Mad Cool review: Avril Lavigne and Dua Lipa dominate nostalgic (and not overcrowded) festival

Is it 2024 or 2004? You can’t tell the difference at this year’s Mad Cool festival, where nostalgia is fed to us on a drip in the 35C Madrid heat. Carrying the Noughties torch is pop-punk queen Avril Lavigne, on her comeback tour 22 years after her debut album, Let Go. “Does anyone still have a copy of my first record?” Lavigne asks the crowd at one point during her set. The screams suggest it’s a resounding yes.

Lavigne, who was responsible for inspiring pre-teen girls’ grunge phases in the early 2000s, looks identical to back then – her bleach blonde hair is washed with hot pink dye. She wears fishnet tights and black nail polish. It’s hard to resist the urge to run into town and buy the first pair of magenta clip-in hair extensions I find. At one point, Lavigne raises a glass – well, a Veuve Clicquot bottle – to “never growing up” before spraying it into the crowd like a F1 racer. “Ain’t nothing like a champagne shower,” she says. Fans are sent frenzy when she performs “Girlfriend”, her 2007 anthem about stealing someone else’s man, 2002’s “Complicated”, before closing on a raucous “Sk8er Boi” and disappearing in a puff of red confetti.

Mad Cool, now seven years old, is often referred to as the Coachella of Spain. It’s easy to see where the comparison comes from: everything is clean, the ground is faux grass, and you can buy margarita slushies at the bar. Nothing feels artificial or overdone, though.

Typically, rock fans make up the largest demographic of attendees at Mad Cool. But they seem to be elsewhere this year: Metallica are playing nearby at another Madrid venue on Friday night and Pearl Jam are the only legacy rock act to headline. Really, its pop and indie rock that shines the brightest this year.

Dua Lipa is a real highlight as the only headliner without a decades-long back catalogue. Her set is virtually identical to her televised Glastonbury performance – minus the numerous outfit changes. After her Worthy Farm set last month, Lipa faced inaccurate accusations of lip-syncing, but there’s definitely no trace of miming here at Mad Cool.

She’s been preparing intensely for festival season, and it shows. Her dancing, which was once cruelly mocked online for being a bit lacklustre, has improved by miles. Her moves are dynamic and slick as she grinds and squats with her entourage of dancers for her “Training Season” opening. Lipa, wearing a diamante two-piece, becomes more energetic as the set transitions into its bouncier, nightclub-inspired segment when she performs the mashup of her song "New Rules" with Bicep’s “Glue” and a dance mix for “Levitating”.

Saturday night sees a nostalgia whiplash with Bring Me the Horizon, The Killers and The Kooks all bulldozing their way through throwback anthems in the space of a few hours. Luke Pritchard, The Kooks frontman, employs his signature vocal cracks in his 20-year-old wholesome hits “She Moves in Her Own Way”, “Sofa Song” and “Naive”, though the latter is disturbed when an unlikely brawl breaks out in the crowd. The Killers’ set moved locals to tears when a lucky audience member, Daniel from Madrid, was invited onstage by Brandon Flowers to play the drums.

Away from the headliners, British singer-songwriter Michael Kiwanuka puts on a soulful performance before sunset, Leeds junglist Nia Archives brings breakbeats melded with melodic drum’n’bass anthems, and pop veteran Jessie Ware shimmies her way through her disco hits, all the while lassoing a phallic snake around her head.

What lets Mad Cool down is its offering of dance music. The large indoor dance tent, The Loop, hosted thumping sets from English synth master Bonobo, London DJ Jayda G and German producer DJ Koze but the dance bookings rarely move away from techno across the four days. The lack of diversity in music styles isn’t helped when the two afrobeats acts that were booked to perform – Nigerian popstar Rema and “Water” singer Tyla – dropped out at the 11th hour.

Still, though, Mad Cool’s scheduling and crowd control is impressive. It’s a welcome sense of organisation at a time when festivals often seem to be overselling tickets to make extra cash. Here, there’s plenty space to dance, no queues and reliable sunshine. And you don’t need to elbow anybody to get to the front.