Playing times for the inaugural Harvest Festival have been announced. But For Sydney and Brisbane only; not Melbourne. Yet.

Which is a little worrying considering Melbourne is the first stop on the tour, to kick-off next Saturday 12th November. The reason for the delay in timetables appearing? According to promoter AJ Maddah (via twitter), it's a case of keeping the bands happy:

Apologies for the lateness of #HarvestAus timetables. We're nearing the end of 6 weeks of horse-trading, massaging egos & kissing ass.

He added soon after:

We have 1 more battle to win before melbourne goes up.

Damn those pernickity indie bands.

Perhaps the delay can be pinned on Portishead's wont to haggle over PA specs. The band's multi-instrumentalist and resident producer, Geoff Barrow told Stereogum recently:

"We’ve never been ones to do a soundcheck and say, “Oh, I guess that will do. It sounds enough like we want it to.” Basically it’s either right or it’s totally fucking wrong. For Coachella I turned up to do a soundcheck at 7AM on this giant PA system and we have all this old gear and all the technicians are scowling at our equipment. Again, it’s like, “Why are you bothering with all this old crap gear?” But in the end we completely murdered with that gig. I don’t mean that in a cocky way. It’s just the truth. We killed ‘em."

Or maybe it's the Flaming Lips being dissatisfied with the laundry options on offer. Wayne Coyne confessed to TinyMixTapes last year, that their routine of arranging fans and friends to dress up in costumes on stage doesn't always go according to plan:

"We did have a Russian woman, one time, pee in the costume which she wanted to do. [Pauses] Now, that's weird. After she did it, we said, “Why did you do that?” and she said, “It's just my dream. I wanted to pee in that costume while you guys played.” That's the kind of audience we want to attract, and when we do, we say, “Wow!” So, that's weird."

But then again, perhaps it's the National being annoyed at the playing times, bassist Scott Devendorf explaining to europandme.eu why festivals can be so "awkward":

"It is a million reasons. The scheduling: What time you are on, what bands are playing at the same time. We went to a festival in Ireland which is a great festival but we played at the same time as Beyonce, who is a huge popstar you know so I would rather be seeing Beyonce. So there were not many people and the weather was not good. And that’s the thing about festivals. There are so many things you can’t do anything about."


HARVEST FESTIVAL - PLAYING TIMES

MELBOURNE: TIMETABLE (COMING SOON) | MAP
SYDNEY: TIMETABLE | MAP
BRISBANE: TIMETABLE | MAP


Here's the full music program:

HARVEST - A CIVILISED GATHERING - 2011

The Flaming Lips
Portishead
Bright Eyes
TV On The Radio
The National
Holy Fuck
Mercury Rev
Death In Vegas
The Walkmen
The Holidays
PVT
Dappled Cities
Foxy Shazam
The Family Stone
Hypnotic Brass Ensemble
This Town Needs Guns
Phosphorescent
Kormac’s Big Band
Devind Townsend

Saturday 12th November – Werribee Park, Melbourne
Sunday 13th November – Parramatta Park, Sydney
Saturday 19th November – Botanical Gardens, Brisbane

harvestfestival.com.au