:: Falls Festival - Lorne - December 2006

By: Anna Kosmanovski

Three days of hot weather, cold camping nights and limited phone coverage are perks, not disadvantages of the mammoth weekend down at Erskine Falls, Lorne that is the Falls Festival. It only adds to the memorable music experience, in which revelers as much music as they can handle from talented international and Australian acts.

The festival is normally held over two action packed days that sees in the New Year, but last year a third day, fabulous Friday, on December 29, proved popular as well.

The eccentric Ramones-loving Mach Pelican were crowd favourites, as were Basement Jaxx, in their full orchestral glory, contributed to an excited dance vibe with some well known dance hits like “Where’s your head at.”

For some, the shining star of the festival was the hyped Wolfmother. Yet, the hype did not disappoint and the ARIA Award-winning band delivered an electric count down to 2006, with hits like Woman and Mind’s Eye. Fans were delighted by Wolfie’s crackling guitar pangs and the mosh pit seemed to grow and grow for this set.

When speaking of favourites, it’s impossible to bypass the very talented and refined performance of Michael Franti & Spearhead who had the privilege of playing twice, easily stealing the show on both occasions.

Country rock spiked with a cocktail of folk and pop came from The Audreys, whose lead singer Taasha Coates and her pretty floral dress and pump heels proved a contrast from the usual black skinny leg uniform of rocker chicks. Coates wooed her late Friday afternoon audience with her comfortable singing drawl, which reminds a bit like a Missy Higgins and sounds a bit like Dido and haunts like Enya. When the crowd clapped its approval of the lovely percussion, the tambourine tapping lead singer laughed, “You guys have been drinking too much in the sun, I reckon.”

On the subject of modest performers, Modest Mouse did not disappoint. They delighted fans and easily converted those who hadn’t heard anything by the cult status, punk rock us rockers. All short in stature but large in stage presence. But, despite one member’s hair being tucked away in a cute little boy cap, these guys are not shy mice, infact from the way they perform their crowd drawing rock anthems, they are fearless rodents. Their cool intros and voluminous songs got the crowd jumping, moshing, which was welcome after The Sleepy Jackson’s earlier performance.

The Sleepy Jackson are talented, though steely performers who didn’t seem to encourage much crowd moshing. But perhaps, this is all part of their distant persona thing - they wore all black, with cream guitars and naturally and rudely kept thick sunglasses on the whole time. (No, they weren’t even aviators.)

Little Birdy did not disappoint either. In fact they delivered a show that was fast paced and sometimes slower, but always hypnotic, thanks particularly to their sexy front woman, Katy Steele. Western Australia must have star dust in their water because Perth bands dominated the Falls line up; Little Birdy, The Sleepy Jackson, The John Butler Trio, and of course Eskimo Joe.

Eskimo Joe did a great show. They are mature and confident on stage. They were in their domain on the stage, belting out words that excited moshers to no end…., “Sarah… wont you tell me your name!”

While other rockers shouted, Josh Pyke sang, including his chorus devoid tunes that more or less seem to resound in your head, the best example being “On the Hill.”

The inspirational Matt Costa needs to be heard more. His set was great, and his bittersweet ballads were a soft tempering against other harder rock acts of the festival. It was perfect chill out music, and his deliverance of songs like “Sunshine” seemed just made for the natural bush and sea location of Erskine Falls.

Claiming the funky soul with Latino edge award was Blue King Brown, although they compete with the other crowd pleasing performers who sound just as good live as they do on recording, namely Labjacd, for this title. 2Up provided a bit of Aussie hip hop/ and some clever improvisation at that…

The Vasco Era was a beautiful surprise; underrated performers that proved a hearty entrée before Eskimo Joe. It was impossible not to get shivers when they played their own contemporary spin on “Fools Rush In.” Mixing this velvety record-player scratchy quality of the love song with a appropriate blend of rock surprised and delighted Falls’ audiences. Their original pieces are great too, strong songs like ‘When we lost it.’ Watch this Melbourne band.

And of course, old favourites like the The John Butler Trio did not disappoint tapping, humming and softly delivering away their unique brand of music, some heavily laden with political messages.

A special kudos to The Exploders who have a lot in common with Wolfmother in terms of influences, both bands share an affinity with the likes of Zeppelin and such. However, The Exploders sound like they have more a classy, singing base to that of Wolfmother’s excited and exaggerated sounds. It must be mentioned that an overexcited fan stripped down to his birthday suit and moshed on a pedestal for most of The Exploders set. However, luckily, most fans were too busy enjoying The Exploders’ music to notice. From the way they sing, you would easier believe that they grew up in Britain in the 60s hanging out with Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath than country Victoria.

Filled with 14,000 happy revelers, one could easily understand why many people want to end the year on a rousing note.