Weekend Roundup
The four day long Easter weekend was amazing. We’re already halfway through the working week, I believe it’s safe to say that I have recovered. Now lets see if I can remember how the weekend went? Where to begin…
Thursday Smashing Pumpkins and QOTSA - Thursday was a make shift Friday at work, so we started off at work for a couple of lagers with some co-workers. The night started getting along and we had to meet some people down at Mac’s Brewery on the waterfront. We ended up spending a bit more time than we should have there and made it to the events center just in time to see QOTSA do a couple of songs, thankfully including No One Knows.
After an intermission the stage was setup for the Pumpkins. They pretty much came on, played their songs one after the other, no talking bull between and rocked the place! They played such classics as Today, Tonight Tonight and Bullet With Butterfly Wings (the crowd went absolutely nuts at this one). They also played material from Zeitgeist, Tarantula, Bring the Light, and at the end a sixteen minute extended version of United States, they even threw in a cover of Buffalo Springfield’s Stop Whats That Sound! Billy then said thanks, and the band filed off stage single file. The crowd shouted out for more, and the Pumpkin’s obliged. We had pretty good seats, left hand side, with a great side on non obstructed view of the stage.
The only things I had to complain about was the sound at times was a bit crap, with the instruments consuming Billy’s singing at times and the length and non movements of the queues for drinks (thank heck for Chicago Bar. My highlights were, actually going to a rock concert for the first time in what seems like forever, and the one point where Billy asked for the light to go over the crowd and seeing the movement, oh yeah, and when everyone went absolutely nuts for Bullet with Butterfly Wings! What an awesome concert!
Saturday Summerset - Forgot to mention this last week, but I will write a bit about it here. Sandwiches started this outdoor gig last year around the same time, and brought it back for 2008. I didn’t go last year, but made sure I went this year, so glad that I did. Saturday was overcast, but did not ruin anything at all. In fact I would say that it saved the day, due to the midday start, the thousands of people who came out were not burnt to a crisp whilst sitting the sun for eight hours. Of course we didn’t arrive right at midday, we strolled down the road closer to three that afternoon.
The music we arrived to was awesome, I have to say, a welcome change to the usual going out and listening to Hardhouse. The basin was pretty much split up into two zones, one for the live music, and the other for the DJs. Timmy Schumacher and Dunsta get a commendation a great start to my day, will definitely try check them out again in the future. Wandered over to the live stage and caught a bit of the Black Seeds - always great you could say. There was constant stops at the bars in between everything, and this is where it becomes hazy, I remember, running too and from each side of the Basin, a mission up the road to a friends flat and catching some acts in between. Saw Shapeshifter, the last half of them from the front seat of the old kingswood Tui station wagon and then finished off at the other tent with Dave Seaman, which was in the tent with electro beats thumping. I guess I will update a bit further if anything else comes back, or someone who I was with jogs my memory.
Summerset 2008 has been one of my favorite parties, up there next to Fielddays 06/07 New Years in Sydney. I have concluded that I much prefer the outdoor gigs that start during the day and end around midnight to the club parties that start at midnight and finish at six in morning! Weather permitting, I believe there should be a revolution of outdoor dance music gigs!
