Electric Picnic Salty Dog line-up revealed as marine themed entertainment returns to Laois

A picnic favourite is set to make a return with even more marine themed entertainment. 

The passing of time has made little difference to the gradual decomposition of this infamous trawler into the forest bed. The battered deck of the Salty Dog, wheezing under the strain of several years of wanton neglect, invaded by rot and rust, will be disguised with a lick of paint the day before the festival, and presented with a toothy grin by its bloodshot-eyed crew.

This year's line-up includes Sprints, Bronagh Gallagher, Thumper, Overhead the Albatross, The Eskies, Gurriers, Powpig, RSAG, Super Extra Bonus Party, Cathay Davey, Jinx Lennon, Tebi Rex, Tan and Sober Gentlemen, These Charming Gentlemen, White Horse Guitar Club, The Deadlians, Bootleg Beach Boys perform Pet Sounds, William the Conqueror, Darnell Cole, Pale Blue Eyes, Racoon Jane, The Blessed, The Love Buzz, Code of Behaviour, The Donnys, The Molgoggers, Monsieur Pompiers Freakshow, Salty Dog No Stars and more acts to be announced. 

Troubadours all - press-ganged, poorly paid, drenched in bootleg rum, and barked at by the stump-toothed captain for leaving guitar picks lying around - find themselves wondering how they became part of the stench. 

Why? Because the Salty Dog is where parents never wanted their children to end up, and that's why they are all there. Including the parents. 

The new dockside holds in the collective belly of its patrons, and the turn-of-the-century harbour that provides a bosom for the decadent to weep into will once again come to life - if 'life' is the right word for the kind of riff-raff that frequent this miscreant port. The scurvy-riddled crew barter for washed up buoys and stolen lobster pots with a man in a van near New Ross, and scavenge for anchors and sails from a shipyard in the dead of night.

Lights are slung high in the sky and The Salty Dog is ready: hustlers, rustlers, duckers and divers move like critters around the port, feigning honesty with fixed grins, doing anything to turn a dime - blood spatters from the crude dentist shop, tattooed giants arm-wrestle girls for ale, grime-covered merchants hawk smoked fish and contraband oysters, warty ladies mend fishing nets and croak shanties at each other, and unqualified doctors offer guidance for unsavoury medical complaints.

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Salty Dog - life at the bottom of the barrel.