Big Day Out   20.01.13
Gold Coast Parklands

It’s not an Australian music festival if it’s not either scorching hot (Woodford every year) or damn near flooding (Splendour 2012). Big Day Out was no different. So as the temperatures soared into the mid-thirties, hundreds and thousands of Queensland locals, and many others from all over the country, flocked into the Parklands on the Gold Coast for a glimpse at the big names on stage this year.

Jakarta Criers opened the Essential Stage with their infectious brand of indie rock. Instrumentally, Jakarta Criers are very similar to many indie rock bands; however, their resonating lyrics and lead singer’s surprisingly powerful voice are what put them ahead of the pack for me. The band was extremely thrilled to be playing their first Big Day Out, having won a Triple J competition to play at the festival. It was fantastic to see a group of guys with such a passion for music, and even better to see a bunch of Brisbane locals succeeding in their artistic endeavours.

Next up on the Essential Stage were The Medics. Their sound introduced an electric guitar and a leader singer with an amazingly soft, soothing voice, somewhat reminiscent of that of Parachute Youth. The idea of chilled-out rock music sounds a little ludicrous, but somehow it worked really well. Their song ‘Beggars’ was a prime example of a really good, chilled-out piece of music. From time to time they would break out of chill-mode and turn the temperature up a bit (on stage, thankfully); the song ‘Joseph’ had a lot of emotional resonance in it and the crowd very much got into that.

Second up on the Orange Stage (one of the two main stages) was the somewhat paradoxically named Every Time I Die. A complete shift away from the soothing indie sounds of The Medics and towards a genre known as metalcore. Here was yet another all-male band, but this time from across the ocean, New York. Personally, I like lyrics, and I’ve never found the hardcore genre to be very fond of them. The vocals are usually indecipherable due to the style of singing and the sheer amounts of instrumental interference. But perhaps the appeal for fans of the genre is not the lyrics but the primal nature of the music, the body-contorting, thrash-worthy rhythms. And there were fans, lots of them; these guys are pretty well known back home and finding their legs around the world now too.

As Every Time I Die finished the temperature began to peak. Many people flocked to the shade beneath trees, others went to see any band playing in an undercover venue, and some tracked down the very popular misting stations, one of which had a Django Unchained theme. It was good to know that Tarantino had our back.

Grinspoon played next, one of the biggest Australian bands at the festival. They opened with ‘Thrills, Kills and Sunday Pills’ to huge applause. The grounds had filled out even more by now, the back section of the grounds slowly merging with the front section. Grinspoon played a very solid set; mostly new tracks that I don’t think a lot of us had heard, but I guess that’s great exposure for them. They played some old tracks as well like ‘Lose Control’ and of course, their money-maker, ‘Chemical Heart’ which caused a joyous uproar from the crowd. The lead singer, Phil Jamieson, summarised the day quite well when he said, ‘I don’t want to state the bleeding obvious, but it’s hot as fucking balls.’ The band then went on to play a great track called ‘More Than You Are’ which just went off. They also sarcastically dedicated a song to the fallen local hero of the Australian Open, Bernard Tomic.

Back on the Essential Stage, Death Grips, an experimental hip hop group, began their set. I got myself deep in the mosh pit and watched as the stage filled with smoke and red lights. From the red emerged the singer, Stefan ‘MC Ride’ Burnett, shirtless, either because of the extreme heat, or to show off his physique. Peppered with tattoos from head to toe we knew straight away this guy was an absolute bad-arse. The first song gave me a taste of what I was in for: an incredible fusion of grunge, electronic and hip hop backing music, overlayed by the inaudible but energetic vocals of Burnett. I mean this guy puts absolutely everything into each line, the sweat was just pouring off him, the front-row moshers probably even got some to take home with them. Each song kind of flowed into the next one, there was really no let up or time for him to breathe, fascinating. The third song dropped a crazy beat and the crowd went absolutely spastic. The mosh was definitely heating up. To the side of me formed an aptly named ‘death pit’ where people, predominantly sweaty, hulky males could thrash about and call it dancing. A few songs later it got more primal and it started to remind me of Fight Club. I slowly made my way to the right just in case a stray punch came my way. Death Grips finished their amazing set with me having understood but one word which seemed to be insinuating that the crowd was indeed fraternising with Burnett’s mother. Gosh, there was even a bit of self-touching near the end, how could I forget that? Burnett either really wanted to creep some people out, or he had to scratch his junk, either way, he does what he wants, he’s Stefan ‘MC Ride’ Burnett!

Next up was Childish Gambino, aka Donald Glover from Community. I knew it was going to be popular, but damn was I unprepared. I stayed near the front of the mosh pit and so many more people joined in and everyone squeezed together. They were chanting for him to come out 30 minutes before his set even started. When he did come out the crowd went wild and I almost broke a damn rib. I had managed to make my way to about the fourth row of the mosh pit by now. It was hot. But it was when he started playing that the true experience begun. I couldn’t move, could barely breath, and it was so hot. There were people passing out and being hoisted up every five seconds. I stayed for about four songs and had to leave, it just wasn’t fun anymore. I sat up against a bin and caught my breath. The acoustics were surprisingly good out there, and so was the air, unfortunately at the sacrifice of my prime viewing position. But at least now it was about the music, not whether or not I would pass out or get trampled. Gambino played a bunch of songs, some from mix tapes he had released in the past few years, particularly ‘Royalty’ and some from his first studio album, released near the end of 2011. Donald was a really great performer: he sang well and put a lot of effort into each song. And he definitely knew how to get the crowd pumped. He, unlike Burnett, would talk to the crowd between songs, charm them, arouse them and then blow their ears off with some great songs. The crowd favourite was ‘Heartbeat’ which just went off. The thing I like about Gambino is the quality of the lyrics; they are very clever, very often pop-cultural, and quite often poignant, Donald specifically talks about race issues a lot and of course his rags-to-riches, out-of-the-projects story that most guys in hip hop have. But there’s an energy there, an integrity; there’s an ego too, but it’s not quite to Kanye proportions just yet, let’s hope he can fend it off for a little while.

I heard my favourite Foals song, ‘Spanish Sahara’ on my way to the next concert and had to stop and listen. The song starts out so quietly and then builds and builds, getting more and more passionate, the soothing, laid-back vocals transforming momentarily into something much more explosive, and emotional. But alas, that was the only song of theirs I knew and I had a date with Crystal Castles in the Boiler Room.

The sun was down by now and the temperature had dropped at least ten degrees. There was a new atmosphere about the festival, quite literally. Crystal Castles were awesome; I really like their sound – electronic music with distorted, high-pitched female vocals running over the top. It’s a surprisingly wonderful combination, but yet another band whose lyrics I could not understand. In one of their songs I’ve always though the line is “this is your po-tato”, of course I realise that is ridiculous, but some part of me doesn’t want to find out what the real lyrics are. Crystal Castle continued to rip up the stage and there was almost no one in the crowd too shy to rip up the dance floor in turn. There was a fantastic light show behind the band and some great visuals up the back as well. All in all, it was an extremely dynamic musical experience – aural and visual. They closed with ‘Baptism’, their biggest hit, and coincidently, the mysterious potato song. Everyone loves ‘Baptism’ so no one left anything in the tank. The people danced until they dropped.

I caught the last few songs of The Killers who were thoroughly entertaining the now gargantuan crowds on Orange Stage. They went out with a bang, literally, when the fireworks shot up during their last song. Fireworks and silver, glimmering confetti; what a fantastic way to end a show.

The grand finale, however, was the Red Hot Chili Peppers. These guys have been playing incredible music for three decades now and the amazing thing is they show no real signs of slowing down. They performed really well in front of the now Woodstock-like crowds, everyone having flocked from the other venues to enjoy one of the biggest bands on earth. They played all of their great songs including ‘Can’t Stop’, ‘Otherside’, ‘Under the Bridge’, ‘By The Way’, and of course, the brilliantly named ‘Californication’. The big screen next to the stage, and the smaller screens behind the band all featured some really great visuals – a mixture of video footage of the band playing with interesting filters and trippy animated footage or bright, colourful patterns. Surprisingly they didn’t close with a massive hit, but some nudity from the crowd set things right. A man, dress only in a sock, to cover his privates, revelled in his fifteen seconds of fame when he was put up on the big screen; as did the several girls who thought, ‘YOLO’ and decided to flash their breasts to the tens of thousands of people watching. I’m told this is all relatively standard for a Chili Peppers concert. They performed a couple more songs after the encore and closed out with a message from one of the guitarists encouraging everyone to keep music alive. What can I say? The festival definitely lived up to its name.

– Ben Carey