Peats Ridge Sustainable Arts &Music Festival - Day Two @Peats Ridge, Glenworth Valley(30/12/10)

Mon 10th Jan, 2011 in Gig Reviews

The bubbly, sweet and downright adorable Lanie Lane was incredibly excited to be performing her music to such an especially big audience for such an early timeslot. She giggled and smiled her way through a number of her 50s-inspired soulful pop tunes, crooning with a voice textured well beyond her twenty something years; and her audience couldn’t help but be anything short of enraptured. The performance peaked with a rendition of her debut single, What Do I Do, a creaking whip-crack blues that requires Lanie’s audience to sing the refrain while the lady herself croons her frustrations with the working life atop of it. A genuiney lovely showcase of someone whom is sure to be known as one of Sydney’s finest voices in 2011.

“Has anyone else got sweaty thighs?” In the Chai Temple, young Melbourne singer-songwriter Ellen Kibble was having some fun with her steaming-hot audience. When they responded with a resounding yes, she laughed and responded “you don’t know how relieved that makes me!” Kibble plays a very simple take on acoustic folk, but with a raw tenderness. Amongst the standout moments of her set include a wonderful take on Radiohead’s All I Need, as well as a heartbreaking original song, Body in a Boat, which stopped her audience dead in their tracks, all chatter ceasing as Kibble sang the tragic tale of a sailor’s wife. More great, undiscovered magic in what turned out to be one of the surprisingly best stage of the whole festival.

Canada’s Jason Collett and his band (made up of the members of Zeus ) were bringing the sunshine over on the mainstage – though, given the day was shaping up to be as hot as the Wednesday prior, this didn’t really feel necessary. Regardless, Collett and co. were a pleasant start to the afternoon, persevering through the heat and making warm, jangly indie rock to a polite audience reception. It might have been a bit more enjoyable for all were the situation just a little cooler, but kudos to the guys for keeping it all together.

Fresh from the Victorian heat of Falls, Jonathan Boulet had the unenviable task of completing his set, a set with his band Parades and then travelling to Brisbane the next day to play with Parades again. Not that our guy would ever let it get to him – his love for performing shines through like the rays of sun we of Peats have gotten so very used to. Favourites from his self-titled debut were naturally played out, including Ones Who Fly, Twos Who Die and North To South East To You. Their wondrous, lush arrangements were given new life in the live setting with extra percussion, played with a resounding enthusiasm. New material, from an as-yet-untitled new record, was also given an airing, expanding Boulet’s sound with greater emphasis on rhythms and keyboards. Another exciting and endearing performance from the unstoppable Sydneysider.

When the MC of the Bellbird stage told the audience they were about to see something unlike anything else they’ve seen on that stage, dude wasn’t lying. The bemusement of seeing a guy in a huge black wig with tassels on his shirt playing along to a backing track was clear on many faces. Still, when you’re dealing with a guy like Devonte Hynes – Lightspeed Champion to most – these kind of quirks are nothing new. And hell, the man deserved a standing ovation for even getting to the festival following a 40-hour ordeal involving getting out of New York during a blizzard and getting all the way to Australia in time. Sure, it was a little weird to see songs like Devil Tricks for a Bitch and There’s Nothing Underwater performed almost in karaoke fashion – but for a dude trying to make full-band music work without his band, it somehow managed to work. Both the cheesiness and the awesomeness factor were sent through the roof following Hynes’ final number – a cover of Todd Rundgren’s Hello It’s Me, in which he made full use of the wireless microphone and ran through the field singing, much to his audience’s delight. It might have taken forever to get here, but just for now, Dev Hynes was the man of the hour.

Back so soon, Jonathan? On the Lyrebird stage, Boulet was up the back, getting ready to drum for what he might call his “other band,” and others might call the best band in Australia, Parades. The quartet are still finding their feet following the departure of vocalist/keyboardist/percussionist Alyx Dennison (she of Kyu ) from the live fold. If anything was proved within their performance, however, it was that these four musicians are able to adapt and evolve to create something invariably stunning. Past Lives was delivered with emotion and finesse, extending out into a dynamic jam session near its end. Dead Nationale lost none of its recorded energy, while a new track presented further inroads to electronica matched with droning guitar to create what was a very intriguing cocktail. Finishing up with Marigold, Parades might consider themselves a three-legged dog at the moment, but there is absolutely no reason to put them down just yet.

In the somewhat cooler surrounds of the Chai Temple, British expat Emma Davis was belting out karaoke classics like I Love Rock & Roll, Stayin’ Alive and Just Dance ...at least, that’s what you’d be lead to believe given the overpowering sound of the karaoke stand nearby. Poor Emma could only compete with her tiny, delicate acoustic numbers, as well as some good humour. “Y’reckon we can drown them out?” she asked with a grin – and, at the very least, we gave it a shot. The audience clapped along in time, got taught to sing one of Davis’ songs ( Feel a Thing ) and fellow singer-songwriter Jack Carty got up to sing a duet on a track he recorded with Emma, Picking Fruit, from her excellent debut album. In the end, Emma’s music was the real winner – a sweet little victory to chalk up, if anything.

Something was wrong with the picture set by Canadian indie-rockers Born Ruffians as they took to the Lyrebird stage. It wasn’t the packed tent with screaming fans – seemed normal, really. Rather, the disconnect lay in the energy of the audience and the energy of the music itself. There was plenty of dancing and singing amongst the punters packed into the tent, but when one paid close attention to the music itself, it really wasn’t anything to get excited about. It’s plain, unoriginal and hardly inspiring, played by bunch of dudes who look as if they’d much rather be somewhere cooler – both in terms of temperature and of social status. Conversely, Newcastle’s Seabellies were having an absolute blast with their audience, delivering an enthusiastic tunes both familiar and brand new. Who says the international act is the best choice?

They might be down on vowels, but rest assured nothing has been taken from the intensity and overall quality of PVT’s live show. The Sydney trio progressed into the world of vocals with their third album, Church With No Magic, and they work as a new point of emphasis within the compositions as opposed to some kind of distraction from the finer points. It’s a beautiful sensory experience – not only sounding fantastic but proving to be quite the musical performers themselves. Everything the band does on stage is done with passion and exuberance: every swing of a bass guitar neck, every mashing of a keyboard, every resonating crash of cymbals all feel as though the band fret they may never play the song again. It’s rare to get this kind of crossover to such a wide and appreciative within Australia’s experimental music scene, but there’s no doubt that PVT couldn’t be happier where they are in the here and now – and when you’re putting on sets as good as they are, you can’t really blame them.

At long last, after finally shooing off the DJ with his 10-minute extended version of White Lines, it was time for the last dance of day two, with Blue Mountains electro explorers Fishing. Let’s get the pun straight out of the way: their set to a packed Boudoir de la Fox got us hook, line and sinker. As the two dudes of Fishing – legally Doug Wright and Russell Fitzgibbon, but better known as “the little guy” and “the massive dude” – bop their heads in perfect sync with the beat, you can’t help but get involved and flail about dancing to their skittering, chopped-and-screwed musical experiments. They finish with what many regard as their crowning achievement, “Oooo,” a swaggered adventure through big beats, warped choir vocals and nanosecond samples of 50 Cent and Beyonce that you really have to keep your ears out for in order to hear. All up, Fishing makes some of the best music you’ll hear on land – shut up and dance.