After hearing about the epic 6 hour delays some punters encountered entering the camping area in the later hours of Thursday evening, I couldn’t help but be thankful I had elected to stay in a hotel in Brisbane for the first night. Thankfully, the delays were down to between 1 and 2 hours by the time we made it to the beautiful Woodfordia on Friday, the sun bearing down on us, barely a cloud in sight.
Unfortunately I had missed Violent Soho by the time I set up camp and made it in, but thankfully Two Door Cinema Club (pictured below), the festival’s second international drawcard (the fantastic Joy Formidable were first) were only just getting started at the Mix Up Tent.
The three piece from New York have been raved about in the indie community for quite some time now, however their heavily layered, gorgeous music failed to translate in the festival atmosphere. This is a band that are meant to be seen in the sweaty dark basements of venues like the Oxford Art Factory in Sydney, not surrounded by 15,000 people who just downed their first pill. But to hear a good mix of tracks from both LPs, Alpinisms and Disconnect from Desire was a treat nonetheless, with the more familiar tracks, such as “Chain” from the former, proving crowd favourites.
The Pontoon Bar was a great place to grab a beer… midstrength or otherwise!
One of the most painful clashes of the festival followed: Yeasayer vs Foals vs Alberta Cross. Having seen two of the three in sideshows earlier that week, it made Foals the obvious choice for myself, although I daresay many others may have struggled! As Graz DJed between Seven Bells and Foals, the chants of the dedicated Foals fans started early, with the crowd cheering for the band some 15 minutes before they were due on. It was clear Foals were going to get an energetic crowd. Graz briefly gained our attention with a “So Happy Together” singalong – just moments before the band arrived, forced him to cut the song off early.
Arriving onto a stage drowned in ambient blue light, the five piece from Oxford (pictured above) were finally making their first voyage to our shores, so it’s no surprise they were given the reception of heroes. They opened with album namesake “Total Life Forever” before favourite off Antidotes, “Cassius” got a play. Recent single “Miami” was next, but it was Total Life Forever opener “Blue Blood” and epic single “Spanish Sahara” which were the highlights of the day. It really showed how far this band had come – their new material was far outshining their older hits. And this was a sentiment surprisingly shared by the crowd before them. “Spanish Sahara” was also introduced by Yannis informing us “If you have joints, smoke ‘em now!” – indeed, this was the sort of song where this would be warranted.
The GW McLennan Stage
Moving back to Antidotes, “Heavy Water” was pretty fantastic, and featured a lovely dose of Cowbell. I particularly enjoyed it later in the set, too, when lead singer and guitarist Yannis Philippaki got a dose of drummer syndrome, and after joining his drummer on the decks for one of the many awesome jams, he proceeded to throw his drumstick quite far into the crowd, looking pretty proud of himself afterwards. “Two Steps, Twice” ended the fantastic set. Here’s hoping they come back soon so I can enjoy them in some more intimate surrounds! Although it was pretty cool to get a little sweaty with everyone for my first taste of festival action in a while. It may as well have been a Summer festival with the heat on offer!
After taking Virgin Mobile up on their “free solar powered phone charger” offer (it worked OK for the first day… but seemed to gradually die along with my phone), the supremely underrated Black Rebel Motorcycle Club were the next band I enjoyed, over on the main Amphitheatre stage. This being my first glimpse of the stage, I was shocked by just how MASSIVE the setup was. It was as big as the blue or orange stage at Big Day Out and was set at the base of a hill – allowing for a pretty spectacular view for all. To compensate with the sort of echo that comes from such a venue, the organisers cranked Black Rebel up to 11, helping make them one of the best tastes of rock and roll we’d see at the festival.
Losing drummer Nick Lago between their last two albums, it was a bit of a shock to see Leah Shapiro (previously the touring drummer for The Ravonettes) on drums – but you wouldn’t have noticed soundwise – she is a killer drummer, an apt replacement. Following on from Foals, Black Rebel, too, opened their set with their latest album’s namesake “Beat the Devil’s Tattoo”. Having seen this band quite a few times over the years, it was great to see some of these new tracks make an appearance. But it was far from being a focus of the set. Favourite “Love Burns” off their 2001 self-titled debut LP was their second track, before they returned to the new album with the superb “Bad Blood”. Favourites of the rest of the hour long set included “Red Eyes and Tears”, “Ain’t No Easy Way”, “Weapon of Choice” and “Whatever Happened to My Rock ‘N’ Roll”. It great to see their songs from almost a decade ago still holding up so well.
I made my way back to the Mix Up stage to find that the majority of the attendants taking over the stage to catch Hot Chip (sans Joe Goddard, who was on paternity leave). It’s pretty understandable why – these guys are killer live. Having caught them at Big Day Out in 2009, I was quite honestly blown away by just how great they were – so tonight would come of little surprise.
Spending the set outside of the overflowing tent, I couldn’t quite enjoy it as much as at Big Day Out, but it was still a pretty fantastic time. A band who know their strengths and weaknesses live, they play to nothing but the former, and dish out hit after hit. “And I Was A Boy From School” came early on, and new tracks “I Feel Better” and “One Night Stand” sent the crowd on fire. But it remained racks “Over & Over”, “One Pure Thought”, “Hold On” (with an extended jam) and set closer “Ready For The Floor” which gained the most insane of receptions. And when a Splendour crowd goes insane, they do it better than any other festival crowd I know of. With no home to return to tonight, the majority of the crowd leave all their inhibitions at the door. And it’s for this reason that I pushed my way to the front for LCD Soundsystem, as Bag Raiders mixed things up on the decks, and I got my dancing shoes on.
Ah, LCD Soundsystem (pictured above and below). So this is the farewell tour? Well, we shall see about that. The moniker of James Murphy shows no signs of slowing down after tonight’s performance, made up predominantly of hits, as disco balls lit up the tent in fantastic fashion. “Us vs Them” opened things up, and the remainder of the set was as follows: “Drunk Girls”, “Pow Pow”, “Daft Punk is Playing at My House”, “All My Friends”, “I Can Change”, “Tribulations”, “Movement”, “Yeah (Crass Version)” and finally “Losing My Edge” which closed out the set. As you can tell by the setlist, it didn’t exactly close out on the most energetic of notes, but that didn’t take away from what was a fantastic set of great sound, great energy and a great response from the crowd.
I made way to Grizzly Bear (below) next, catching most of their amazing set on the GW McLennan Stage. While the same lighting we encountered at Sydney Festival earlier this year was set up, it unfortunately encountered some technical difficulties for a good portion of the set. Still, that didn’t take away from the sound that was coming off the stage – surprisingly perfect – and a set which was much less weighted towards the new material than in their last appearance on our shores. Plenty of tracks off of Horn of Plenty and Yellow House got a listen. It may have isolated some of the newer fans, but it was a thrill to hear some of these tracks live for the first time.* Nonetheless, tracks “While We Wait For The Others”, “Two Weeks” and “Ready, Able” (featuring wonderful lighting effects), proved highlights of the night, as they did in January.
Meanwhile, back at the Mix Up tent, Scissor Sisters were rocking things up, sans a rumoured Kylie Minogue appearance, with a good mix of tracks off all three albums. Tracks like “Laura” and “Tits on the Radio” gained the best reception, which for me is unsurprising considering their first album is their only truly listenable record. But even so, it all came off a bit too over-the-top for me, and the band failed to impress.
Moving over to the main stage, I caught up with Ben Harper and friends next, who had replaced the Relentless7 set last minute with a set of his own numbers, which included the classic “Diamonds on the Inside”, giving the crowd a pretty lovely singalong. It wasn’t the most energetic set I’ve seen come out of Mr. Harper – in fact for the portion of the set I witnessed, he remained seated and fairly unenthusiastic, but this may not have represented the remainder. “Waiting For You” and “Please Bleed” were among the other tracks played in the hour or so set.
Compared to the nights which were to follow, it was a fairly lacklustre way to end a pretty spectacular day – but given how epic the journey to Woodfordia had been, and how epic the days that were to follow would be, I think we were all thankful for the rest.
*Well, the first time in which I knew the tracks. I caught Grizzly Bear back in 2006, supporting TV on the Radio in Vancouver, before I had any idea who they were. It was one of the most spectacular introductions I’ve ever had to a band – and I no doubt heard many of these tracks then!
