DAVID MARTIN reports on the opening night of the North's biggest rock festival, the Leeds Carling Weekend, at Temple Newsam, which continues tonight and tomorrow.

Last night saw the Prodigy and Guns N'Roses return to action.

YES, they did turn up. Eventually.

Guns N'Roses being Guns N'Roses (well, sort of, singer Axl Rose is the only original member left), they took to the Leeds festival stage a mere hour late, before a packed and remarkably patient crowd, and, in true rock n'roll fashion, overran until nearly 1am.

Axl, now 40 years old, (and rather bulkier than when last sighted in the UK a decade ago), can still hit those screeching top notes, but seems desperate to turn the clock back to 1991.

The new band - starring a lead guitarist with a bucket on his head, are convincing at being the world's best tribute band, but only premier a handful of new songs.

While GN'R know their strengths - keeping the set list to the nostalgia-trip Appetite For Destruction classics, from the opening Welcome To The Jungle to the inevitable Sweet Child O'Mine and Paradise City - Axl is still a rambling Rose, letting the set fall apart midway in bad ballads and naff guitar solos. Also on the comeback trail, the Prodigy, too, favoured the greatest hits tactic. They may have lost dancer Leeroy and gained a live drummer and guitarist, but the tentative slices of new material don't hold a candle to the likes of Firestarter and Their Law, and they know it, however much Keith Flint does his John Lydon sneer and Maxim Reality hypes up the crowd. Top marks however for the fantastically unlikely version of Madness's Night Boat To Cairo, complete with sax player.

But while the old guard struggled to remind the crowd of past glories, there were plenty of newer names to save the day, such as dance tent headliners The Streets, successfully bringing their album to life with live musicians, and the awesome Texan alternative rockers And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead blowing away the second stage.

Masked madmen Slipknot's thrash metal pantomime mayhem has to be seen, at least once, and they are the only band of the night with members brave or foolhardy enough to hurl themselves into the crowd. U.S. stars Incubus were very likeable, if so slick it could have been the record. Of the day's rock-flavoured bill, young Brit bands Hundred Reasons and Hell Is For Heroes had plenty about them in the way of melody and energy, and Six By Seven were moody and magnificent, unlike lumbering U.S. clich merchants Puddle Of Mudd. And speaking of mud, the festival mercifully escaped the rain that was lashing York. Disappointment of the day was the no-show of eagerly-awaited cult ska punk band Reel Big Fish.

Updated: 09:52 Saturday, August 24, 2002