They had said that it was going to be bigger and better this year and in this assertion the Deer Shed Festival organisers had got it absolutely right. The capacity for this the fourth annual outing of Deer Shed had been increased from six to seven thousand and with this rise in the numbers of those attending there was also an allied expansion of its programme of entertainment and a clear development of its infrastructure and organisation. As part of these changes, and while the event is still set in the beautiful surroundings of the Baldersby Park estate in North Yorkshire, the actual festival site was this year moved into a much larger adjoining field.
Speaking to Guy Chadwick on Saturday night just before House of Love appeared on the main stage, I suggested to him that 
this may not be his usual audience; he just smiled and remarked that it was rather full of kids. Children remain the heart and soul of Deer Shed; they are absolutely everywhere, swarming across the site like a small tsunami. Despite its growth the festival is still fundamentally all about them and their entertainment. And as was the case in the past two years, the festival is again built upon a child-centric theme. First there was the Sky at Night, then it was the turn of Monsters; now in 2013 it is the rise of the Machines.
All things mechanical, great and small permeate the festival site over the weekend. There are robots, Robogals, rockets, gadgets, gizmos, Minecraft and Mecanno with which children and adults alike can commune. You can have the opportunity to construct plastic super structures out of plumbing waste pipes, design and decorate water bottle rockets, balloon powered cars, cotton reel tanks and model machine junk in a staggeringly wide range of innovative practical workshops. And if all that isn’t quite enough there is the chance to create beads, bracelets and bumper bunting, model clay and make badges too. When account is also taken of the giant sandpit, ukulele workshop, the Ferris wheel, helter-skelter and a sports field full of hula hoops, space hoppers and tennis on a string it is surely a young persons’ nirvana.
But it is not all about children and Deer Shed has worked extremely hard to manage the dilemmas and tensions that evolve from 
trying to both produce and combine entertainment for those who lie either side of the sixteen years divide. This year’s evolution of the comedy tent very much reflects this process. At one end of the age spectrum you have Big Howard and his much smaller but equally animated partner Little Howard steering a safe and steady course through child-friendly waters, whilst at the other the truly talented Steve Best and Justin Moorhouse do just about enough to stay the right side of that parental guidance fine line.
And then there is the music. It is something that has previously felt almost incidental to the overall Deer Shed experience, but as the festival grows so does the continuum and quality of the artists that it attracts. Friday night is 
the case in point when two men who are both perhaps better known for what they have previously achieved in their respective musical lifetimes take to the two main stages. A recent advert for a Japanese automobile made this very point by introducing the first of these men to its TV audience with the words “It’s Gaz from Supergrass”. Not Gaz Coombes you understand, but Gaz from Supergrass, which on tonight’s evidence may be where his identity will forever lie. He desperately wants to reveal his more experimental side to the world and the introduction of material from last year’s debut album Bombs does achieve this purpose. But it is the catchy, pop-laden tunes of his erstwhile band that people want to hear and ‘Moving’ is exactly that.
Edwyn Collins is another man with a past. For him it was with Orange Juice but now nearly thirty years beyond that band’s 
watershed it is perhaps easier for him to both embrace and manage that particular history. He effortlessly weaves Orange Juice’s first single ‘Falling and Laughing’, an imperious ‘What Presence?’ and a rattling good encore of ‘Don’t Shilly Shally’ in amongst his solo material, of which a barnstorming ‘A Girl Like You’ (complete with the most dazzling pyrotechnic guitar from James Walbourne) is the undoubted highlight.
Saturday’s early peaks are all scaled by young men for whom the rather hollow descriptor singer-songwriter offers scant justice. In an inspired piece of 
scheduling David McCaffrey, Luke Sital-Singh, Stephen Black (performing as Sweet Baboo, pictured left) and Ross Wilson (as Blue Rose Code) follow one after the quite glorious other on the Lodge Stage. McCaffrey, a local man still one year shy of his twentieth birthday, exudes a quiet serene authority which is in perfect accord with the relaxed early afternoon ambience. Sital-Singh inhabits the ghost of Jeff Buckley, resurrecting memories of him with his beautiful falsetto voice and plangent, esoteric guitar. By way of contrast Sweet Baboo infuse the crowd with a wondrous blend of whimsy, warmth and idiosyncrasy. A clutch of great tunes also helps; ‘Let’s Go Swimming Wild’ is an abstract pop gem. And then there is Blue Rose Code. A vehicle for the music and experiences of Ross Wilson, a man in whose eyes you can catch disquieting flashes of fear and anger, heaven and hell, and the road to redemption. Spending time in his company is not easy but it is time that is ultimately well spent.
Triumph and disaster have always had an uneasy relationship in the history of the House of Love, and whilst on Saturday night it was not quite at the darkest extreme of that scale, the early signs were not altogether promising. The sound was largely listless and 
uninspired. But then out of nowhere ‘Holy River’ ignited the entire set. The guitars glimmered and the song’s gorgeous melody shone through the earlier fog, reminding those in the crowd old enough to remember just how great this band was and clearly still is. The euphoric glow of ‘Shine On’ and ‘Beatles And Stones’ told a similarly heart-warming story of triumph over disaster.
In Darwin Deez the ever widening reach of Deer Shed’s musical arm is perfectly illustrated. He is black, he is American and whilst its luminance 
varies throughout his set he is undoubtedly a star. In the sprawling centrepiece of his performance, ‘Alice’, he introduces us to the concepts of heartbreak, mystery, romance, intrigue and guitars. It is a song that also captures his incoherence and brilliance in equal measure. Turbulent chord changes jar at points where the strange syncopation of the avant-garde dances uneasily with indie-pop. But then out of this mayhem comes one of the most fluid guitar solos this side of heaven. It is a trick he repeats to even greater effect on ‘Chelsea’s Hotel’, showing that if he were able to harness the more untrammelled excesses of his imagination his light would surely burn even brighter.
By way of marked contrast with most other festivals and in further emphasising its unique differences with the rest, Deer Shed winds down to a gentle close by early Sunday evening. It is often described as the long goodbye and provides everyone with the time to reflect upon the events of the previous two days. In these circumstances it then seems perfectly befitting that the day’s three principal musical acts should all deliver performances immersed in the sepia of reminiscence. To a backdrop of archive movie clips and footage taken from old documentaries and public safety films Public Service Broadcasting weld an explosive post-modern Krautrock soundtrack of songs taken from their debut album Inform – Educate – Entertain. Despite having seen it all before it is still wildly impressive, the epic ‘Everest’ providing the most perfect of finales.
Also reflecting life-changing events and with the emotions of its central narrative equally bound up in a strong sense of pride and glory, The Unthanks musical accompaniment to the film Songs from the Shipyards is an altogether more mournful experience. 
The rise and fall of the shipbuilding industry in their native North East is conveyed with a stark poignancy, never felt moreso than on a deeply moving reading of Elvis Costello’s ‘Shipbuilding’.
It then falls to the sovereign of the Fife music scene, King Creosote to turn out the lights on Deer Shed 4. Like The Unthanks before him, he is steeped in a great musical folk tradition and his songs are laced with an unmistakeable sadness. However, he presents his timeworn tales with wry humour, a sense of balance and the grounded humility of a man who you feel has found in himself a form of inner peace.
And these are the very emotions with which you leave Baldersby Park, reflecting on what has been a nigh on perfect occasion. For many Deer Shed traditionalists this year’s structural changes may mean that they will bemoan the loss of the buildings which gave the festival its name. They may also speak of the festival’s shift away from its local roots towards a more expansive corporate identity. But the truth is that in this particular instance bigger is undoubtedly better and Deer Shed’s gradual evolution has been successfully achieved without losing any of its inherent warmth or intimacy.
