Farmer Alan Binning tells TIM HUGHES about preparations for this year’s homegrown event

ALAN Binning is a busy man. For most of the year he is a farmer, tending 350 head of cattle and 500 acres of pasture, wheat and barley.

But for one weekend every summer his contented cows are joined by an altogether noisier herd: 5,000 music lovers who descend on his rolling hectares at Hill Farm, Steventon, for two days of partying.

“There’s so much activity going on,” he says. “It looks good and it’s all falling into shape nicely.

“The festival site has been mown for winter forage, there’s a lot of equipment, the stages are up, and so are the lighting and fencing.

“It is disruptive, but I can live with it – after all, we have done so since 1998.”

Starting as a birthday party for local musician Robin Bennett, who grew up in the village, the festival has grown into one of the country’s best-loved summer gatherings.

Originally run by Robin and his brother Joe, who still lives in Steventon, the event is now organised by the team behind the Y Not Festival in Derbyshire. Robin and Joe remain a part of the event, however, playing with their band The Dreaming Spires and providing instrumental support to an array of musician friends.

Joining them is an impressive line-up headlined by psychedelic rock band Spiritualized and Essex garage rockers The Horrors, former Supergrass frontman Gaz Coombes, London country-rockers Treetop Flyers, Patrick Wolf, The Joy Formidable, Subways, pop-rock band Ash; electronic-rap outfit Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip; experimental-rockers Rolo Tomassi; and audio-visual creatives Public Service Broadcasting. Despite growing, the event has stuck to its roots as a springboard for local talent.

Among the other Oxford artists appearing are The Epstein, Gunning for Tamar, singer-songwriter Lewis Watson, The Original Rabbit Foot Spasm Band, Swindlestock, The Shapes, Empty White Circles, King Of Cats, Von Braun, Duchess, Ags Connolly, The Gees, The Heavy Dexters, and Nairobi, as well as Co-Pilgrim, featuring Joe Bennett and Hampshire artist Mike Gale.

“It is going to be really good fun,” says Truck organiser Cecelia Broadbent. “We’ve got a really good line-up, with some new stages, a chance to explore lots of new talent and a really competitive ticket price. “Truck has become a national event, with people coming from all over, but it’s still an Oxford festival. It has lots of support locally and is a springboard for Oxfordshire talent. We’ve kept Truck’s old-school vibe, which is that of a quirky village fete, and have invited lots of people back, who have played before. “There are so many aspects to it, this year, it has to be seen to be believed.”

Headliners Spiritualized will be making their first visit to Hill Farm. “It looks good,” said frontman Jason Pierce, talking from his home in London’s East End.

“Playing festivals is not the same as playing a gig, from a musical point of view, as you have to make compromises, but they are fun. They are more about people. It is about meeting the people you inhabit that part of the world with.”

Also eager to play is Public Service Broadcasting’s J Willgoose Esq, who graces The Market Stage with his drummer Wrigglesworth. The duo mix rock guitar riffs with electronic music and footage and samples from 1940s and ‘50s public information films harvested from the British Film Institute archives. Their soaring song Spitfire, celebrating the development of the fighter plane with a sample from the 1942 film The First of the Few, has proved a hit of the summer.

“We are looking forward to it,” says J. “We seem to go down well at festivals and like to make it fun. Visual musicianship is important and, with the sound and visuals, it becomes an audio-visual assault.”

As well as laying on two days of live music, the event raises many thousands of pounds for charity, including up to £38,000 for Didcot Rotary Club, which runs the festival’s burger and chip kitchen.

Farmer Binning is a member of the club and joins 160 volunteers in feeding festival-goers. “I look forward to Truck,” he says. “We all do. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t do it any more. We also make a lot of money for charity, a lot more than we would by rattling tins. But I have to admit, I really look forward to the day after the festival – when it’s all over!”

TOP TIPS...

  • Spiritualized, Truck Stage, Fri: Jason Pierce’s space-rock outfit play lovely music which veers from feedback-drenched psychedelia to fragile dream-pop.
  • Co-Pilgrim, Veterans & Virgins Stage, Sat: Mike Gale's delicate Americana is perfectly suited to Truck; his sublime vocals augmented by Joe Bennett’s plaintive lap steel guitar.
  • Public Service Broadcasting, Market stage, Fri: Expect songs about The Blitz, trains and the conquest of Everest – with catchy riffs and samples designed to “inform, educate and entertain.”
  • Treetop Flyers, Truck Stage, Fri: Reid Morrison’s band were a highlight of Glastonbury and can be expected to storm Truck with white-hot country-rock and virtuoso musicianship.
  • Gaz Coombes, Truck Stage, Sat: Former Supergrass frontman, and all round local hero, plays music from solo album Here Come the Bombs and maybe a surprise from the past.
  • The Epstein, The Saloon, Sat: Olly Wills's reconstituted country-rockers play the kind of life-affirming country-flavoured folk rock which makes you feel glad to be alive... and standing in a field in Oxfordshire. The new indie-tinged material shows a change of direction which will establish them as a must-see band... and their new album as one of the year's best.  
  • The Dreaming Spires, The Saloon, Fri: There would be no Truck were it not for the Bennett brothers, and their catchy sets of sing-along country rock are a traditional highlight of each festival.

LIVE: Truck Festival takes place at Hill Farm, Steventon, tomorrow and Saturday.

Weekend camping tickets are £78.15 incl booking fee from truckfestival.com