BDO 2004.

I was completely not expecting to get along to this year's event, having left my blagging for free tickets (which worked a treat last year) far too late. But, lo and behold, my wife decided to spring for tickets, and, planning the day around a five day holiday in Aukalofa, off we went (children safely ensconced in the hands of doting grandparents for the day).

We arrived about half way through the Goodshirt set, and spent the first ten minutes or so staking a spot out in the D ring, slapping on sunscreen, taking in the vibes, firing off a few snaps, and then realised that the Goodshirt set was worth taking in properly, and thoroughly enjoyed the last 4 or 5 songs. I do love their song 'Mousey' - the bit where Gareth joins in on the 'yeah yeah yeah!' bits in the chorus always makes me smile.

The Darkness were my main reason for wanting to be up the front of the main stages that early in the day, and I'm glad we made the effort, as they were pretty much everything I expected: glam, over-the-top, stupid rock and roll. About half way through the set my wife started to get serious short person sight problems, so we retreated to the stands for a bit of shade and a better (if not more distant) view. And that's where it occurred to me: the sound was shit. Half of the appeal of The Darkness is whassisname's insane voice: the soaring falsetto, the inane lyrics, the between song banter ('do you like to boogie woogie in NZ?'). But most of it was lost in the swirl of the stadium, a fate that befell (from all reports) the majority of acts that were to come. The Dandy Warhols certainly suffered from it (and their own apathy, perhaps). It was, from our short stay up that way, better up the front near the stacks, but not everyone can, or wants to get into the sweaty heaving throng just so they can hear the bands better. Pity.

We watched the start of the D4 set, which looked like it was going to be another rock'n'roll extravaganza, but, having seen them plenty over the last couple of years, we decided to go and try our luck with some random wanderings (and a water stop - the heat was definitely taking its toll). We ended up finding a 'quiet' spot over by the Hip-hop stage (the Hothouse as it's called on the program), where we could sit down, drink our water, reapply our super-strength sunscreen (which kept the rays at bay, but had the nasty side effect of making my eyes water sting and water like crazy if so much as a molecule of it got near my eyeball, which it regularly did), and check out some acts we knew next to nothing about. It seemed several more 'hard-out' individuals had had the same idea as us with regards to the Hip-hop area being a good chill-out zone, and there was a pretty regular stream of St John's mini-carts and personnel ferrying those who had imbibed a bit too much (it may, of course, just have been sunstroke) back to the medical tent for a bit of freshening up.

Anyway, we took in about half of Verse Two's set, which was a nice tonic to the guitars and testosterone we'd witnessed so far in the stadium. Good beats and Ladi6 (I assume it was her) has a fantastic voice. Just what we needed to ease us through the hottest part of the day. Things got hotter though, as we delved into the Boiler Room for some Concord Dawn action. Despite the rave reviews from their performance last year, and their relatively high profile at the moment, the big tent was sparsely populated, so wandering to somewhere near the 'front' was easy, and the heat was on the bearable side. I'm not the biggest d'n'b fan in the world, but, played that loud, and with Tiki Taane of Salmonella Dub adding some colour to the almost indistinguishable tracks, I ended up really enjoying it. I even pulled some low-key gangly whiteboy moves out of the repertoire for good measure. A few people were *really into it*, and did the whole 'punching-both-fists-into-the-air' thing that I can honestly say I would have to be *nutted off my head* to even consider doing. A whole lot of punters were into the more conservative 'mowing the lawn' dance routine, and a few, here and there, were even indulging in early mating rituals: synchronised moves, the touch of the shoulders, a bit of a bootie-grind for good measure. Most of the time I really spent staring at the lights and wondering how many times Concord Dawn could get away with using that beat at that tempo. Surely someone's going to notice one day?

Back blinking into the daylight we wandered aimlessly for a bit before deciding our Hip-hop spot was the best we'd found so far, so decided to go and camp down there while we waited for our next 'must see' (the ill-fated Dandy's set). We got back to find DJ CXL in full effect. Or, at least, his MC, whose name I totally managed to miss. You could not, however, have missed the fact he was emceeing for DJ CXL. 'Yo yo. Give it up for DJ CXL! All the ladies, I want you to shake it aroouund. Give it up for DJ CXL! Shake it around! All the fellers, look at the lady next to you and say "shake it around".' A few of the ladies were shaking it around, but best of all was the fantastically red-befrocked, pink sun-hatted middle age and ample white lady who was getting really jiggy with it. I made excellent use of the heavily vibrating (backed onto the Boiler Room, didn't they), extremely private and criminally under-utilised portaloos next to the hip-hop stage (while, but 100m away, women queued up to 20 people deep for the few toilets in the stadium concourse), which set me in good stead for the next hour, where the wife and I admired DJ CXL's (Yeaaahhh! DJ CXL! Give it up for my maaaaan ... DJ CXL!) mixing skills, and then the b-boy battle that came afterwards. I have no idea who the DJ was for this breakdancing showdown, but he shouldn't, I repeat, shouldn't have shown off his own moves before the real crews took to the stage. Sure, it was handy for sussing out which bits of the stage where going to cause skips on his record player, but he could have figured that out with a couple of dolphin dives and backspins - delving into his robot moves repertoire was pushing his envelope a bit far methinks. Anyway, I haven't seen live breakdancing for ages, and these guys were obviously pretty top notch (if a touch restricted in their moves by the nagging DJ who kept berating them for getting too close to the record-skipping 'no-dance' zones). The wife was particularly taken with a young red-capped lad who could not only pull all the break moves, but also looked like he had a fair idea of dance moves in general. Niiice.

I've been loving the Dandy Warhols' 'Monkeyhouse' album in a big way over the last few months, so the combination of a completely crap sound, and a fairly lackadaisical performance by the band meant their performance was one of the big letdowns for me on the day. Admittedly, some of their swirlier, quieter tunes suited the stadium's poor acoustics, but, generally, there was a decided lack of excitement about the set. Cute keyboard player though. And a nice hat on the lead singer.

So yes, we cut our losses there, vowing never to return to the stadium (bye bye Strokes, Datsuns & Metallica), and decided to go and settle over on the Green/Essential stage lawns in preparation for the Flaming Lips. If only we'd made the move a bit earlier and caught was a well reviewed Mint Chicks set. Oh well. As it was, we got a couple of good tunes from Fur Patrol, with Julia, as always, belting it out about 30db louder than the combined volume of the three lads in the band (and wearing this incredible looking black dress which had a sewn in bright blue cape attached to the back - very rock star). We stocked up on bland chicken burgers and chips for tea (I cued for twenty minutes, got to the front, and asked for a 'pottle of chips'. 'A bottle of chips?' the confused attendant replied. 'No no, a pottle!' Does no-one use the word pottle any more? Had she not been confronted with it even once during the course of the day, selling countless dozens of pottles? She looked baffled. 'Chips!' I yelled, at which a light went off in her head and she grabbed a pottle for me), and got that down us while Gerling played an entertaining set across the field. They may look like Aussie idiots, and there's a fair bit of shouty shouty stupidness to their music, but they had the kind of enthusiasm and eclecticism that I really enjoy, and they were a good warm-up to another act I'd been told 'not to miss' - The Mars Volta.

Now, when they came out, I was well into it. They had all the moves and the looks: the super-skinny white rockers at the front with the unbelievable tight denim gears, the mega-cool black keyboard player bashing away like there was no tomorrow, a mad man for a drummer, and another completely superfluous looking skinny white guy in a nice shirt doing random percussion (the wife and I hypothesised that he was just one of the lead boys' mates and had come along for the trip). The lead singer's efforts with his mic and lead were top notch - when he sent his mic swinging in a wide arc around his head, and then let it wrap itself around his neck, I was nearly sold. The mic-drop onto his boot for the kick back into his hand was equally stylish (the lead singer of the Mint Chicks was conspicuously positioned side-stage, no doubt making many a mental note). But then, I don't know, it just got boring. The first songs were sharp angular rock numbers - short and sweet, but then they started to delve into longer noise workouts, with lots of improv stuff, which was ok for a burst, but left me cold after the third or fourth time. Dolf de Datsun wandered out from the backstage area to check out the band at one point, and nodded away appreciatively before starting to head back (where he was to suit up as the Goodnight Kiwi for the Flaming Lips gig later on), but, before he could make it to the security gate, a girl grabbed him for an autograph and a picture. The floodgates opened. A whole gaggle of girls, lead by one particularly forward young lady who ran and leapt at him wrapping her legs around his waste, mobbed him for about 15 minutes as he (patiently and politely, it must be said), handled their requests for autographs, photos and kisses. Great fun to watch, but after he made his escape, we felt the urge to take one last look somewhere else, so we went to see the Aphex Twin...

...which was, uh, interesting, as Aphex Twin is, invariably, but didn't quite tickle the mood we were in, so we made use of the magic toilets again (obviously a few people were onto it by now, and we did have to queue this time, but only about three or four people deep. It was a miracle of hip young person's civility in fact - each portaloo had an orderly queue stationed almost three metres from the door, so you had time to get out and dash away before the next person coming in could even make eye contact, thus avoiding any potential 'jesus, I'm sorry about that' moments that can occur when you've been living on nothing but cheap hamburgers and power drinks for the day -- not that that was really a worry; god knows what the chemicals are that they put in those portaloos, but they kill odours dead), and then took in some of Aesop Rock & Mr Lif & Fakts One who had a pretty slick Noo York rap act going on. One of the great things about the non-stadium, non-hyped gigs is that you can pretty much wander right up to the front, which is what we did here. The wife was well taken with Mr Lif's cleverly coiffured hair, and they were definitley at the high end of dexterous word play, but they were just about a little too slick for our tastes. They did this whole 'DJ dissing the rappers' intro to one song ('I am going to kick your ass' the DJ would spin, the MCs had turns at 'trying' to calm him down), that was too staged and too fake for our cynical tastes, and we wandered off again, planning to settle down on the grass for Betchadupa and the Flaming Lips.

We bumped into Andrew from Fur Patrol on the way through, which was nice - he's always a friendly lad to catch up with, hugs aplenty - and then I spotted and yelled at Scott from the Tokey Tones, who somewhat hesitantly approached, but relaxed when he figured out I was actually noizyboy (as announced by my home-printed t-shirt). We did the usual 'who'd ya like?' chat, and then as I do, I turned talk to business to Lil Chief Records - the label I knew the Tokey Tones were on, but which I didn't know, 'til that moment, that Scott helped run. I admired his Lil Chief badge he was wearing, and, what a gent, he gave it to me. My memento for the day, a good score.

I can't remember which of Poison the Well or Thursday on the 'Essential' stage got on my nerves the most - they were both horrible as far as I recall. The lead singer of one of the bands seemed to be so short of breath, or existentially challenged, or just such a dick that he could only talk in staccato sentences between songs....

Thanksforhavingus...[gasp]...You'vebeensuchagreat...[gasp]...audienceandwereally...[gasp]...lovenoozealandit's...[gasp]...beenanamazingday...

...and so on. We made a final fuel top-up (coffee and hot-dogs, excellent) before the final few acts, during which I bumped into a gang of nzmusic.com people I had yet to meet. Earlier in the day (just after concord dawn) a young girl had tried to tell me something which I knew had to be something to do with my t-shirt, but I was deaf as a doorpost at that point, and she ended up waving me away in frustration. Thankfully she spotted me at this point, and, cellphone enabled, came up to me and held the screen to my face. Hurray! Nice to meet you Dr. G! Another fantastic use of cellphone technology that still won't encourage me to buy one. And then, returning from a final magic portaloo pitstop, Heather (who I do know) shouted me out and introduced me to fellow longtime users (dare one say addicts): ralphie, pissmefish and niceguyeddie (there was someone else there - but they didn't have a username, so no introductions were made - oh, the ostracisation of the non-internet connected). Again, nice to put faces to names.

And then: Betchadupa. They were a revelation. With 99% of the crowd probably stuffed into the stadium to see Metallica, we were able to get straight up to within about 5 rows of the front for what I thought was a brilliant set. I've never seen the band live before, but I've been told they put on a good live show, and it was great to see just how good they are. Ace harmony singing, top playing all round (wicked drumming it has to be said), and the songs all sounded great. When they rock out, they rock out, and, really, considering their age and what they've already achieved, you'd have to back them as NZ's great white hope of pop. Bands like the Datsuns and D4 might get the media spotlight thanks to musical trends, but I reckon Betchadupa have the all round package: songs, age, looks, and a few famous connections for good measure. Speaking of age, Liam Finn announced their last song as a dedication to Metallica: "the old farts" (or something similar). I'm a convert.

Likewise with the Flaming Lips. I had the best time. I was getting cold, my back was starting to give out - Betchadupa had nearly signed off the night for me with their great set, so it was going to have to take something remarkable to keep me interested. And the Lips totally delivered. Their set-up alone would rank as one of my top half dozen shows of the day: main man Wayne spent a generous amount time setting up a fish-eye lens that pointed up his nose and then on towards a giant TV screen that served as the band's backdrop (thus, with camera and tv both on, created a wayne to infinity effect), as turgid Thursday droned away in the background.

Then the set itself: dancing furry animals, wayne going crazy with the glitter, mad imagery on the big screen, and another good mix on the small stage. Wayne was fighting a bit of a battle against general tiredness amongst the crowd. After 12 or so hours of music, there wasn't a whole lot of energy bursting forth from the punters, but Wayne forged on marvelously. 'Come on guys, this is the last act of the night. Let's make it special!' And he did make it special. He got the crowd doing the waving arms thing (even me, and I *never* do the waving arms things). There was a moderately successful singalong. Wayne smeared himself with fake blood. It was all great entertainment, and the songs were great too. For what was bordering on a circus-like funfest, the music still packed an emotional punch - when he sang...

Do you realize
That everyone you know someday will die?
And instead of saying all of your good-byes
Let them know you realize that life goes fast
It's hard to make the good things last

...I almost cried. And then it was over. The wife and I did the slow trudge out of the stadium grounds, broke into a decent stride once outside, then hailed a taxi about half a mile down the road, and were back home in bed before midnight. What a day.
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