Nostalgia is a funny thing. Remembering the previous 9 years of Latitude, it is easy to bundle all of the significant events in the festival’s history and imagine one super-festival. Arcade Fire, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Kraftwerk, British Sea Power, Hot Chip, Franz Ferdinand, Belle & Sebastian, Bon Iver, Metronomy, Bloc Party and Foals are just some of those who have graced Latitude’s stages over the years and likely figure heavily in the Latitude loyalists’ imagination of the festival. Festival organisers no doubt felt the pressure to live up to these expectations when creating Latitude 2015: The 10^th Birthday. After all, what better way to celebrate than by pulling out all the stops?

However, as many festivalgoers had anticipated on the Thursday night before the festival fully got under-way, it is not immediately clear what was so special about this year’s line-up. Alt-J headlined the Friday night, delivering more-or-less what was expected of a band whose popularity had somewhat faded since their 2012 Mercury prize. Similarly, Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds served the purpose of closing-night headliner, drawing in born-again Oasians and finishing the festival well with “Don’t Look Back In Anger”.

Portishead and the Manic Street Preachers proved the best of the higher-billed acts. The former rarely come out of their lair to play, their three albums over twenty-four years underlining their selective disposition. Backed by large imposing images of David Cameron with light rays coming out of his eyes, the (almost) Bristolians delivered every one of their hits with perfection, finishing off with a surprise duet with Thom Yorke. The Manics similarly brought previous form with them, offering a light-hearted and fun moment in the festival on the Sunday evening. For those still in doubt about the billed line-up, the surprise return of Ed Sheeran, Snow Patrol and Thom Yorke in secret gigs should have provided some relief.

Latitude, of course, has always sought to avoid putting its festivalgoers through the ‘stressful’ experience of plotting a course through an epic bill of headliners. More emphasis is placed on allowing those attending the time and space to discover things for themselves – a first world problem resolved if ever there was one. Perhaps the 10^th Birthday took this too far at times; it is hard to remember a Latitude in which the afternoons felt quite so lightweight in terms of acts without much ‘oomph’. The upside of this, in line with the Latitude ethos, was that several smaller, newer acts were given an opportunity to thrive. Songhoy Blues, Leon Bridges and Young Fathers all kicked life back into festival’s daytime billing, drawing large crowds of fans gained largely over the last few months. Warpaint, playing on the Sunday afternoon, delivered a fantastic and tight set with their usual subtlety and light-hearted spirit. The technical talent of these newer artists clearly meant more to the crowd than the length of their discographies – though it was obvious from the energetic performance of King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard how they have managed to pump out six albums in five years. Equally, acts that may not have been considered ‘headliners’ to the crowds that turned out to see Kraftwerk in 2013, evidently meant as much to the increasing amounts of under-20s populating the festival, who turned out in droves to catch the tented parties hosted by Django Django and SBTRKT.

The ‘light’ billing of Latitude 2015’s afternoons also provided room for non-musical acts to flourish. As usual, the Comedy and Cabaret tents regularly overflowed, and together provided an unrivalled festival stand-up environment in which up-and-comers like Alex Edelman, Sarah Kendall, Phil Wang (MC) and Aisling Bea could thrive. Tim Key graced Latitude again, spending half his time delivering poetry and half his time nicking drinks off the audience. Murray Lachlan Young similarly brought comedic verse to the Literature Tent, highlights including poems about curries and a folk tribute to dogging. 

Elsewhere, Stuart Bowden’s dreamlike one hour operetta ‘Before Us’ did for live comedy what Dan Deacon does for live music, and would have perhaps been the comedy performance of the festival, had it not have been for The Boomtown Rats equally surreal and unhinged performance.

While Latitude 2015: The 10^th Birthday was not a celebration studded with the biggest names in the festival’s history, who says it needed to be? Latitude has always used big names sparingly; a hook to get festivalgoers into an environment in which they can discover other, new things. If the lures have changed over time, the ethos has remained the same. Latitude 2015 never seemed a ‘go out with a bang’ farewell, rather another instalment of a festival determined to stay.

Latitude Festival celebrates its tenth birthday this year. Muso’s Guide will be covering the festival on Twitter throughout the weekend of 16^th-19^th July, alongside our usual review coverage once we return home. If you want to join us, tickets are still available. In the meantime, here’s our pick of the top ten things to look out for (in no particular order):

Portishead: Portishead are a rare beast to spot. They’re like a bear in hibernation, except not even as regular as bears (they don’t appear once the snow has gone away). This is the band’s only UK festival appearance this year, so we’re very excited about the potential of seeing them whirring up the classics from Dummy (1994), Portishead (1997), and Third (2008). If we’re lucky, they’ll play some new material, but we wouldn’t bet the house on it. 

Public Service Broadcasting: This year’s The Race for Space (2015) proved a fantastic follow-up to the London duo’s Inform-Educate-Entertain (2013). Public Service Broadcasting bring in their wake an amazing visuals team – with old archive footage being reworked and played behind them to spectacular effect. Catch them on the BBC Six Music Stage on the Friday night.

Unknown Mortal Orchestra: If you haven’t listened to it yet, give Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s Multi-Love (2015) a spin, because it will surely be remembered as one of the year’s highlights. The various layers of synth, guitar, and Ruban Nielson’s vocals will amount to quite the live performance. 

Tim Key: Tim Key amounts to being the poet laureate of Latitude. He’s there every year so, unlike Portishead, there’s not quite the same degree of pressure involved in catching him while you can. All the same, Key is a class act. On the back of his sell-out performance in Daniel Kitson’s play ‘Tree’, he is deservedly at the top of the alternative British comedy scene and Latitude-goers would be wise to see him grace the birthday party.

Andrew Marr and Kate Fox: You read that correctly: Andrew Marr and Kate Fox. Latitude is the type of place where you can go and see all the acts listed above, have a party, and then drop in and see one of the arch interrogators of the political class and the author of Watching the English (2004) chat about class, identity, and politics in the 21^st Century. We intend on doing just that.

Leon Bridges: Delivering classic soul with no gimmicks, smooth Texan Leon Bridges has been slowly melting the hearts of the British radio listenership. If a soul revival were going to happen soon, this would be the man heading it. His Glasto set was almost too flawless and seemed a little overshadowed by the sheer scale of Glastonbury’s line-up. However, Latitude is much more likely to provide the platform and audience for him to shine.

Django Django: After a 3-year recording hiatus in which they only played a few shows, Django Django are hitting the festival scene hard this year. With a genuinely different sound and an impressive stage show, these synthed-up Beach Boys make the BBC Radio 6 Music stage the place to be on the opening night.

Toro Y Moi: Chaz Bundick’s alter-ego has been making ‘chillwaves’ (as the genre is apparently known) in the UK with his recent album What For? and will have no problem settling into his mid-afternoon set. His music sounds as funky incense might smell if it were a thing. One of the few Latitude artists not to be playing Glasto this year, this is his only UK date this summer - be sure not to miss it.

SBTRKT: The name might not immediately ring a bell, but it’s very unlikely you haven’t heard and enjoyed SBTRKT (pronounced ‘subtract’ by the way) already. Famous for his hits ‘Pharoahs’, ‘Hold On’, and ‘Wildfire’ (alongside his characteristic tribal mask, of course) but not quite a household name, he’s a surprising headline booking. However, trust in the Latitude organisers and we think you’ll be rewarded with a dark horse dance party.

Young Fathers: The Edinburgh trio have been going from strength to strength since they picked up the Mercury Award in October 2014 and released their second album White Men Are Black Men Too this April. In contrast to SBTRKT, they’re probably a band you’ve heard a lot about but you might be less familiar with their discography. Nonetheless, you’ve heard a lot about them for a reason and Latitude is your chance to see what the fuss is about!