Day two of Byron Bay Bluesfest 2023 was a cracker. It was well worth getting to the festival early, as one of the highlights was Southern Avenue who ripped up the Juke Joint just after midday. Their mashup of gospel, blues and R&B had us dancing and blowing away the cobwebs.
Southern Avenue
Over at the Crossroads, our own 19-Twenty, a festival favourite continued on with warming up the crowd for what was to follow. They are playing Saturday and Sunday, so don’t miss them if you are heading out.
LP (feature image) once again blew our socks off. She has an incredible magnetism, and will go down for many as their discovery for Bluesfest 2023.
Christone ‘Kingfish’ Ingram is well and truly a maestro on the guitar. He really does make it sing. With an outstanding band behind him, you are experiencing one of the great Blues showman of the current era.
We were treated to an acoustic set by Beck. It was a more relaxed set than usual by the 8-time Grammy winner. He was in good humour, and even played a song that a mate of his had sent him, which was generated by the AI chatbot as a ‘Beck’ song. It demonstrated that perhaps AI chatbots aren’t all that great at simulating art.
Closing out the Crossroads stage was the irrepressible Gang of Youths. They were at the top of their game. Lead singer Dave Le’aupepe was on fire, prowling the stage, throwing some kick-arse dance shapes, and was passionate and grateful. He suggested that perhaps the audience would be better off seeing Nathaniel Rateliff who was on at a different stage, cause they were better than GOY, but no-one was falling for that. The band was as tight as ever, and it was a fabulous finish to what had been an outstanding day at Bluesfest.
Tickets are still available for the rest of the festival. Check HERE for details.
Check out the rest of Bruce’s photos below.
Header image: LP
