VETERAN

Stuart Braithwaite, Mogwai

It’s Mogwai’s first T in ten years. What brings you back?
We’re doing a lot of festivals this summer. We hadn’t actually done any for a while until we did Connect two years ago and it was great. So we’re looking forward to it.
1997 was your first appearance. What can you remember of that?
It was a really exciting summer – we’d just finished out first record and we’d started playing abroad for the first time. It was great back then because we were finished by early afternoon, so we had loads of time to get drunk.
What’s special about T?
Scottish audiences are brilliant anyway, but when you get a crowd that’s got a lot of people in it that don’t go to gigs every week, then they’re even more excited. It’s got a massive amount of energy.
A decade on, you’re going head-to-head with Blur again. Can we expect new T-shirts: ‘Mogwai: Blur Are Still Shite’?
No T-shirts. I think we’re a bit old for that now.
What if some enterprising vendor sells them anyway on the sly?
I think there are probably things people can sell illegally at a festival that make a lot more money than fake Mogwai T-shirts.

VIRGIN

Tommy Reilly

This is your debut as an artist, have you been to T in the Park as a punter before?
I’ve only been to T once before and it was quite a while ago – I went back in 2002 when Oasis headlined, as a really wee guy. After that, it became a dream for me to go back and play there.
What kind of gig are you expecting?
People are at T to go mental, it creates a great vibe. I’m going in for the whole thing, I don’t think we’re going to be able to get hotel rooms so I’m pretty sure we’ll be camping.
So you’ll have a foot in both camps, literally?
Yeah, I know what it’s like to go and hang out, so to go as a performer is going to be great – a little headline slot on the T Break stage – I can’t wait. Every time you set yourself a little goal and you score through it, you make another one. To get to play T in the Park full stop is a dream, but I guess after that I’d like to come back and move a wee bit further up the bill - the NME stage or the King Tut’s stage maybe. To headline one of them would be the ultimate dream.

Mogwai close the King Tut’s Tent, Sun 12 Jul; Tommy Reilly closes the T Break Stage, Sun 12 Jul.