In January this year, Soundwave boss and Big Day Out promoter AJ Maddah predicted “there will be zero festivals going to WA in 2015.” Fast-forward a few months, and his prophecy came true with confirmation that Perth had seen the last of both Big Day Out and Soundwave this year as each scaled back to become “East Coast only” events.
The removal of Big Day Out and Soundwave from Perth’s festival calendar is a major blow for the city’s cultural caché and simply reinforces the sad cliché that when it comes to live music, Western Australia typically gets the short end of the international touring stick.
But it’s not necessarily just factors like the high costs of travelling out West that can be blamed for the WA capital for missing out on high profile international tours and stopping Perth from becoming the world class live music city it deserves to be – there’s an other, more glaring problem.
Perth hates live music.
We should clarify, Perth music fans don’t hate music – they love it – generating $134.1m in revenue from 1.7 million ticket sales last year and buying up concert tickets faster than any other state.
There’s also no arguing that the city produces some of the country’s best music (one look at the Spinning Top roster is proof of that) and world class live bands (The Drones and Karnivool, anyone?), but the Perth government, local council, and venue authorities seem to most certainly dislike music events based on a worrying pattern of poor attitudes in the city.
Need proof? The latest cutting example comes courtesy of the powers that be at the Fremantle Arts Centre (FAC), who cut Lauryn Hill’s performance at the venue short owing to the enforcement of their strict curfew.
Ms. Hill, in Australia as part of the VIVID Live 2014 lineup, saw her Fremantle concert cut “just after 10pm in line with the venue’s noise curfew,” as the FAC explained in a Facebook statement following angry fans taking to the venue’s social media to complain about the early finish to her career-spanning set. The removal of Big Day Out and Soundwave from Perth’s festival calendar is a major blow for the city’s cultural caché…
Adding insult to injury, according to attendees, the venue refused to turn the former Fugees figurehead’s mic back on even as her daughter arrived on stage to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to celebrate Ms. Hill’s 39th birthday.
The venue makes no apologies for the curfew, and instead blames Ms. Hill for not acquiescing to the 10pm noise restrictions. “The artist chose to arrive on stage just after 8:30pm, an hour after the agreed start time. The event’s promoters made the artist aware of the curfew requirements and unfortunately Ms. Hill chose not to arrive on stage or finish at the agreed time,” write FAC in their statement.
“FAC has hosted many concerts over the past six years and this is the first time the artist has ignored the curfew. Despite this, we hope audiences enjoyed Ms. Hill’s hour and a half show.” Clearly satisfying the early bed times of neighbouring residents (“with whom we have built a strong relationship over many years”) takes precedence over the first ever headline visit by Lauryn Hill to Western Australia in her two-decade long career. Given the negative experience, do we really think next time Lauryn Hill visits the country that Perth is going to be on her tour itinerary?
Taking a professional stand for noise regulations might benefit the venue in the short-term but in the long run it does far more harm than good. Given the negative experience, do we really think next time Lauryn Hill visits the country (if ever), that Perth is going to be on her tour itinerary? ‘Oh, spend all that money and travel time to a city where they cut off my daughter wishing me ‘happy birthday’? Yeah, we can give that a miss, I think.’
Sure, we can understand the venue’s frustration at the singer arriving late and breaking previously agreed upon conditions but the circumstances also perfectly highlights the draconian attitudes of many authorities in WA, jumping at every opportunity to side with the noise complaints of residents neighbouring entertainment venues and cultural centres rather than attempting any kind of mediation between the two. Never mind getting the root of the problem (why 10pm is seen as a reasonable time for curtain call to begin with, for instance).
You only need to look at the long and ugly track record of Perth’s Claremont council, the anti-festival gatekeepers of the town’s RAS Showgrounds, and their antagonistic attitudes toward major music events to see that authorities not only belittle the cultural benefits of visiting festivals and touring bands – calling Stereosonic patrons as “the worst ever” and labelling them ignorant squatters was a watershed moment – but seem to go out of their way to make life as difficult as possible for big name festivals over curfews and noise regulations. “The perfect shitstorm of the Perth governments – both local and state level – being very difficult and making it really clear that they don’t really want to deal with festivals.”
Claremont Council’s petty campaigning in the name of residential peace and quiet reached tipping point this year when they triggered Big Day Out and Soundwave’s last-minute venue switches to Arena Joondalup. There’s a reason neither event is returning to the West Coast for 2015 and beyond – and it’s not just financial factors like staging costs, poor attendance, and ticket sales.
“It’s [about] the combination of the perfect shitstorm of the Perth governments – both local and state level – being very difficult and making it really clear that they don’t really want to deal with festivals,” said a “devastated” Big Day Out/Soundwave promoter AJ Maddah in February, “They don’t really care if we don’t go there.”
The feeling is almost entirely mutual given the sour experiences Maddah’s had with the WA Government in the past – directly blaming them for the Warped Tour’s snub last year – and recently declaring he “will never set foot in Perth again.”
To say that Perth has become a cultural wasteland is pre-emptive; there’s always other events returning (Future Music, Laneway, Stereosonic) and other great music festivals hitting the city this winter. The awesome-looking State Of The Art takes over the Perth Cultural Centre this weekend and the sophomore edition of the boutique Circó Festival has the blessing of Claremont Council (*gasp*) to use the RAS Showgrounds this June.
However, when two of Australia’s biggest music festivals strike a major city from their schedules, there’s clearly an issue. There’s no longer any benefit in dismissing the attitudes of local councils and complaining residents as being isolated incidents.
Claremont Council has singlehandedly contributed to helping muscle out Big Day Out and Soundwave, and while there’s only been minor grumbles against other events – such as WA promoter Sunset Events facing local opposition over relocating their flagship WA festival Southbound to a new location or launching a new 1,500 capacity music hub and boutique brewery – who’s to say how long it is before the vocal minority becomes the majority?
Perth might never become the globally recognised – or even nationally hailed – destination for live music it deserves to be if these anti-festival attitudes persist.
