We sent Nick Acquroff to Port Macquarie for 2 days to cover Festival Of The Sun. Here is his account of the experience.
Sharon Jones arrives in a bus with the Dap Kings as Jarred and I complete our interview with Quan from Regurgitator, who is almost interviewing himself. The sun is down. We are sitting in the back stage area of the festival, a barbeque spot in the camping ground with timber tables and muddy tiles. I check the timer on my recorder and nervously ask Quan one more question, about writers block. “Are you kidding, I’ve had writers‘ block for ten years” he answers, in the most candid and down to earth fashion, like he is completely at ease with Regurgitator’s place in the music landscape.
He talks about the naivety he had as a young songwriter, when the bands classic ‘UNIT’ album came out and how he misses the simplicity. But with or without writers block, the band enjoys a healthy touring schedule and a place in Australian music folklore as stayers, in the job for 17 years now. They are due to take to the Festival of the Sun stage in hour, after Sharon Jones, who has by now made her way into the dressing room at the back of stage.
It’s hard to believe that just hours ago, Jarred and I were drinking at the Watson’s Bay pub in Sydney, eating into our 8 hour delay. It’s hard to get to Port Macquarie from Melbourne. It takes a connecting flight into a tiny airport, with a few vending machines and check in counters scattered sporadically around. There isn’t much. If you miss the shuttle into town from the airport it takes 30 or 40 minutes for the driver to make the round trip. It dawned on me immediately that Port Macquarie was unlikely to host a festival that was anything like a Falls or a Splendour in the Grass. But that was the intrigue.
Festival of the Sun is held in Port Macquarie at the Sundowner Breakwall Tourist park, over two nights. The name makes you feel like you’re at a Southern bluegrass festival eating corn off the cob in gumboots, and the rain makes you splash around in the sand while the bands play. It was fascinating to me as a Melburnian to see the entrance to a festival without flashing lights and brightly coloured signs. Short of a tiny sign and a sausage sizzle at the local bottle shop, there could have been no festival in Port at all.
We walked through the cabins at the front of the camping ground and turned right, to see a line of cars rolling through the temporary guard of honour, looking for places to spend the weekend. As you set up your tent all sorts of interesting characters present themselves at their bizarre camping spots, drinking heavily and smoking.
The first hour at a festival is always the best, when the grass is green and the floor isn’t full of bottles and crushed up paper cups, so the two of us set up our tent and made the most of our small patch amongst the greater, more interesting mass. Festival of the Sun is different to any other festival for two reasons. The first is because it’s so small. The camping ground holds 3,000 people, so as you walk up to the stage or back to your tent, you pass the same campsites, full of people that you know a little better than strangers. It’s most noticeable at the small scale main stage area. It’s no bigger than the side stages at the major festivals, but it’s got everything that they have, with food wagons and shade areas.
The other major difference is that you can leave the festival at any time, to go to the beach or into town to buy cans (it’s BYO), so people bring surfboards and skateboards and wander in and out all day.
I replace the batteries in my recorder and look up to see Camilla, the PR manager for the festival. “I had such a fun time last night” I say and thank her for the hospitality. We all talked and drank outside the stage area after Sharon Jones finished her set. “Ill find Ben from the Gin Club for you, your interview is in 5 minutes”, she says before seamlessly answering her mobile phone and crossing things off the list on her clipboard. “No problem” I say, before she moves out of earshot, to be replaced by Ben.
I struggle with my recorder again before deciding to use my phone instead. I don’t think i’ll even hear the interview anyway with British India in the background. We begin talking and it’s immediately clear that I’m speaking to someone with incredible articulation. Ben is one of seven members the Gin Club, fronting the band. He holds the crowd with tongue in cheek wit and charisma. “I can’t stand it when people bitch about being in a band and making no money.
I always think ‘well why don’t you get a fucking job’”, he says during the pre interview small talk. “Yeah sometimes it’s pretty hard to make money, but I’m lucky enough to be travelling around the country playing at beautiful festivals like this one, in Port Macquarie”. The Gin Club were also a musical highlight at the festival for me, with their diverse range of melodic, melancholic songs. He tells me that his ideal preparation is with 3 beers and a few joints, before being called away by Camilla into the dressing room, to prepare for the show.
Jarred and I continue talking with Camilla at the table once she is finished rushing around and we pour a cup full of vodka and water. I decide that I am in love with this festival, in a completely different way to every other one. Ben rushes out from behind the stage and interrupts the lazy conversation. “Nick, do you remember that conversation we had about smoking before a show?” he says. “You don’t have any do you?” I gesture a no and he is gone before I have the chance to mouth the words.
Festival of the Sun is a wonderful festival, with a stupid acronym (FOTSUN). It showcases fantastic musical talent, by the beach, in one of the prettiest towns along the east coast of Australia. Ill be at FOTSUN next year for sure.
More from our coverage of Festival Of The Sun 2010
Watch the video of Nick’s experience at the festival
Check out what you missed at the festival in our photo galleries
