SPLENDOUR IN THE GRASS 2018
North Byron Parklands
“Have a drink every time you see a chick in fishnets!” exclaims the wily teen. His cohorts erupt in cheers, privy to the in-joke. Fishnet bodysuits haven’t been this popular since Cher straddled that anti-aircraft cannon on Big Mo.
The giddy enthusiasm of these lads suggests it’s their first Splendour in the Grass and I share their energy by proxy. This is my twelfth visit to the circus, first attending the big bash as a fresh-faced twenty-two-year-old when Bloc Party made their Aussie festival debut at two in the afternoon, Queens of the Stone Age’s hit new single was ‘Little Sister’ and Moby garnered the reverence required to close the festival.
These cum guns, these whippersnappers with their hormones and blind pimples, are ready to blow. Fizzing piccolos of sparkling wine primed to launch their corks into the roof of this Blanch’s shuttle bus, then pile out at the gate and mark their territory with a casual cock of their hind legs. And here I sit, tentatively, behind the driver, wondering how he keeps the width of the bus in the narrow lane, half wishing these kids would keep their corks in, half wishing I’d shelved a pinger and was right there with them. It’s like looking into the past. Thirteen years went somewhere, ash scattered to the wind.
Through the bus window, the familiar rainbow capital letters roll into view, spelling the festival’s name in a Technicolor mock Hollywood sign, driven into the gentle undulation of the hillside. Teens turn to statues at the foot of the hill, frozen for Instagram. It’s an obligatory shot. You’ve arrived. Splendour is in session.
Through the gates and past those motorcycle ashtrays, the sniffer dogs, I make a beeline for the GW McLennan tent. Named in honour of the fallen Go-Between this stage has changed over the years, gaining size until it’s comparable to the Splendour main stage of the mid-noughties, back at ol’ Belongil Fields. But for a browser of discerning taste such as myself, it’s usually got the best acts.
An almighty crowd has flowed in for Jack River, aka Holly Rankin, a Forster lass of decidedly sugary pop leanings. There’s something otherworldly about her presence, draped in a shimmering floor-length Dreamcoatthat catches the purples and blues of the lights above. Performing as a four-piece gives the sound some welcome muscle. The pristine pop of debut record Sugar Mountain (named after the Neil Young tune) translates to the live arena with some frayed and welcome edges, recalling ‘90s quirks like that of The Cardigans. Here in the crowd, the birds are on each other’s shoulders, bellies full of earworms like ‘Fool’s Gold’ and ‘Fault Line’. Then Rankin serves a little dessert. Tal Bachman’s ‘She’s So High’, a hit from 1999 which, remarkably, would have been written before most of this audience was conceived. Chew on that. Nonetheless, these larvae lose their fucking minds. Tal Bachman. Socially relevant.
There’s thick clouds of Parklands dust roiling all around me, like blooming Nesquik, kicked up by the surrounding stampede. This is the trade off for ten inches of Parklands mud, which has been the Splendour site trend since its inception. Expensive gumboots. Muscular calves. Weary ankles. Quagmire as far as the eye can see. But not this time. The sky’s been kind and rain will not befall us. So I breathe it in, relishing silted lung and crusted nostil.
I boot-scoot over to the Amphetitheatre where those decibel demons The Bronx are plying their trade. They could have played from Los Angeles and you’d still be able to hear them. The monstrous Joey Castillo is behind the kit, wielding the same blistering power he brought to Queens of the Stone Age, Eagles of Death Metal and Danzig. It’s old school hardcore punk, no holds barred, aggressive energy, balled fists and knotted biceps.
But where are the kids? I’m enjoying this hardcore punk ferocity from a seated position side of stage, but when I glance out into the voluminous natural amphitheatre, it’s in a state of emptiness. Barren. No humans except for one solitary boy, all of seventeen, black clothed, white knuckled, gripping the front barricade, sweaty, eyes wide and wild as if he’s being slowly rotated over an open fire. He’s got security on edge despite his meagre frame. That’s the effect The Bronx’s music has on people. Shame there’s not more folks here.
The Amphetitheatre is decidedly more crammed when DMA’s appear on the main stage half an hour after The Bronx go for a well-deserved slice of orange. DMA’s, in fact, have filled the hillside. Massive audience.
This Sydney three-piece look like the kind of scallywags that David Jones security chase from their stores on the reg, trying to prevent the little scamps from nickin’ all their Nautica polos. DMA’s, however, probably pay for their Nautica. They probably have a yacht too.
Sonically, though, these lads write Brit-pop-inspired songs that match it with the best cuts of the ‘90s decade they’re pillaging. As the shimmering melodic waves of ‘In the Air’ saunter up to you and delicately cup your testes, you’re momentarily reassured that everything’s going to be fine. You can almost forgive the false apostrophe in their name.
Lord Huron are at the top of my to-watch list this year, so I mince back over to the GW McLennan, kicking my heels with heightened revelry. I’ve heard a few choice nugs from the Los Angeles foursome, who tour as a sextet, and my sonar’s detected hints of Band of Horses, My Morning Jacket, Fleet Foxes etcetera. Pastoral folk serenity.
A few things strike you about Lord Huron when they take centre stage. They’re well-dressed. They’re dapper. Musically, they tease spacey alt-country jams. Opener ‘Ancient Names Pt 1’ has a propulsive thrust supplied by Mark Barry’s kinetic drumming, and it’s slightly ragged when performed live compared to the neatly assembled studio version. But I’m looking for frayed edges. To a Rusted-on Crazy Horse fan like yours truly, Lord Huron’s pastoral rock is too easily digested. Too considered. I want them to get weird. The boppy bop-bops of ‘Fool For Love’ ain’t gonna put lead in my pencil. Where’s the distortion, Huron? My ears aren’t yet ringing! That said, they’ve got some crackin’ songs. ‘Wait By the River’ is a yearning waltz that makes you want to put your tongue in someone. I just wish Lord Huron were more rough and ready. They’re giving me Bud Light. I want a brew you can stand a spoon in.
Kids hurriedly wrench cell phones from their pockets and hit record when Huron play their wistful love ballad ‘The Night We Met’, which was given a new lease on life when it appeared in Netflix’s teen drama 13 Reasons Why. Never saw the program myself, though I heard it made kids want to kill themselves. Kinda like when I catch a few seconds of Love Island. The song, an undeniably pretty thing, is to Lord Huron what ‘No One’s Gonna Love You’ is to Band of Horses. There’s some goddamn wedding royalties comin’ their way. Let’s hope they spend it on overdrive pedals.
Saturday finds me sitting on the grass of the Amphetitheatre at midday, sucking on a vodka cocktail. It’s passionfruit suspended in a refreshing reddish juice, possibly pomegranate or bottlebrush nectar or pureed hummingbird. It’s sweet and goes down very nicely with the dreamy disposition of Byron Bay’s Seaside. Their indie-pop might not yet have the widescreen atmospherics to adequately fill a gargantuan amphitheatre, but their serene arrangements lend themselves to this most sunlit of hours, like light shimmering on the ocean. Lady singer Darcy’s vocals are fragile, butterfly wings undulating over psychedelic guitars and a slinking rhythm section. They give Halcyon treatment to Pixies’ ‘Hey’ and it’s pretty good. One suspects Seaside will be the soundtrack of many summers to come.
Another Byron Bay band are in hot pursuit. The Babe Rainbow keep Flower Power fertilised and well watered. Their swirling ‘60s psych pop makes me want to chew a fistful of blotters and float away into the nether regions of the Milky Way.
The five-piece group look like they should be solving mysteries with Scooby-Doo, and they’re either using a smoke machine in broad daylight or their guitar tech has self-immolated. But I’m otherwise entranced by their sickly sweet arrangements and Beatnik charm.
It’s early enough in the day to venture to the Mix Up Tent, that simmering chemistry lab of gas leaks and open flames. It’s usually a wild ol’ orgy of writhing flesh, dilated pupils and deep bass. But in this early afternoon hour it hosts duo No Mono, a collaboration between Tom Iansek, of Big Scary and #1Dads, and the alien-voiced Tom Snowdown. The pair crafted the #1Dads tune ‘Return To’, which blew up, and decided there was more to explore.
This set is experimental and transcendental. More arresting than the entire NSW police force. Snowdown’s inhuman octave-dancing vocal chords glide over Iansek’s beats and sample-based wizardry. My mind turns to James Vincent McMorrow, Active Child and Anohni. The duo performs ‘Return To’ and soon lay down a sumptuous ‘Unchained Melody’ by The Righteous Brothers. This is especially unifying, with strangers putting their arms around each other’s shoulders, forming a human fence through the centre of the tent, swaying to Snowdown’s preternatural rendition.
Methyl Ethyl are amongst the most interesting pop bands in Australia at the moment, alongside Holy Holy, and their radio-worthy anthems are given the big test when they take to the Amphetitheatre stage. There’s a lot of people here. To escape the throng I’ve climbed the slope to the special Gold Bar in the sky, where very important media and industry types watch from a private bar at the rear of this giant half bowl, this cauldron of humanity.
Methyl Ethyl’s sound isn’t travelling well. I’ve chosen decadence over the music. It’s the tyranny of distance! Nevertheless, I get strong sense of how superb bangers ‘No. 28’, ‘Ubu’ and ‘Twilight Driving’ would sound if I was engaged. If I gave more of a damn. In 2005 I’d have been front and centre, breathing second-hand pot smoke, pressed against random folk like durries in a fresh pack. What’s become of me? Where did it all go so wrong? I sip my beer.
Let me tell you something for free. Gang of Youths are very popular. I wish I understood them. I wish I could like them. On paper, I should be a fan. They tick lots of boxes. There’s the DNA of Bruce Springsteen, Paul Westerberg and ‘80s goth-tinged new wave. I like David Le’aupepe’s voice. I’m impressed with his hip work and how wet he’s making everyone. If I had a vagina I’d need a bucket under me. GoY have the songwriting ambitions of a band that normally takes my fancy. Bold. Cinematic. Shape-shifting.
Yet I’m left cold. A sea of people bubbles before me, each having a life-affirming experience, singing every word, basking in the immediacy of Le’aupepe’s poetry and presence. And here I stand, watching from my lofty tower, sipping my tinnie, waiting for the penny to drop. It doesn’t. Not yet.
Those seasoned Scotsman Franz Ferdinand are a must-see festival band, with the setlist artillery for a sure-fire good-time party. I’ve seen them many times over the years, including a spectacular New Year’s Eve headline performance at Falls Festival. They’re still hard to fault in 2018, but they’re lacking the dangerous energy that made their new-wave revival tunes so addictive a decade ago. I wander down the front and am quickly reminded of how damn addictive tunes like ‘Do You Want To’ can be. From the razor riffs of ‘Michael’ to the foot-stomping grooves of ‘No You Girls’ and ‘The Dark of the Matinée’, they are hard to deny.
But tonight Franz seem too comfortable, too casual. They’ve got nothing to prove. I’m patiently waiting for them to reach full mast. Even ‘Ulysses’, their biggest banger, doesn’t slap me around the head like it should. Neither does the requisite ‘Take Me Out’. I resign myself to the notion that Franz have lost some of their vigor, their brash shoot-from-the-hip swagger. But then it reappears with gusto for the closer, ‘This Fire’, when the Franz Ferdinand of old steps forth. The crowd loses their collective shit and a wave of relief crashes over me in a slow, glorious arc.
Confession time. Never been a big fan of Ben Harper. ‘Diamonds on the Inside’ makes me want to stick knitting needles in my ears. But here in the McLennan tent, I am being schooled, baby. Holy moly. Harper is bringing the fire, joined by bona fide blues legend Charlie Musselwhite. The pair, backed by a world-class band, are touring their latest collaborative record, No Mercy in This Land, and the result is a heavy blues masterclass.
Musselwhite is ripping on the harp, and I don’t mean the type on Ireland’s coat of arms. Harper leans heavily on his lap steel, like he’s trying to extract information. He’s assaulting it like it spat in his drink. You might even say that he’s “shredding”. I nearly jump the barricade and attempt a daring rescue.
Taking turns on lead vocals, Harper and Musselwhite stroll through one of the best festival sets I’ve seen in recent years. ‘The Bottle Wins Again’ is a highlight. Mighty, mighty, mighty.
Skeggs kick my Sunday into high gear. By way of Dune Rats’ label Ratbag Records, the three-piece is at the forefront of this Aussie surf garage pop-punk movement that’s threatening to take over the world. It’s exuberant, exquisitely simple and celebrates loud guitars. I’m taken back to when I first heard Green Day’s Dookie all those moons ago.
I sidle past the Snoop Hot Doggs, this year’s inflatable art installation centrepiece, to the Busker Stage, where Vinnie Laduce weaves tunes with a microphone and a box of tricks. Sparse bedroom beats and minimal samples come together in a super-chill summer-soaked pill that brings the small but attentive crowd to its feet, dancing in the sunshine. With French export Aasiya laying down some slinking bass grooves, Vinnie coos and croons over tunes like ‘Passion Pop’, ‘Spinning’ and the bed-ready ‘Want You’.
After watching a couple of songs by Sampa the Great, I realise I’m guilty of being ignorant to her brilliance. I only dabble in hip hop, but a moment’s marveling at the stage production, with its cookin’ live band, phenomenal backing singers, and generally empowering aesthetic, makes me realise that Sampa the Great is not just a clever name. The pint-sized singer and rapper is a superstar, one worthy of worldwide acclaim.
Sampa’s lyrics leave her mouth like a chain gun, at times aggressive, at times reflective and gentle, residing more in the realm of woke poetry than throwaway rhymes. The Zambian-born, Botswanan-raised musician stalks the stage, a lioness, and it’s scintillating to watch.
Australia loves The Wombats. Calculated, of course, on their behalf, for they named themselves after one of our most beloved marsupials. Next, to me a big bloke in a hi-vis onesie dances and wails every syllable, bouncing as if on an ant’s nest. The lunatic is on the grass.
The Liverpudlian trio writes playful, self-deprecating and endearing pop that doesn’t require a high cognitive capacity. Often tongue-in-cheek, The Wombats wring every bit of volume and energy out of their three-piece arrangements. ‘Moving to New York’ remains their best tune.
If I’m being brutally honest, I came to Splendour a twelfth time for the promise of seeing Kendrick Lamar. I watched him lay waste to Bluesfest a few years back, converting the wary and incredulous with his searing gospel. We speak of the departure of music’s giants, having seen Bowie, Cohen and the like float into the constellations. We’ve watched them transcend death upon departure, gone to the annals of folklore. But some giants still walk among us.
Kendrick Lamar, Pulitzer Prize winner and social sage, builds anticipation with a marginally late arrival time. But when the Amphetitheatre plunges into black the crowd, the biggest I’ve seen at Splendour since Outkast, shakes the earth with their singular roar.
Lamar’s set is punctuated by fun videos that depict the rapper’s transformation into spiritually enlightened martial artist Kung Fu Kenny, with one such clip opening proceedings. Then the man himself appears, backlit, lights carving out his silhouette. Then it’s an hour-long greatest hits set, from opener ‘DNA.’ to ‘ELEMENT.’. There’s 30,000 folks in his pocket, chanting every word, every catch phrase that’s been osmotically absorbed into millennial vernacular.
Third song’s ‘King Kunta’ and, yes, the funk is within us. Kenny does a collab medley, dropping his Black Panther tune ‘Big Shot’ before delivering his verses on Travis Scott’s ‘goosebumps’ and Schoolboy Q’s ‘Collard Greens’. Then the Good Kid goes back to m.A.A.d city, with ‘Backbeat Freestyle’. We’re right there with him. We wanna fuck the world for 72 hours. There’s more m.A.A.d cuts: ‘Money Trees’, ‘Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe’, ‘The Art of Peer Pressure’ and ‘Swimming Pools (Drank)’. There’s more DAMN.: ‘XXX.’, ‘LOVE’ and ‘PRIDE.’. We’re gonna be ‘Alright’. His Hottest 100 winner ‘HUMBLE.’ is teased and the whole crowd spits it a capella, before Kenny, ever the nimble expert, backtracks and gives the song its full-blooded treatment. He’s all lyrical roundhouse kicks and flying elbows. A true master. Then he’s gone.
The mass exodus begins, straining through the exits like blood through a cholesterol-lined artery. My stomach’s starting to RUMBLE., as seems to be the trend, with the kids doing the midnight line-up for a final Splendour chew. I track down a burger and make my way for the exit. A Gen Z bloke in front of me, all of nineteen, also has a burger in his mitt. “It’s raw!” he wails, showing his mates. “Fuckin’ hell,” he says. “That’s fucked, ay. Fuckin’ raw.” He takes another small bite. His friends are laughing, mocking his apparent misfortune. He walks over to a group of police officers and complains to them about the state of his chow. I don’t say anything, I just wander past, floating on this river of departure. As I bite into my own burger, it occurs to me that sometimes you don’t realise just how good you’ve got it. You see, I saw that kid’s patty. Got a real good look over his shoulder. It was perfect medium rare. Cooked to perfection.
