Over the past few years the Forestry Commission
have been putting on live music at seven different
forests across the country and this year their
live concerts have been as diverse as ever with
the likes of The Script, Paloma Faith, Blondie,
Paul Weller, Jessie J, Olly Murs and many other
acts signed up for headline forest shows, the
great thing about the shows that the Forestry
Commission put on is the fact that they take a
casual approach to live music as most live venues
these days you have allocated seats and have to
pay the venues wallet crunching prices but not
at the Forestry Commission shows you can bring
your own food and drink as long as it passes the
rules and regulations stated on their tickets
which are extremely fair allowing people to bring
up to 2 litres of alcohol or soft drinks as long
as it is in a plastic bottle and also pretty much
unlimited food.
Tonight I headed to Westonbirt to see everyones
favourite X factor star Olly Murs, I got to the
venue at 7pm and we got in straight away as the
queues had died down and straight away I noticed
there was a good atmosphere with what felt like
4000 people packing the venue out and the age
group in attendance tonight ranged from toddlers
to oap’s and you had the hardcore Olly Murs
fans right at the front who I image got to the
venue hours in advanced and in the middle spilling
out to the back you had the family’s enjoying
their picnics with their fold out camping chairs
waiting patiently for the nights entertainment
to start.
The main support act tonight was Olly’s
old X Factor friend Diana Vickers and she took
to the stage at 7.45pm and she wasted no time
and started interacting with the crowd from the
start and her 30 minute set was mainly dominated
from new material from her forthcoming second
studio album ‘Songs To Make Boys Cry’
and it was the title song from her forthcoming
album which really brought the crowd of Westonbirt
alive tonight as thousands of people were swaying
their arms in the air mimicking the dance moves
of Miss Vickers.
Vickers spent a lot of time talking to the crowd
tonight about her experience on the X Factor,
the reason why she has been away from the music
scene for a short while and also to explain the
meaning behind pretty much every song she played
and she also had a slight technical fault, now
most artists a guitar string snaps or something
needs retuning but not Diana Vickers her technical
fault was her shoelace coming undone but she recovered
from it in quite a comical way.
The set closed with a fantastic performance of
Vickers forthcoming single ‘Cinderella’
which is due for release on the 21st July and
I am sure after tonight’s big pop meets
dance set the song will find its self climbing
towards the top of the charts.
After a short 25 minute wait Olly Murs and his
backing band bounced onto stage, the stage was
set up really well with some bright lights, two
big screens and Olly’s initials with his
trademark triby hat lit up on stage and straight
away he thanked his fans for coming out to the
show and told them that it was an absolute pleasure
to be in their company for the next couple of
hours.
The likes of ‘Dance With Me Tonight’,
‘Personal’, ‘Hey You Beautiful’,
‘Hand On My Heart’ all got the crowd
going tonight but it was moments where he mixed
songs up and added little bits of classic songs
such as ‘No Women No Cry’ into his
own song’s which really showed his talent
off tonight.
In-between each and every song Olly interacted
with the crowd and covered everything from school,
the X Factor, love letters, detentions, single
people, Take Me Out TV show and even got the crowd
singing the classic school hymn ‘Whole World
In His Hands’.
Towards the end of the set Olly played his current
single ‘Dear Darlin’ where he went
on to thank his fans for buying the single and
helping keep it in the top ten. The set finished
with a triple whammy of sing-a-long songs with
‘Right Place Right Time’, ‘Heart
Skips A Beat’ and ‘Troublemaker’
ending the set and before the later of the three
songs Olly teased the crowd telling them that
he is going to be working on his forth studio
album and going to call it ‘Westonbirt I
Love You’.
Olly Murs is currently on the road supporting
Robbie Williams in Stadiums across the UK which
is obviously his biggest set of shows to date
and you can tell that Olly has learnt so much
from Robbie Williams as they have been friends
since the X Factor days and Olly is as much of
a good entertainer as his partner in crime Robbie
Williams and it is safe to say that schools are
not going to know what’s hit them on Monday
morning when this hyperactive pack of Olly Murs
fans hit the class room.
Diana Vickers 4/5
Olly Murs 5/5
Review By Trigger
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