Pack your tents, eskies, booze, and um, gumboots – it’s time for the 14th annual Meredith Music Festival.  Situated about an hour and a half north-west of Melbourne in a natural amphitheatre on some bloke’s farm, this festival has deservedly gained a repuation as the best in Australia.  As one punter remarked to me, the best thing about Meredith is that you can approach anyone, and end up becoming best of friends (well for that 10-15 minutes anyway!).  Although I later heard some horror stories about cars getting bogged, and four hours waits to get inside the gate, the mood inside the festival was electric.

As the heavens opened up early on Friday night, Digger & The Pussycats produced perhaps my most memorable Meredith experience.  The rain and hail was coming down horizontally, as the Melbourne two-piece ripped through their dirty garage rock tunes.  As they jumped and fell about the stage, I was thinking they were lucky not to be getting electrocuted.  Andy showed me my first ever scissor-kick performed by a drummer mid-song.  Fan-bloody-tastic.

Die!Die!Die! took to the stage and delivered a solid set of their brand of New Zealand angular/math rock.  There was plenty of on-stage action, but I got the feeling that they weren’t producing anything that hasn’t been done before.  Similarly 67 Special put on a good show, but didn’t quite excite me.  Sort of your standard “nu-rock”, with a bit of keyboards thrown in.

Wolf & Cub - believe the hype!  This band is awesome – they kind of remind me of another Adelaide band Sin Dog Jellyroll that was around a few years ago.  Two drummers, trippy vocals, soaring guitar riffs, plenty of effects, and endless onstage energy.  They were the first band to fully use Meredith’s flash new onstage video screens to full effect.  They made me wanna dance (and that is a very difficult task to accomplish).

Next up were Melbourne-based Ground Components.  After the Meredith organisers announced that they would one day headline the festival, I was a bit disappointed with their set last year.  But this year it appeared that their journey overseas has seen them mature, and the songs off their EP sounded far better live than on the recording.  They put on a great show, and their fairy lights around the microphone stands were a fitting touch.

Cobra Killer took to the stage late on Friday night, and put a smile on my dial.  They are basically two German ladies that tear up the stage, singing bad-ass electro/punk tunes to backing tracks.  Think hoola-hoops, sexy outfits, glitter, screaming, and plenty of crowd surfing.  Some of my more sober friends remarked that they had a shocking mix, and described them as “shit”.  I guess you’ll have to decide for yourself!

Headlining Friday night was the Immortal Lee County Killers III with their dirty blues ditties.  The addition of their keyboardist helped to fill out some of their songs from the Love Is a Charm of Powerful Trouble CD.  Goin’ Down South and She’s Not Afraid of Anything Walking provided particular highlights. Their stage presence wasn’t as full-on as I had hoped for, but it was 3am in the morning!

I finally dragged myself out of my tent (which was now doubling as a mid-morning sauna) on Saturday morning in time for Wolfmother.  Despite all the complaints about their derivative sound, these Sydney boys know how to rock and got a tick in my book.  They deservedly received the loudest crowd response on Saturday afternoon.

Sage Francis kept me interested for a while with his take on white-boy hip hop, and spoken word antics.  But then I decided that he was an arrogant Yank better off staying on his side of the world.  Half of his set was without backing tracks, and it quickly developed into a schnore-fest.

Canucks The Unicorns took to the stage dressed respendidly all in white.  This provided ammunition for some punters to decide it was a good idea to throw mud at them!  Very amusing, but not to the band I don’t think.  They played a set of trippy pop tunes that didn’t really get my heart racing.

Later on it was time for my Meredith highlight, the mighty Young Heart Attack.  All five band members put everything into the show in the heat of the Meredith afternoon sun.  The guitarist stage left was particularly entertaining, climbing stage risers and amps, and pointing his guitar at the crowd as if it were a rifle (my favourite rock move).  Over and Over, and Starlight sounded particularly great, and got the hairs standing up on the back of my neck.  I was very upset that I was unable to catch them in the smaller surroundings of the Tote the night before (maybe all of my clothes wouldn’t have been drenched as well!)

Hilltop Hoods got the Meredith crowd bouncing with their Aussie-accented hip hop.  Not my cup of tea, but they appear to be very good at what they do.

Sunset for the Dirty Three didn’t arrive as planned.  Instead we were greeted with storm clouds overhead that looked remarkably similar to those that had drenched us during Digger & The Pussycats the night before.  This helped turn the Dirty Three’s set in to another Meredith Kodak Moment.  The squally sounds of Warren Ellis’ voilin backed by huge strikes of lightning.  The band received huge applause from the crowd, giving them the heroes welcome that they deserved.

Luckily the storms seemed to bypass the Meredith site, and everyone was dry and cheerful as Combo La Revelacion got the party started for the tenth year running.  Latin, salsa, humungous conga lines, and many smiling faces – I think they’ll be back next year for their 11th straight.

Rocket Science and Spiderbait showed us why they are festival stawards in Australia.  Spiderbait’s latest album have put them right back in my good books.  They both put on shows worthy of a Meredith headliner.  Just don’t ask what songs they played!

Later on the Supernatural Amphitheatre transformed into Mere-doof.  Dexter brought along his Shook Daily Crew (including his brother), who mixed together funk, soul, rock, pop, metal and all genres in between.  Highly enjoyable, but I’m sure I had heard a lot of the tracks played at previous Merediths.  Bass Bin Laden’s Ghetto Fabulous Show kept the fiends amongst us entertained and dancing right through to well past sunrise.  The sultry female DJ provided most of the highlights of their three hour set, singing and dancing along with the tracks she was playing.

I caught a bit of Jolie Holland on Sunday morning – she seemed to be in a very bad mood, complete with some sound technician abuse.  This mood didn’t seem to suit her beautiful countrified-folk music.  I was later bored by Xavier Rudd’s “hippier than thou” acoustic guitar/didgeridoo waffle.  Best get that tent down, and get out of the heat I decided.  Mmmm, a shower might be nice too.  Did anyone find out if JK broke the nude long distance running world record?

Aunty Meredith – you did it again!  Start planning your trip down for next year’s festival - you will not be disappointed (as long as you don’t forget the gumboots, and tow ropes!).

Now, anyone got some Berocca or a can of Redbull?