Nos Alive 2018 review: Proving itself once again as one of the best festivals in Europe

Portuguese festival hosts another tremendous lineup - this time leaning more heavily towards rock music - in one of the world's most beautiful cities

Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam performs at NOS Alive festival (Arlindo Camacho)

The festival scene outside the UK has transformed from something of a secret into a general fact: they're better in pretty much every way.

NOS Alive festival in Portugal has been proving this for a while; even among its competitors in Spain, Croatia, Norway and Sweden, it stands out thanks to a multitude of factors that make for a memorable, joyful experience.

Compared to giants such as Primavera in Barcelona, its compact festival site means you don't have to stress about missing artists whose sets overlap with one another. There's a huge variety of food and drink on offer, and most importantly, it's cheap: you can get a generous glass of sangria or a glass of wine for 2 euros, and there are plenty of options for vegetarians, vegans, or people who just don't fancy burgers for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Away from the festival site you also have the option to explore all the delights Lisbon has to offer, from tours of the breathtaking Jerónimos Monastery, wine-tasting, or simple strolls around the city where every corner seems to lead you to another hidden gem - whether it's a local market, vintage store, or a tiny church at the top of a flight of stone steps, where you can take refuge from the blazing sun beneath cool stone and beautiful painted tiles.

Where last year's festival leaned towards pop and R&B, with headliners including The Weeknd and Depeche Mode, 2018's edition of NOS is rock-heavy, starring Arctic Monkeys, Pearl Jam, Jack White, Nine Inch Nails and Queens of the Stone Age plus the likes of Franz Ferdinand, Wolf Alice, The National and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club. Yet, as is the general approach for European festivals, NOS caters to an eclectic variety of tastes, so also welcomed the likes of Chvrches, Rag'n'Bone Man, US artist Khalid, French pop star Jain, emerging pop icon SOPHIE, Mercury Prize-winner Sampha, Brooklyn favourites Yo La Tengo, and Portuguese art-pop darlings The Gift.

Nine Inch Nails managed to attract a huge crowd on the first night ahead of Arctic Monkeys' headline set, with frontman Trent Reznor giving it his all on songs including 1994's classic "Closer", tracks off their latest album Bad Witch, and a cover of Bowie's "I'm Afraid of Americans", which replaces Reznor's recently-retired rendition of "I Can't Give Everything Away" off his final album Blackstar.

In possibly one of the biggest musical anticlimaxes of the year, Nine Inch Nails are followed by Snow Patrol. You'd think that tracks like "Chasing Cars", "Open Your Eyes" and "Just Say Yes" would inspire a kind of drunken nostalgia, but even those songs fall flat, and the most recent, from the band's new album Wildness, barely cause a ripple among the static audience.

Arctic Monkeys, who released one of the most divisive albums of 2018 with Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino, perfectly meld that new material with their back catalogue. Set-opener "Four Out Of Five" is just as well-received as "Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High" off 2014's critically-acclaimed AM, while Turner primps and preens his way through his new album's title track before a sultry, hip-swaying rendition of "Do I Wanna Know?"

Nothing, of course, goes down quite as well as "I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor", prompting Turner to quip ahead of the performance: "This song didn't really mean anything to us when we released it all those years ago.... and it still doesn't mean anything to us now."

Friday sees resplendent sets from Glaswegian synth-pop band CHVRCHES plus American synth-pop act Future Islands, where frontman Samuel T. Herring is as exuberant as ever; twisting, leaping and crouching in so many contorted, wild poses you think he's about to topple off the stage at any moment.

Lauren Mayberry of Chvrches performs at NOS Alive festival (Hugo Macedo)

On the same stage - Palco Sagres - the now aptly-named Portugal. The Man deliver a superb rock-out performance that, of course, includes a raucous play of their hit "Feel It Still".

Two Door Cinema Club fare much better than the aforementioned Snow Patrol when it comes to revisiting your teenage nostalgia, with tracks such as "Undercover Martyn" and "What You Know" feeling as fresh as the day they were released, while more recent, funkier material like "Bad Decisions" of their latest record Gameshow has everyone dancing.

Scottish indie band Franz Ferdinand, led by the irrepressible Alex Kapranos, offers a wonderful, rather surprising set crammed with the likes of "Take Me Out" and "The Dark of the Martinee", ahead of a blistering show by Jack White who seems more than happy to air out The Raconteurs' "Steady As She Goes" and The White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army" alongside more recent cuts from his solo album Boarding House Reach.

He re-emerges onstage at the invitation of Pearl Jam after the camera catches him with his hands over his face in shy disbelief as Eddie Vedder sings his praises, joining them for a well-worn but nonetheless uplifting cover of Neil Young's "Rockin' In The Free World" and sending ecstatic fans back out into the night.