After the UK’s unseasonably dingy summer, you’d have been forgiven for having reservations about End of the Road 2023. Sure enough, the four-day music and arts festival, set in the scenic Dorset countryside, begins with a sense of foreboding: the sky a dark, flat sheet of grey; the ground slick with mud, and looking to get muddier.
But the rain never really comes. Chicagoan alt-rockers Wilco, the first night’s headliners, open with an almost plodding rendition of “Handshake Drugs”, but settle assuredly into their groove after a few minutes, lifting spirits with a selection of songs from across most of their 12 studio albums.
