Review: Christian Stanger
Photography: Nate Rose
As the days get longer, the nights more balmy and the sun starts violently burning any exposed skin, it can only mean one thing: Festival season is upon us once more and it’s good to have it back. Kicking things off this year ahead of the pack is a new one on the Calendar. How Here brings together a stellar folk-punk/indie lineup of both stalwarts like The Smith Street Band and DZ Deathrays with new-comers, Semantics, Money Boys,and Great Daze for an afternoon in Burleigh perfect for a Sunday session.
As a ne’er-do-well youngster I used to come down to the Burleigh Town Tavern to try my luck buying a bottle of Beam at the drive-through, but tonight it’s frothies over the bar and punk on the stage in a state-of-the-art function room complete with a sort of cylindrical jumbotron and a wall of legends. Calling promoters! Put more gigs on here! In any case, it’s perfect location for local supports Goodbye August and Ferny Fairway to peddle their wares.
The inaugural festival kicks off as Goodbye August welcome the early afternoon beer garden punters to stage-front with a lot of energy to spend. Their take on melodic-emo, post-hardcore and punk are at the forefront offering something a bit different for this lineup. 15 years ago you couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting an emo-alt-rock band but the gripping genre doesn’t get much play these days, so it’s good to see Goodbye August making a name for themselves.
Heart-wrenching tracks about those darker emotions utilising a backing track to create tension and atmosphere, punctuated by intricate guitar parts and twin-pronged vocals make for a decent start to the festival.
In contrast, Ferny Fairway take it back to the early 00’s as the emo vibe is replaced with a definite Australian-indie/Grinspoon influence, so it’s no surprise as the archetypal bass line rings out as they launch into a cover of the Lismore legends’ 1999 release, ‘Ready1’. The band add their own flavour though and deliver a fuzz-heavy set that sets the tone for the afternoon.
Radolescent first showed up on my radar at the Best Night Ever festival in that glorious beer-soaked week between Christmas and New Year’s 2019 before the world was turned on its head the following February. It’s good to see they’re still going strong and have laid claim to the coveted title of ‘Australia’s third-best support band’, so they say.
Radolescent never seen like they’re not having the time of their lives and provide a set full of upbeat, indie-punk sing-a-longs. A capable cover of ‘Teenage Dirtbag’ (which actually made the song palatable) was utterly outdone with original tracks like Tough, Tab and set-closer Winnie Blues following it up.
With the release of their debut long-player, Money Boys has been a revelation to me this year. New Modern Architecture is packed with anthemic song-writing, pop-punk melodies, with the definite folk-punk, deeply personal lyricism that put it up there for album of the year as far as I’m concerned.
Frontman, Carlo, bounds on stage clad in double denim, gets a good stretch in, and doesn’t stop for the 40-minute duration. From the opening chords of ‘The Future Is A Lonely Place’, to closer ‘New Skin/New Century’, you cannot take your eyes off him, bounding across the stage and down with the audience crooning top calibre, poignant social commentary and the occasional divisive moment as he has the audience sing “maybe I should be a gun” (something those latte-sipping Brisbanian liberals refused to do, so I’m told!).
The biggest draw of the show so far though appears to be Great Daze. The five-piece are another point of difference in the lineup with stacks of keyboards making their way to the stage for the first time.
Sweeping strings, indecipherable guitars and trip-hop beats fusing indie-rock tropes and melodies is an instant hit as the crowd moves and often sings back at vocalist, as clips of cricketer Peter Siddle playe on the screen. Poetic lines of love, loss and daily struggles are the subject matter and the ambience, layered complexity of these tracks – with the odd biting guitar solo – are the stars of the show.
Cut from the same cloth as the Money Boys and Smithies, Semantics are more overdriven, guitar-focused and ‘shoegazey’ than their counterparts, keeping the theme of the evening going but never threatening to be more of the same.
They’ve got the heavy metal imagery without the metal and you can expect a tasty tapping solo when you least expect it from singer-guitarist Callum Robinson. ‘Last Armour’ showcases all the above and is one of the standout tracks for the year for me. An alternative rock fusion with buzzing guitars, turned-up guitar licks and mournful vocals, a perfect shoegaze moment.
The early evening crowd lap it up and, being that some of the more enthusiastic punters are nearing closing in on six hours of drinking at this point, Semantics are the first band of the day to see things get hectic in the pit.
There are a few fellas who really shouldn’t be on someone’s shoulders, on someone’s shoulders and a lineup of potential crowd-surfers develops. This will, of course, reach a crescendo as DZ Deathrays set about bringing the house down and somehow inspiring an impromptu ROW (a la Amon Amarth)!
With the addition of Violent Soho’s Luke Henery, DZ Deathrays – already the heaviest hitters on the Brisbane rock scene – have become monsters. The bass stylings of Henery and his incendiary stage presence has proved the missing piece of the band, and they are in full flight in Burleigh tonight.
Upbeat opener ‘Gina Works at Hearts’ gets the pit moving and the set builds from there as windmills and guitars fly around the stage. ‘Reflective Skull’ proved particularly crushing leading into ‘First Night Ever’ – featuring the aforementioned circle-pit and rowing line.
It feels like a lengthy wait for The Smith Street Band but they’re right on time and frontman Wil Wagner smiles massively as he plays the intro to ‘I Still Dream About You’ – the perfect opener. 15 years deep into their career, The Smithies know how to fashion a winning setlist and lay all the cards on the table with ‘Birthdays’, ‘Duck Fly Together’ and ‘I Don’t Wanna Do Nothing Forever’ following one after the other – a blistering summary of their career to this point.
To the gathered crowd, falling over themselves to see from the front to the back, it doesn’t matter the song, its lyrics are belted from the crowd back at the stage to more appreciative smiles from the frontman. But these words aren’t nothing, this is heavy stuff and nowhere is it more apparent than in the cathartic and desperate and crushing chorus of ‘Throw Me In The River’ – sparking the night’s final circle-pit.
The obligatory closer, Death To The Lads, sees a whole chorus from the How Here ensemble taking the stage to sing the final chorus. An absolute celebration. How Here, we will see you next time. Don’t sleep on this festival in 2025.
– GALLERY-
