DARREN LEVIN reports from the Golden Plains Music Festival, which saw a slew of local bands and the obligatory dickhead or two converge on Meredith, Victoria, for the Labour Day long weekend. Photography by KRISTY MILLIKEN.

“There will be no rain for the rest of weekend,” yelled an announcer to 8500 fist-pumping punters at the Golden Plains Music Festival in rural Victoria on Sunday.
“But … ”
A collective gasp.
“… it will be really fucking cold tonight. Down from 10 to eight degrees, so buy a commemorative blanket from our gift shop. They’re only $35.”

Shameless as it was, the plug actually worked. By midnight on Sunday, festival blankets had sold out, as did Pink Flamingos, a vodka and pink grapefruit combo that’s become the festival’s signature drink. Nevertheless, a chilly and Flamingo-less night under the stars was a small price to pay for a weekend of picture-perfect conditions, especially for those who braved three days of torrential downpour at last year’s Meredith Music Festival.

Now in its third year, Golden Plains is Meredith’s kid sister, which makes comparisons inevitable, so let’s get them out of the way first. There are 2500 fewer people at Golden Plains which makes for less queues and more space. Unfortunately, it doesn’t make for less dickheads.

But because one person’s fuckwit is another’s hero, there were as many jeers as cheers for the following:

• A guy in a huge inflatable ball who walked across the audience like Wayne Coyne during My Disco;
• A group of friends who celebrated a birthday by smashing a piñata in the middle of the crowd;
• Two kids who taunted security guards from the top of a tree on Monday morning, only to be coerced down by the promise of a cigarette;
• A pack of shirtless bogans who attempted neck-breaking circus acts for most of Sunday arvo (did they think Cirque du Soleil scouts were in the audience?);
• A renegade pyrotechnics “expert” who regularly shot off fireworks into the air;
• And the campers who set up shop next to the cinemas, telling every drug-addled passer-by that their “cocks had AIDs”.

Despite some outrageous behaviour, the festival is still pretty self regulated. The security presence is there, but not obtrusive, and the event is generally held in good spirits. There even appeared to be more families at Golden Plains this year. A father giving his son a piggyback while trying (and failing) to neck a VB stubby may scream “DHS” in the outside world, but it truly warms the heart here.

Speaking of kids, festival openers The Harpoons must collectively be younger than the median age of most punters at Golden Plains, but that didn’t stop them from playing an infectious – if not a little innocuous – brand of ’60s doo-wop and blue-eyed soul. Like Little Red, they don’t yet have the pipes to pull off those harmonies (contrary to popular opinion, off-kilter vocals are not part of their aesthetic), but with youth on their side and a sassy frontwoman in Bec Rigby, who looked ab-fab in a little yellow number, they’ll undoubtedly improve.

As will Deaf Wish, who haven’t quite struck that Hüsker Dü-like balance between noise and melody. Their show is powerful and loud and direct, but it washes over you without so much as a parting hook. They have the potential to be something special – as a slew of new songs proved – they're just not there yet.

After an eight-hour bracket of seemingly incongruous acts – from Dan Deacon’s shit samples (but good banter) to Mogwai’s soaring post-rock to Of Montreal’s perplexing pop pathos – You Am I were the final Australian band to take to the stage on Saturday. Those expecting straight-forward, no bullshit rock’n’roll – there was a conspicuous lack of this all weekend – were somewhat deflated by the sight of a violinist and percussionist joining the band onstage. But the pair added some nice touches to opener ‘Damage’, a reworked version of ‘Who Takes Who Home’ (a song written in “1896”) and a glut of songs from last year’s terrific Dilettantes LP.

The shackles were finally broken by a quartet of greatest hits – ‘Purple Sneakers’, ‘Cathy’s Clown’, ‘Berlin Chair’ and ‘How Much is Enough’ – which prompted wild, nostalgic singalongs recalling the band’s performance at Meredith in 2005. Others undoubtedly found Rogers’ on-stage shtick – kissing his guns and yelling, “I’d love to be humble, but I’m Timmy Rogers”, in a faux European accent – a little off-putting. He also provided one of the weekend’s talking points when he stripped off his singlet, leaving little more than a novelty bowtie and a freakishly sculpted body. Either he’s got the metabolism of Iggy Pop or he was given an ab roller for Christmas.

Sunday morning at Golden Plains is always a little bit Dawn of the Dead with disheveled zombies trudging over beer cans and broken chairs in search of caffeine and food. In fact, there were more people lining up for their morning espresso than there were watching Melbourne duo Luluc (Zoe Randall and Steve Hassett). A pity really, because the pair’s softly-sung folk, augmented nicely by horns and Sodastream’s Pete Cohen on double bass, were just the tonic for a hungover Sunday morning.

Following in similar laid-back fashion was Dan Kelly, who continues to defy logic by appearing on-stage with “The Ukeladies”, who are easy on the eye but can’t really sing. The best moments came when they departed the stage, leaving Kelly alone for the Alpha Males’ ‘Drunk on Election Night’ and a lite reggae take on “Sinead O’Connor’s (sic)” ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’.

While mid-afternoon sets at Meredith/GP are often dominated by bands you can dance and sink piss to, organisers flipped the script by scheduling a trio of musically challenging groups. The genre-bending and nuanced songs of Bridezilla and Pivot were perhaps a little lost on the masses (ATP this is not), but My Disco shined in the late afternoon sun. Their early years may’ve been characterised by weird change-ups and shred fests, but the band have learned the value of less is more. A guy behind me described them as “space rock” – and he was dead on, even though he probably meant something else. Indeed, it’s the spaces between the notes that really makes this band so good.

This year’s heritage act The Church wound back the clock to the 1980s with barn-storming opener ‘Tantalized’ and a gorgeous rendition of jangle-pop classic ‘Almost With You’ (dryly described by Steve Kilbey as “a good song because they played it at the Grand Final a few years back”). The band clearly enjoyed the stadium rock setting, staging fake fights, playing under a haze of smoke and kicking out the jams. Even when he wasn’t wailing, guitarist Marty Willson-Piper was a focal point with his showmanship and Zig-Zig Man-esque beard. The nadir of the set was a listless version of ‘Under the Milky Way’, which Kilbey described as a “cover”. They sure played it like it was.

The Drones lived up to their late night berth and then some, proving that you don’t need expensive international flops with three hits or industrial goth has-beens with combovers to headline these sorts of events. On the same stage that guitarist Dan Luscombe took his first tentative steps with the band, The Drones delivered an hour of tenderness and brutality, subtlety and histrionics, light and shade, beauty and grit. ‘Oh My’ was an epic tour-de-force with a Dan Kelly acoustic cameo, a chorus of “woahs” and nightmarish Cormac McCarthy-inspired imagery, as was ‘Shark Fin Blues’ with 8500 “nah, nah, nahs” reverberating into the night.

Gareth Liddiard openly contravened Meredith/Golden Plains rules by swilling from a glass bottle of red, but everyone was too captivated to really care. Save for a couple ballistic strobe lights, no visuals were required to enhance music this good. Just the moon.

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