on the opposite stage and were also on immediately before dance titans The Prodigy. Despite the pressure, the band’s brand of dubstep fused rock measured up to the task fairly well. Now that darkness had set in the audience seemed more willing to mosh, although they were not quite fired up enough to do the usual epic crowd surfing fest that normally occurs during “Juggernauts”. Still, the band did a great performance in what must have been a daunting slot.

To the opening bars of “Voodoo People”, The Prodigy began their quest to bring the Main Stage to a close. The set started well, with the band throwing in “Poison”, “Breathe”, “Omen” and classic “Firestarter” amid MC Maxim’s usual chants about warriors (although he did come unstuck a bit when he tried to change his chant up to “Where are my French people?” Erm…what?). But it was at the start of “Spitfire” that things started to sadly unravel. Netsky had started his closing set on the Greenroom stage, and he was absolutely drowning out The Prodigy.

The audience started to leave the Main Stage in droves because they simply could not hear properly, and Netsky’s more contemporary sound seemed to become irresistible draw. I guess Hospital Records (to whom both acts are signed) will not be troubled by that, but it must have been galling for The Prodigy to see their audience drifting away and being powerless to stop it. It was the first time I had ever left a set by The Prodigy disappointed.
Meanwhile, The Prodigy’s loss was Netsky’s gain, and he and his entourage received a fantastic reception to the great set he was playing, which was enhanced further by a live drummer. Most of the remaining audience was dancing, and he seemed to manage to lift the disappointment left by the previous set, closing the night on a high.