Photo credit: Brian David Stevens

There are more London music festivals than ever. For the dedicated music fan, this is a brilliant thing, and the number of festivals out there truly represent the diversity of the city. Whatever you like and whatever your postcode, there’s a tent in a park somewhere out there to indulge you, and a few thousand other people to join you.

But, the sheer number of them can be dizzying, and it’s for this reason that the prospect of starting another one can sound like madness. Where do you position yourself when Field Day and Visions have the summer’s urban cool on lockdown? Are there even any free weekends left?

It’s precisely this problem that makes Caught By The River Festival work. Founder Jeff Barrett’s solution was to make a city festival that isn’t really a city festival at all. Indeed, with its quaint name, Thameside location and eclectic programming, Caught By The River conjures the feel of a countryside arts, crafts & music festival – and all within a walk of a tube station. The whole thing starts to sound even more quaint when you realise that its origins can be traced back to a love of fishing combined with tiring of London’s party scene. Caught By The River is a patch of escapism from London – within London.

Barrett has decades of experience in the music industry, having founded Heavenly Recordings 26 years ago. In recent years, he’s run the website Caught By The River, the precursor to the festival, from where it takes its name. We caught up with him to discuss the festival’s origins, ethos and what makes it exciting.

In an overcrowded London festival scene, Caught by the River is a refreshing proposition. What is it that sets it apart from other festivals?

The line up, which is as eclectic as our site.  On top of that, we like to think we do things differently to anybody else. Our style both on and off the web is unique and that's something which appeals to those performing and those attending.

Caught by the River Festival grew out of your website of the same name. Can you tell us a bit more about the blog?

The first post went up on the Caught by the River site just over nine years ago. The idea had been suggested to me by my friend and colleague Andrew Walsh close to a year before that. Our inspiration came from a combination of things, but the catalyst was really going fishing. This was something that we both did in earnest around that time, something that neither of us had done very often since our mid teens. 

Andrew and I are both keen readers and the time we were spending outdoors also began to influence our reading matter. Casting At The Sun by Chris Yates was a big book for us. As soon as I had managed to figure out what to do with Andrew’s idea, Waterlog by Roger Deakin gave the added impetus to crack on with it. 

To put things into context - I started a record label - Heavenly Recordings - in the year 1990. I've worked in music, in London, since 1985. It defines me and I’m ok with that but I was restless for something new back then. I was a bit unsettled - and dare I say bored - with what I was doing. A partnership deal that our label had (with EMI) ran into a spot of bother and I found myself with a lot of free time, which I spent mostly on the riverbank. Andrew so enjoyed the time we spent outdoors together - a scene so different to our usual haunts of pubs, clubs, gigs and parties - that he came up with the suggestion that 'we do a fishing website and we call it Caught by the River' (the title of a song by at the band Doves who we worked with at Heavenly at the time). 

My first response was to say, 'a fishing website? I can’t imagine anything so dull, plus we are rubbish at it'. But what he suggested did have resonance. Over the coming months we rolled ideas around until there was suddenly a moment where I said 'I’ve got it'. We realised that all it needed to be was a blog, someplace that we just documented our enthusiasms, and those of a select bunch of trusted and valued friends. What we didn’t know though was how you actually did a blog! Neither of us was particularly web savvy. That’s when fellow Heavenly collaborator, Robin Turner, got involved. Robin was in charge of press and special projects at the label plus he and a mate (Paul Moody) did a magazine (called Socialism). Robin knew how to set things up in Wordpress. Rob is also an excellent writer - something that neither Andrew or I were (or are) - his writing and editing skills taught me a lot. 

The next thing I knew we were up and running. We declared our patron saints to be Chris Yates and Roger Deakin - a writer and thinker whose words and, importantly, attitude - really inspired us. We knew that to ensure people revisited the site we had to post on a daily basis so we took it seriously. 

The talk in the pub, or in the wee small hours, between us three friends and anyone who would stick around long enough to listen to us crap on, was Caught by the River. Before long we’d get mates saying  '‘ere Jeff, what’s this fishing website all about?' then it was acquaintances, 'Jeff, you’d never catch me going fishing but I’m enjoying reading your blog'. 

From the start I knew that it was special. Mostly, I guess, because I was doing something different, thinking differently, being creative in a way I hadn’t been since the early days of starting a record label. The three of us are the sort of people who make it up as we go along and that’s exactly what we were doing. It's exactly what we're still doing and that is a fantastic place to be. 

How did the festival come about? Did it feel like a natural extension of what you’ve been doing with the website?

To attempt an answer to this question we have to go back to the year 2008. We’d been doing the blog for a year and somehow during that time we’d managed to get a book deal. The guy that signed us, Mathew Clayton, was taken by the fact that suddenly there was this place where folks that obviously had some ‘rock’n’roll' ways about them were crapping on about rivers and books and nature. By now, among our contributors were early adopters like (the artist and writer) Bill Drummond, the wildlife sound recordist (and founder member of Cabaret Voltaire) Chris Watson, the music writers Ted Kessler and James Oldham and one guy, a very important part of the story, John Andews, ex marketing bloke for Super Furry Animals and Teenage Fanclub. Mathew, the book guy, probably thought we were quite eccentric, a bit mad even, but he spotted the potential for a book and he was right. Caught by the River: A Collection of Words on Water came out under his editorship in May 2009. Two months later we were curating a stage at Port Eliot Festival, an annual boho gathering in St Germans, Cornwall, run by Peregrine and Cathy St. Germans, who liked our style and invited us to get involved.

That year we had a stage there for two days and we used it to launch the book and put on music by a bunch of people we considered to be fellow travellers - namely the ever-adventurous British Sea Power, Kenny ‘King’ Creosote and Kathryn Williams.

The festival was a joy to do and it worked for everyone. We were invited back to do it again the following year - this time over four days - and next month (July) we’ll be returning for the seventh time. It’s a highlight of our year and it’s something that we are incredibly proud of pulling off. It became clear that this was an opportunity to clearly define ourselves. The website came alive, if you will. It gives us all - the editors and our many,  jawdropppingly talented contributors - the chance to hang out together, do our thing, meet the readers and come up with new ideas. 

The experience of doing Port Eliot has given us the confidence to do more things. There have been many - but, as an example, last year we did Caught by the River Teifi: a five-day communal arts, crafts, dancing and swimming event which took place on a campsite in a very secluded part of west Wales, on the banks of the beautiful River Teifi. 

Finding the right space in London has been a mission for several years. We had given up on the idea of being able to host a Caught by the River Thames event in the capital - we thought that it was going to have to be in Buckinghamshire or Berkshire. So when we were shown this site, Fulham Palace, on the north bank of the Thames path, five minutes' walk from Putney Bridge tube station, it was a hallelujah moment. The site holds the right number of people, it’s relatively unknown, it’s stunning and it’s central. A dream come true. 

Back to what you originally asked: yes, it is an extension of what happens on our website, which in turn is an extension of everything we're into. In our world, Chris Packham’s messages of conservation sit perfectly alongside the unpredictable genius of Sun Ra Akestra or Super Furry Animals. They're all people with deep beliefs and unique style. We know that our readers are broadminded and wouldn’t expect anything less than the adventurous variety we present. 

How would you summarise the festival’s ethos?

Reconnecting with nature as our message: to be honest with you, no. That’s never crossed our minds. As I mentioned earlier, going fishing and engaging with the outdoors in a way that I hadn’t for decades was (and is) an inspiration, but we are more about connecting with people than with nature. The big, real, achievement for us, as I see it anyway, is that we have managed to bring together an utterly fantastic cast of characters to enable Caught by the River to express itself. The talent is ridiculous: the quality of the writing on our site is top drawer. 

I don’t think we have a message, but if we do it’s ‘get involved’. Don’t waste your life. Be inspired. Be inspiring. Make friends. Have a good time all of the time. Mind your manners. Pick up a book. Pick up a pen. Pick up a camera. Now go start a blog. 

The Waterfront Live Stage festival has been specially curated for the festival – could you tell us a bit more about this and how it came about?

Our friends at the Canal & River Trust are going to be joining us at Thames. They have curated The Waterfront Stage (named after their house magazine, which we recommend you subscribe to) and their programme includes a bunch of talks on London’s waterways. Our pal John Andrews will be acting MC for the weekend and one of our most anticipated talks is going to be between John himself and Dexter Petley, author of the recently published memoir Love Madness Fishing. Looking back to the very early days of Caught by the River, it appears that John (JA) and Dexter (DP) provided most of the content with their correspondence column, 'Letters From Arcadia'. 

Also on The Waterfront Stage will be CBTR regulars Melissa Harrison (reading from the series of seasonal anthologies she has recently edited), Nina Lyon, author of Uprooted: On the Trail of the Green Man, and Emma Warren, who will be talking with the folk behind SoundCamp. Other highlights will be a talk from London psychogeographer Iain Sinclair, who'll be talking of Thames history, and Tristan Gooley, who'll be explaining how to read water.

You also run the label Heavenly Recordings, which turned 25 (!) last year. How would you describe the ‘sound’ of the label, and how has the label changed over that quarter century?

Heavenly: oh man. I was always keen to keep Caught by the River and Heavenly separate from each other but I guess it’s not possible. The music game got tougher and there was a scary time when I thought we might go tits up. But Caught by the River has undoubtedly played a massive part in keeping it going. That’s not to take anything away from our artists and all of the amazing people I work with on the label, but to have created this thing which allows us to act on instinct, make our own art, have different conversations all day every day -that's influenced everything that I do, without a doubt. 

Heavenly is a wonderful thing. We’re in our 26th year - I never saw that coming and we are putting out fantastic music. I know how lucky I am.

Caught by the River Thames
6 & 7 August
Fulham Palace
London SW6
Info and booking: caughtbytheriverthames.com
caughtbytheriver.net

waterfrontlive.org.uk
canalrivertrustwaterfront.org.uk