Industrial Strength: The end comes to Easterfest; X Factor NZ winner; Adelaide, Melbourne, in spotlight at UK convention; Perth festival holds funding discussion

The end comes to Easterfest

Just after the Easter long weekend, TMN revealed that the organisers of Toowoomba’s Christian music festival Easterfest announced they were going to assess its long term future.

The decision has now been made. The festival’s Chairman of the board Tony Gear announced that after 17 years, the event will not return in 2016.

He explained, “This has been the most difficult decision we’ve had to make, and we understand it will take time for the Easterfest family to process this news. Like many other music festivals around the world, Easterfest has seen a slow decline in crowd numbers over recent years.

“We desperately wanted to find a way forward after this year’s festival. In recent weeks we’ve looked at all the options, we’ve considered all the factors, and come to the conclusion that this current event model isn’t sustainable.”

At its peak, in 2009, Easterfest drew 40,000 over three days. But in recent years the numbers dropped by half. This year organisers counted on last minute turn-ups, but were thwarted by heavy rains.

Toowoomba Mayor Paul Antonio told the local paper he was “bitterly disappointed” at the loss of the festival, saying it injected $12.5 million into the Toowoomba region (with up to 80% of attendees coming from outside the area) and $6.5 million to Queensland. He hoped it would return “in a different form."

The news comes as two other festivals battle on against odds.

The Brisbane International Jazz Festival continues (June 3 to 8) after its Arts Queensland funding was cut by the previous government, and it was not successful in the latest Australia Council funding round.

Organisers of Planet Dungog in the Hunter Valley (May 29 to 31) are determined to hold it five weeks after the area was devastated by floods, loss of lives and damage. Festival Program Director, Jackie Luke, said holding it was part of the area’s “recovery”, adding, “It’s very important to show that while there has been tragedy, Dungog is open for business.”

Adelaide, Melbourne, in the spotlight at UK’s Music Cities convention

The inaugural Music Cities convention, held just before the Great Escape festival in Brighton, England, proved a runaway success. Tickets were oversold, and they ended up with 50 cities from 20 countries in attendance. The revival of Adelaide’s live music through close cooperation with the state government was the topic at a panel presented by David Grice of Musitec and Becc Bates of Arts SA, while Music Victoria’s Patrick Donovan presented Melbourne as a case study of a city with a festival market.

BIGSOUND extends artist application deadline

BIGSOUND has extended the deadline for artist applications to midnight this Friday (May 22). Held over September 9 and 10 with over 140 acts, these have long proven to be a place to be noticed by international A&R and tastemakers and media. Courtney Barnett, Flume, Seth Sentry, Sheppard, The Jezabels, DZ Deathrays, The Temper Trap, Jungle Giants, Boy & Bear, Clare Bowditch, David Bridie, Kingswood, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard and Megan Washington are among those who showcased in the past.

Perth festival holds funding discussion

With arts and music funding taking a beating in both the Federal and WA budgets, Tura New Music is presenting a funding panel at its Totally Huge New Music Festival. Paul Mason, Director of Music at Australian Council and Duncan Ord, Director General of the WA Department of Culture and the Arts will provide updates and debate current and future trends in funding. A Q&A session facilitated by ABC Radio’s Robyn Johnston follows. It is held on Thursday (May 21) at 5pm at the State Library Theatre, then moves to PICA Bar afterwards. Inquiries from 9228 3711 or info@tura.com.au.

Beat boxer, singer, wins X Factor NZ

Beau Monga, 21-year-old beat boxer and singer from South Auckland, won The X Factor NZ last night. He scored himself a deal with Sony Music International and a new Mazda CX-3. It was a close call for Morga: even he and his mentor Natalie Bassingthwaighte, thought that runner up, Samoan diva Nyssa Collins would win after what was called a “flawless” performance.

It has been a turbulent year for The X Factor NZ. It included apologies after a convicted murderer appeared, and more apologies after two judges cruelly humiliated contestant Joe Irvine and were sent packing back to obscurity. (Irvine himself went through a depression after he was voted out and said he’d had no support from the show’s producers after he left). There were tense “please explain” emails from franchise owner Simon Cowell, sponsors pulling out, and ratings well below last year’s.

The grand final last night was no different. The large amount of voting overloaded the system. Media commentators were suggesting the show would not return for another season. After funding it to the tune of $800,000 in 2015, and $1.6 million the year before, New Zealand on Air is not writing out another cheque next year.

MusicNT lowers crowd-funding target to $10k

Northern Territory’s peak music association MusicNT announced that “because of behind-the-scenes private donations and sponsorship”, its crowd-funding target has been reduced from $50,000 to $10,000. For every dollar raised by May 28 will be matched by Creative Partnerships Australia's Plus1 Program to help remote and regional musicians.

A $5,000 donation gets an indigenous act to the indigenous NIMA awards. $2500 goes towards Desert Divas putting on a showcase after a three day workshop with indigenous female songwriters. $1,000 covers the cost of a mentor. The campaign is at https://chuffed.org/project/supportmusicnt.

New juice in venues

* The Jam Gallery basement club in Sydney’s Bondi Junction which has been showcasing reggae and Latin bands, this Friday begins a new weekly club night covering bass, luvtrap, tropical house, party hip-hop and deep house. It’s marketing heavily the fact it’s out of the lockout zone.

* Perth could get a new venue called The Sewing Room aimed at spotlighting emerging acts. It will be in the basement of an 1800s building which was once the sewing room of the Pierucci fashion empire. It needs punter help in acquiring a liquor licence, and has all the details on its Facebook.

* The Ballina Hotel in NSW is launching a nightclub aimed at 25 to 35-year-olds on May 29. It will be initially opened on Fridays and Saturdays, but possibly Thursdays as comedy and open mic are being considered. The hotel has a new manager Vanessa Fincher and assistant manager Katie Faber.

* Rubber Soul Lounge is a new addition in central Fremantle, which is primarily a rehearsal room and bootleg recording studio but also hires itself out a rom catering for 100 people for live performances, album launches and other events. It opened on the weekend with a mass jam session.

* Melbourne’s Bendigo Hotel (Collingwood) will host a new punk rock festival called Night of the Living Shred promoted by Crossroad Creative. Held Saturday Aug 22, it will feature eight noisy bands from around the country including Born Lion and Captives.

* The Experience Group, the team behind Sydney’s Soda Factory are opening a second project, Rosie Campbell’s in Surry Hills (Crown & Campbell) aimed at the flavours of the Caribbean.

* The Prince Public Bar, in Melbourne’s St. Kilda is new home for the weekly Sunday afternoon Elwood Blues Club, which started over 15 years ago.

More venue updates: fires, life bans, revamps

* Townsville’s historic Great Northern Hotel, which features live music, was set on fire. An off-duty cop on his way to work at 5.30am raised the alarm. A teenager was arrested and may face charges of arson and willful damage.

* In a first for NSW, two former Kings Cross bar operators copped life bans from holding a liquor licence. John Barakat and Dominic Kaikaty ran the bar and dance music club Déjà Vu from January 2013 to March 2014 when their licence was suspended. It was for breaches including operating it as a nightclub instead of as a restaurant, serving minors and drug possession.

* Adelaide’s Mile End Hotel, a regular host of live music, has gone through a revamp which maintains its original 175-year-old bluestone and red brick with a new food and drinks menu.

Deadline for arts marketing summit on audience development

The deadline for the Australia Council for the Arts Marketing Summit 2015 is Friday May 22. It is held June 1 and 2 in Cairns at Tanks Arts Centre. The theme is Audiences: Yours, Mine, Ours. It will explore long term audience development through new research on audience habits and trends, successful marketing campaigns, and workshops on topics varying from ticketing to segmentation, digital media planning and the latest in direct marketing.

Vale

Alex Mcnulty, bassist with Tasmanian post-hardcore band Save The Clock Tower, passed. Cause of death unspecified but the band cancelled three shows early last week. They are signed to Fiction in Australia and Bullet Tooth in America.

A wide group of creatives gathered at Wategos Bay in Byron to carry out the final wishes of violinist and artist Morrice ‘Moshlo’ Shaw. He wanted them to throw his ashes into the sea and drink champagne. Shaw’s Polish-Jewish heritage drew him to Romanian blues, the doina, which he popularized in Byron after learning about it in Israel and Berlin (and made an album of), along with the tango, which he performed and taught.

And a few other things …

While the reason for the split between Lorde and long time manager Scott Maclachlan is yet to be revealed, the partnership was certainly a success one. In their time together, it is estimated that Lorde made $12 million while he collected $3 million in commission.

Lorde meantime is immortalised in wax at the Madame Tussauds museum in Hollywood. She hit Twitter to share a pic of the statue as well as one of the long and detailed process of posing for it. It’s placed near a waxwork of her bestie Taylor Swift.

Is James Warburton replacing Rhys Holleran as Southern Cross Austereo CEO, the Australian Financial Review put out there yesterday?

More reason for arts and music organisations to panic. Word from inside the Australia Council is that the schedule for the new Six Year Funding is to be revised after the recent budget slashes.

The next project by the Nick Cave-Warren Elllis team is the score for feature-length documentary, Prophet's Prey, about controversial Mormon leader Warren Jeffs. Cave is also its narrator.

Iconic Perth drummer James Baker (Hoodoo Gurus, Beasts of Bourbon, The Dubrovniks, The Victims, The Scientists) has decided to turn his marriage to Catherine Podger into a mini-festival called I’m Flipped Out Over You. Slated for June 6 at Rosemount Hotel, it is a quasi-reunion of his former bands. Among those performing are Dave Faulkner, Kim Salmon and Spencer P. Jones. Baker will be performing with four bands on the night.

Paul Allen and Renae Maxwell who run the Record Paradise record store in Brunswick (15 Union Street) in Melbourne, started another venture Paradise Cutters in nearby 56 Sydney Road. This one offers patrons the chance to peruse through albums while getting their hair cut, styled and coloured.

Mi-Sex bassist Don Martin lost his best friend of 40 years – his red and orange 1962 Precision Jazz bass that’s seldom been out of his sight since he got it in 1972. It was stolen from backstage at the Palais Theatre in Melbourne, where the band played two sold out shows as part of Pure Gold with Ross Wilson, Eurogliders, 1927 and Rose Tattoo. Mi-Sex posted on Facebok, “It's not really worth anything to anyone as it is such a distinctive piece and will eventually be found. We trust that the good spirit in us all, will help return this instrument to it's rightful owner sooner rather than later.”

Congrats to Melbourne talk radio 3AW journalist Lauren Hilbert and the station’s Online Manager Matt Cram on their recent nuptials.

Two Sydney homes belonging to musicians found new owners on the weekend. Peter Garrett’s three-bedroom terrace in Randwick sold for $1,321,000, well over what he was hoping for. Garrett and wife Doris bought in Paddington for $2.7 million in late March.

Meantime fashion designers and philanthropists Peter and Doris Weiss bought the Woollahra cottage of late composer Peter Sculthorpe, for $3.75 million – $1 million above the reserve. Some of the proceeds of the sale go to Sydney University to set up a Chair of Music, as per his request. The Weisses apparently plan to see up a music fellowship in Sculthorpe’s memory.

Following on from Australia’s move to whack a tax on music, video and software downloads from overseas sites, the whisper is that New Zealand Government will follow suit in its Budget on Thursday.

Jon Stevens’ run of bad publicity continues: he accidentally struck a 69-year-old man near his home in Point Piper, Sydney, yesterday afternoon. "It was just an accident, I can't take a trick right now,” the devastated singer sighed to Channel Nine news.

Bureaucrats working at WA’s government agencies and state-owned corporations are receiving perks with thousands of free tickets to entertainment and sporting events, the Sunday Times reported. These were part of sponsorship deals but WA Premier Colin Barnett expressed “concerns” at the high level of freebies.