Big Day Out, Perth, 2007

Venue: Claremont Showgrounds
Line Up: Spazzys, Sick Puppies, Calerway, The Simian Line, The Dirty Secrets, Streetlight, The Butterfly Effect, Evermore, Scribe, The Sleepy Jackson, Blue Shaddy, New Rules For Boats, Trivium, Little Birdy, My Chemical Romance, Eskimo Joe, The Vines, Kasabian, Schvendes, Sugar Army, The Drones, The Killers, John Butler Trio, Jet, Muse, Tool, Something for Kate, You Am I, Bob Evans, Snowman, Violent Femmes, Tim&Tex with Strings, and some more that I just can't be bothered listing right now.

My first Big Day Out. It was an event that I have fantasised about going to for such a long time now. It started with the older brother thing. They liked metal, rock, alternative, etc. and went to listen to their favourite bands while the little sister who was too young got left behind, despite her growing appreciation for their taste in music. I think, with this lovely ideal in mind, we should start with first impressions...

The set up was terrible! I have to say it - What were the organisers thinking? Claremont showgrounds is a maze of permanent structures that are not appropriate for a multiple stage set-up, let alone huge masses of eager music fans pushing into a venue. For example, to get to the Green Stage, where most of the better smaller acts were playing (the likes of Little Birdy, Something for Kate, and You Am I) you had to make your way behind the pavillion into crowded market/food lined walkways with little visibility to try and discern whether you were going the right way. The entrance was a small walkway that was quickly fenced off because the mash of people broke the hand rails in the early afternoon, or an open grassed way that was around the back and hard to find unless you knew exactly where you were going. Once in the venue area, the fenced off drinking area was lower than the actual audience area, so if you wanted to enjoy a beer while watching, you couldn't watch. And to tip it off, The "Green" Stage was actually Red... CONTINUITY PEOPLE???
There was also the problem that the two main stages were facing West, precisely where the wind was coming from (which was blowing throughout the whole day) so the sound quality was badly effected at times.
I am not sure how to take the drinking areas. I was with my cousin, who is an eastern stater, and he says that the drinking areas aren't fenced off like they are over here. While I can see the sense in keeping the alcoholics away from the younger and more eager punters, this venue would have benefitted a lot from getting rid of some of the barriers because it was hard enough to move around without the extra fences needed for licensed areas.

I will gladly now move onto the music.
There was no way I could have seen all the bands that I wanted to see, so I tried to focus on bands I hadn't seen, keeping it breezy so that I had a good time, and what was better for my own health. (I wasn't about to try and press into a venue with all the people ee-ing off their heads and get smushed against the fence, or ground, or scary Tool fans!)
Starting the day off with The Spazzys was an excellent choice. Up-beat, fun on stage, silly and it is always nice to see girls on stage playing their instruments well instead of blokes. The early punters even got up a bit of a dance crowd for them, bless 'em.
A change of pace was provided by The Butterfly Effect. I was sceptical about these guys, but was pleasantly surprised. Got the crowd up and going, great energy on stage and produced a very tight set. They suffered from the poor sound quality provided by the wind sweeping all the music away (I think the people in Subi would have heard it better than us!), so they failed to keep my attention for the whole set.
Birds of Tokyo filled up the Converse Venue (which was a shitty indore small venue to begin with, another proof of the inadequacies of Claremont Showgrounds) to the extent that I couldn't have seen them. Instead, I gave Evermore a chance, and I am pleased to report that their other songs aren't as shit as their popular ones, and they definitely know how to play a live gig.
My cousin Nigel said Sleepy Jackson put on a good show, so we TRIED (see above) to move over to the Green Stage, but arrived late putting up with all the crap of the set up. Then we experienced a shitty set anyway, which disappointed me greatly because the crowd was the right temperament that I could have had a great dance, but the boys didn't warrant the attention, so we moved to the back of the crowd and waited for Little Birdy to lift our spirits.
Little Birdy were awesome, combining old with new, as well as their highly popular Finn brother's cover.
By now the crowds were a bit heavy, and moving around was getting even more difficult. I was sad to miss local act Schvendes who I was wishing to introduce my brother to, but happy to skip Eskimo Joe, who I believe are practicing the act of boring the audience to death by replaying their cds back to them.
I caught a bit of Johnny Butler, but he also suffered from sound problems with the wind in the wrong direction, and The Killers, who played both the old and the new superbly and have a great live feel that made me forget that I had already heard their songs a million times each on the radio.
I skipped across to Something for Kate at the Green Stage alone for a while, seeming as my brother doesn't like them. This is the first time I had seen them live, though I have been a fan since being introduced to them by a friend in high school. I am not a huge fan of their two latest cds, but I am glad to say that when played live they lose that commercial feel and ring with the sound of good old S4K. Paul Dempsey was sporting some longer hair and a sense of humour which made the set run smoothly when he didn't run the songs directly into another. The drummer was dripping with sweat he was working so hard! I was sad they didn't play more from their old albums, but this is understandable with Desert Lights so recently released. As they played while Jet was, the crowd consisted mostly of loyal followers and allowed for much fun dancing and bouncing a-long.
Muse was coming up on the big stage, so I tried desperatly to find an OK viewing spot for their set. It is enough that I say they impressed me even though I was atleast 300m away from the stage!
The crowd then got a lot more crazy waiting for Tool to come on stage, and surged forward when they began. Though I had a great view for the distance I was sitting away, and I am a great Tool fan, I could not enjoy the set. The sound quality for that deep bass just wasn't there, and putting up with all the drugged up fans was almost unbearable. At times I couldn't hear the band at all, just all the people singing the lyrics wrong in the crowd. It didn't bother me that Maynard was almost invisible on stage (he was hiding at the back somewhere) because his voice is more than enough for me, and I appreciate the bands stance on their music. The venue was just completely wrond for the band, and being at the end of the day, the crowd was way too far gone to appreciate it as they should.
Due to my discomfort, I convinced my brother to go visit Tim&Tex with Strings, who I had bragged about ever since seeing them with WASO. These two blokes have performance to a T (so to speak!) and their light hearted banter makes them a constant pleasure to watch, despite the poorly Converse Venue. It was such a relief after the oppressive crowd at Tool. So we ended the evening with a nice small crowd, acoustic guitar and two performers who love to perform. A perfect end to a very long day.

Though I would love to end this very long review on the positive note above, I have to make the observation that if Perth doesn't do something with the transport leaving the venue, which was completely inadequate, they might next year have a riot on their hands. The situation was completely unorganised and so close to getting out of control. People could have seriously gotten hurt with the lengths they were going to to get on the train platform.