Unless you’re Vishnu, chances are you missed out on something at this year’s Up The Creek festival, such was the manic energy of the place. All the familiar faces from the event’s last incarnation in 2005 were there, plus a few new ones. ‘Bout time, too; we’d been saving a Black Label quart for a special occasion, and my tattooed girlfriend just won a beer bet…

It was carnage, at first. Then came the retrospective solitude, the kind spent behind the ablutions with a territorially marked puking space. Having missed all the name-pulling bands on the Friday due to covering The Womens’ Show (I know: wtf), we stumbled upon a wayward drinks voucher as we arrived. Let’s face it. In situations like this, nothing can be done to salvage the situation but get busy deleting that voucher’s validity. After all, nobody honest has the ability to truly appreciate that evening’s lineup of Taxi Violence, Dan Patlansky, Van Coke Kartel and Prime Circle in a state of parent-like sobriety. Where’s the bar.

DNA Strings surprising the 2008 Up The Creek Festival More Vids | Submit Vids

When we woke up, the sun was setting. Excellent. Just in time to catch the good stuff. First off, Taxi still bring the Violence, opening their set this time with an angle-grinder-weilding weirdo and a cover of Feel Good Hit of the Summer by Queens of the Stone Age. Nothing wrong with that, especially when the four-piece hard rock outfit sees fit to demonstrate their abilities on each others’ instruments. George drives that kit like he stole it, and despite being on his way out of the band, Loedi has some frontman in him yet…

They say Dan Patlansky’s mastered the guitar. We didn’t get the chance to slur out an interview with the guy, but we did catch his act at the Table Mountain Blues Summit, and got a piece of him again now. Yeah, the 26ish-year-old Saffa has a couple of licks to dominate the ordinary, soggy, Wonderwall-covering Melrose advert guitarist, and he’s definitely worth checking out before some international bigwig decides “I’m taking that, thank you.” If blues is your thang, do yourself this one favour.

Gotta say, tho, it was DNA Strings that converted the ordinary rockaholics into a state of undivided attention, and got the peripherals at the fringes of the trademark Up The Creek central stage canopy pushing in to get a look, waterblommetjie stew in one hand and Amstel in the other.

Bringing a vocal-free 45-minute-set to the crowd, we were quite impressed with the ability of what is essentially a soundtrack band to dominate the live set. A sense of humour and passion overlays their stuff, and you can tell just by watching them that they’ve got a freehold over their music, their act and themselves. Uplifting stuff with a Gaelic pizzicato or two. Since the five-piece violin-fronted instrumental act is reputedly as busy as a pack of gorillas on viagra, you won’t have to look far to catch them live.

After donating our breakfasts back to the earth, the main crowd slumped together to catch the unspoken highlight of Up the Creek. Two guys who are unafraid of strapping raw bacon onto the face of a guy who they’ve named Denver, while pushing their faces into his crotch and re-enacting the nativity play with creative license. “Hands aap, who’s hung ova?” Three or four hands. “I can’t belivv it, guy. Afta seein so many pipple actin like-a blerrie assholes las night, only three of them’s got a hungover.” Welcome back Corné and Twakkie, everyone.

As mentioned, there’s only so much you can stick into a piece like this, so the rest of it goes out in thanks to the UTC crew for re-opening their doors on an unabashedly South African festival and giving people like us something to chat about on Facebook. With a smash-bang-crash straight from the good ol’ days, welcome back, Up The Creek!

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“I can’t belivv it, guy. Afta seein so many pipple actin like-a blerrie assholes las night, only three of them’s got a hungover.”