Lilkafest Music and Camping Festival returns for 2009 to Meningie boasting some of the best South Australian talent going round at the minute. Over ten hours of live entertainment including Fire! Santa Rosa! Fire! is what fans have to look forward to. Josho ‘Barracuda’ Flavel (bassman extrodinaire)from the band talks about the festival experience.

What is the latest for your band? “Well we’ve just come back from a six date east coast tour with I Heart Hiroshima, we’re touring off the back of our new single that’s just about to come out called Witch House. We’ve been playing a lot more regional dates as well, such as Geelong and Port Macquarie. The crowds have been great, lots of interesting characters including motorcycle enthusiasts (read: awesome bikie dudes) and affected Melbourne hardcore kids who heckled us relentlessly.

Are you excited about playing Lilkafest? “We most certainly are! We never get a chance to go out and experience regional SA as much as we’d like to. Also we really think a couple of the bands we’re playing with are pretty amazing.. God God Dammit Dammit are quite possibly the closest, sweatiest, loudest thing the white man is ever going to get to funk. P-funk I guess. We went and saw them play at Luku’s Let Them Eat The Dead art exhibition a couple of weeks ago and they were insane.

What is the best part of playing a festival like Lilkafest? “It’s definitely harder for people from those places to go and see shows, but when they come out they party HARD. I like three things in life. My bass, my woman and the audiences at those shows. Enough said FL.”

How does the band plan to celebrate/unwind after your set? “We’re going to spend the weekend up in Meningie and have a look around. It’s really nice out there and we plan on ending up in some Deliverance style situation out there. I’ll be Bert Reynolds, because I’m the only one who can grow chest hair. But Samuel Stearne will be Jon Voight, he’ll save the day.”

What does the rest of the year hold for your band? “We’ve almost completed our debut album and we’re just putting the finishing touches on it as we speak. Matt Hills has done an amazing job producing it with us and then we’re looking to work on the mixing/mastering over the new year. The tentative title for our new record is Sea Priest, we’re pretty happy with how it’s turned out. We’ve probably only got one or more so gigs left in SA for 2009 so everyone needs to come and see us play before we tour off the album in early 2010!”

To check out our new single Witch House, please check out our myspace at (www.myspace.com/firesantarosafire)

For more information on Lilkafest head to http://www.lilkafest.com/