rory Rory Mcleod played the Mokudotei today – that fun little stage in the woodlands. It was like being at his house as he sang story songs, and prefaced all his story songs with stories about what the story songs were about. As you spend time at Fuji Rock and see the crowd respond to “Yo FUUUJIII, are you enjoying yourselves?”, it’s easy to think that people pick up most of the chat, but I’d wager that most of it was lost on the people here. Rory told us about Pauline, a girl he went to school with, before beginning a tune about Pauline, the girl he went to school with.

Without a doubt, it didn’t matter than nobody knew what he was saying. Half the time, Rory didn’t seem to know what he was talking about. He’d begin a story, go off at a tangent, then end with “well, anyway, let’s see how we go.”

At one point, Rory borrows a water bottle from one listener and pretends it’s a telephone and he’s talking to his mum. That sounds crap on paper, but it’s charming in real life. He plays little gags with his harmonica, and then every so often he thumps out a danceable folk song that one moment is about Pauline, and the next moment about the odds against him being alive being the exact number of his dad’s sperm that didn’t make it to the finishing line.
On the one hand, I can’t imagine anyone better for this stage than Rory McLeod. He held the crowd just by tapping his foot and blowing his unplugged harmonica. On the other hand, if people had space to dance, they surely would have. I didn’t catch any of his other sets here, but I bet there was some stomping going on. Hope he’s back soon.

Rory ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Stories ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Glory ★ ★ ★ ★ ★