Another week, another festival. Am I crazy? Perhaps not. The St Kilda Festival, unlike Laneway, has long been the target of scorn from every right-thinking hipster in town. But this year’s event goes a long way towards proving that mindset wrong.

With a reported crowd of 250,000, there are no queues, no public urination (well, no more than usual for this part of town), no obvious trouble and the sightlines are great. Despite a fairly hefty police presence, the alcohol ban seems pretty flexible, as long as it’s not being flouted too openly. The AMP shortlist is announced somewhere, apparently, but no one seems too excited.

Wagons are playing on a “world music” stage, sponsored by a cable TV company who are pushing their world movie channel to the sophisticated locals. It makes no sense, but there’s no point in arguing. Maybe it’s because they are from north of the river? Regardless, the dry grassy lawn of Albert Square stage is a pleasant place to sit and enjoy a sly beer or two during their set.

If the key to a good band lies in their front man, then Wagons should be huge. If it’s all about the songs, well, they’ve got that covered too. Henry Wagons is hugely entertaining to watch, and to listen to. He writes country-ish story songs, darkly humourous or tellingly sweet. They play a decent set today including some new things from a forthcoming album. Old favorites like ‘Be Your Man’ and ‘Redwoods’ go down well, but it’s the “and I worship Satan every day” line from ‘I Pray’ that gets the biggest response – make of that what you will. It’s worth mentioning that, despite the western cliches they play with, the heart of the Wagons best songs is often some purely punk guitar courtesy of Richard Blazé.

Henry tries to bait a couple of nearby residents who are too busy being all swell on their balcony to pay attention to the party going on downstairs. But all his good natured hollering from the stage is to no avail – they remain blissfully ignorant. There’s the usual excursion into funk with Si and Mark’s ‘Da Bidness’ before some nobody MC is up and ushering them offstage.

Then it’s across The Esplanade to watch The Angels rock the beach. But that’s a different story.

by Trevor Block