Splendour in the Grass - Sunday
Belongil Fields, Byron Bay
Sunday 26th July, 2009

There's simply no chance of getting to the festival grounds in time to see Danananakyroyd, Lost Valentinos, Jack Ladder or The Middle East. Which we're annoyed about. Particularly the latter after seeing them at the FBi benefit show at the Metro a few months back, and how the bigger arena works to their advantage. Nuts. 



By the time we scramble our blog update, walking shoes, rain poncho (which we never have to use, thankfully) and banana and coconut bread, we're running late for Friendly Fires. Which is disasterous. We suspected the UK debutantes might be the hit at the festival and judging from the crowds of people we keep walking past discussing whether they would've started or not, we're not alone. 



Somehow we make it just two songs into their set, squueze down to near the front and soak it in. Primarily a "dance" act - or at least, put as such on the Mix Up stage - the four-piece band in full flight have hints of the grandiose indie-rock side of things to boot. They would work equally as well playing with Arcade Fire, Interpol and Modest Mouse as they would with with LCD Soundsystem, Justice and !!!. The massive crowd is 100% behind them and they play accordingly, singer Ed Macfarlane a pocket rocket, writhing and punching the mic out in front of him in a dervish, while the lanky Edd Harris wrings joyous post-punk sparks out of his Mustang even as he dances wildly. Underpinning their tunes is a constant percussive groove, almost tribal (as Macfarlane says near the end of the set "All you need is drums to dance") and it sends everyone spare. The pulsing synth to mark the start of 'Paris' gets a giant roar and it's smiles and spirit fingers all round as the tent screams "They'll be out for us" in unison. The highlight of our festival. Everyone should try to see these guys at least once.
 



We manouver past Kisschasy, who's stoic guitar rock sounds pretty solid on the main stage, even if their angsty brand of pop is well off our radar. The walk takes us past Bob Evans on the GW McClennan stage who's friendly, country-tinged musings exist somewhere similar. We have to choose now between the reliably epic Sydney band Decoder Ring and UK's Doves, and feel slightly annoyed with ourselves the tourists win out. 



The Doves are one of those bands that always sound good to me but not great. As if they could just as easily be on in the background as pulling your attention when the right place and time allows. We're up close for the band and I find my attention drifting as one easy melody follows another. All reliably nice and solid; definitely not dangerous, inspired or piercing. Perhaps suited better to the dark. Or the car.



As night settles in the Gutter Twins are playing to a small crowd of diehards. Fifteen years ago Greg Dulli and Mark Lanagen would've been headlining this festival (if it existed) with their respective bands The Afghan Whigs and Screaming Trees. Toting acoustics instead of blooded pages of the new testament, they're no less imposing. I don't hear them say anything but "Thankyou". Dulli still looks like a mischievous altar boy, if a little chubbier, and Lanegan still looks like a character from the woods. Mean. He sits between Dulli and some ring-in on guitar with his eyes shut, face scowled and hands planted on each knee as if about to orate some great tale. All he needs to do is ripple his tattooed fingers and grimace and you get the sense that the girl on the other side of his narratives didn't fare so well. Dulli's the good cop, still wringing fine vocals from a voice that was never meant to pitch perfectly, but nail his muse with intent. It's great. The crowd slowly builds and there's a sense that Splendour is no place for The Gutter Twins, but also that that's probably how they like it. 

We take our time leaving the Gutter Twins behind. There's some Buddhist Monks doing their gutteral chanting thing by a fire and it's a pleasant distraction. Funnily enough it's only while watching them "om" and munching on another doughnut that I realise for the first time what a battelfield of sound is careening around the festival grounds. Above the trees birds flash in the evening air like slow fireworks, distant festival lights bouncing against them momentarily. We walk past the ever pumping Tipi forest and I'm keen for some lollies from the muppet-wearing kids in the doof tent but don't really feel I look wasted enough. There's a massive line for the Jager Cube, which appears to be a nightclub - which we have back home - so instead of waiting around we go past Grinspoon. Who we'd relegated to a local footnote but no so the crowd, who love it with frothing abandon. Mmm.



Like Meredith last year, the anticipation for the arrival of MGMT is palpable. People are milling around well before showtime and I even wonder if Grinspoon's crowd is so big because people were just getting a spot for the Brooklyn hipsters. Entry to the front section was long ago cordened off, and as we plant ourselves a vantage point we can't see a single space left uncovered by humans; outside the fence in the distance trying to see in, up trees, scaling poles, perched on shoulders as far as the eye can see. 

It's frustrating then the kind of show that MGMT put on. I'm an unabashed fan of every track on Oracular Spectacular, right down to the meandering '4th Dimensional Transition'. So it's annoying how little attention they command live. At both Meredith last December and here at Splendour, it feels like the crowd are allowing them to be better than the band deserve. Maybe they're just studio nerds who can write a good tune but can't harness the tsunami of goodwill to entertain, but you'd think a few outbursts of tangible emotion would be all you'd need to send the crowd, now dripping off anywhere they can fit themselves, into raptures. The three big singles typically overshadow everything around them and when the duo do the karaoke version of 'Kids' the ground literally bows underneath our feet with the amount of people thundering themselves around. A bunch of new songs sound like they'll be interesting on record but fans of the singles so far will stay away in droves. This, you kinda get the impression from their recent, humble interviews, could be the whole idea. 



The Flaming Lips crew are all dressed in orange construction workers outfits with hats and miners lamps. Wayne Coyne is the Willy Wonka in this Chocolate Factory and he's busy helping set up all their own gear whilst waving to the crowd. Soon he disappears as video footage of a naked woman dances on the screen behind them, laying down and spreading her legs before the band... 

...just watch:
 

Balloons and confetti cannons ensue. Coyne's mic isn't on for 'Race For The Prize' which sucks out some of the fun, but generally speaking the Lips give us the Tim Burton rainbow necessary to close out the festival in appropriately elated fashion. The bubble, the spaceships, the nudity, the balloons....I love the Lips and dare I contradict the criticism we found with MGMT, but I'd almost love to see them play without that stuff now. Just rock out, without the sermonising and props. Still, the only band (apart from maybe Cornelius) who provide all the hallucinogens you need.

The bar runs out of drinks and we find ourselves paying $8 for a mid-strength vodka and something horrible, as well as scrambling to order Jager and Red Bulls before the bottle runs out. A new low. The pleasant winter night air escorts us back to suburban architecture via a series of lively conversations, shaking of hands, hugs and the obligatory sausage roll as the sun comes up over Byron Bay. Too soon, too soon.