Wilderness Festival, review: Where else could Jamie xx and Philip Pullman both wow the crowds?

It is testament to just how desperate young people are to get out and dance again that Wilderness – a boutique arts festival usually packed with middle-class parents towing their toddlers in wheelbarrows – was teaming with glitter-drenched twentysomethings and barely a tot in sight.

Wilderness is only the second major British festival to go ahead without the backing of a government pilot scheme, and, until the excited trickle of bobbing rucksacks started arriving at Charlbury Station on Thursday morning, many festivalgoers were worried that the pingdemic would wreak havoc on the line-up. At Latitude two weeks before, several major acts such as Arlo Parks and Fontaines DC had pulled out to isolate. This weekend, all eyes were on star headliner Jamie xx: the British electronic artist (also frontman of the indie rock group The xx) whose brilliant debut album In Colour won a Grammy in 2015, and who is on the cusp of releasing his first new music in six years. If he went down, the bill would lose some significant sparkle.

But as dusk pulled over the Wilderness Stage on Saturday night, nervousness made way for fizzing excitement. With giant puffs of purple and pink smoke erupting from the stage and lighting up the small figure all alone at the decks, the crowd swayed in tranced-out bliss. Fans eager to hear about the artist’s rumoured new album finished the gig none the wiser – Jamie xx didn’t speak a single word as he switched from thudding bass to upbeat samples of hip hop and grime. When it was over, the wildest of the Wilderness set clambered down to the Valley, a sunken pit where DJs such as the Blessed Madonna entertained until the early hours.

While this year’s line-up was heavily electronic – with the crafty programmers perhaps sensing a more youthful demand – there was still something for everyone across the weekend. Soul singer Mahalia’s bouncy RnB matched the rays of sunshine poking through the clouds on Friday afternoon, while Loyle Carner’s easygoing boom bap got the whole crowd head bopping. Others got their kicks from hip hop karaoke or the Wilderness Choir.

One of the festival’s biggest crowds wasn’t for the music but for Philip Pullman, in conversation with Spitting Image producer John Lloyd (who admitted he had never read His Dark Materials until this week) at the Forum. The pair reminisced over both getting third-class degrees at Oxford (“a gentleman’s degree!” Corrected Pullman) and debated the meaning of consciousness over matter, including one waspish aside at the expense of Education Secretary Gavin Williamson. Pullman also spoke thoughtfully about what it means to have an imagination (“not to make things up, but to see things clearly”) and why children force authors to write better by “sticking to the story”.

The fact that a talk with Philip Pullman can segue so seamlessly into a set from Jamie xx – with much of the same audience members in both – proves why Wilderness is such a wonderful festival for arts lovers open to everything. A game of disco dodgeball, anyone?