EXCLUSIVE: Splendour In The Grass 2017 wrap-up

Let’s not mince words: in a weekend full of world-class performances from established legends and compelling young stars, A.B. Original’s set was the most important and electrifying moment of Splendour In The Grass. The crew locked down the Mix-Up stage on Sunday afternoon, their furious fire backdropped with a now familiar photo: a beaming Elijah Doughty. Trials made the painful context of their performance explicit early on, speaking against the legal decision that sparked rallies this week and leading the crowd in a chant of “No justice! No peace!” The shout recurred throughout the set, right through to the fiery finale of their now iconic ‘Dumb Things’ cover, with Paul Kelly, Caiti Baker and Dan Sultan taking the stage before a packed, roaring tent.

The Smith Street Band and Client Liaison bookended their slot in the Amphitheatre with terrific sets, but A.B. Original owned the festival in that hour. They are Australia’s best nakedly political band since Midnight Oil, and they bring an even bigger party, in a time where both rage and joy are desperately needed.

There were plenty of moments of national pride throughout the weekend, though nothing so heavily dosed with stark reality. (Bernard Fanning had stern words for the current government regarding their environmental policies, but undercut them a bit with an on-the-nose lyric video montage featuring John Lennon, a Gandhi–MLK hybrid and festival attendee Elon Musk.) Going from A.B. to a rammed Amphitheatre where Client Liaison were tossing tinnies into the crowd and yelling “Welcome to country!” was jarring to say the least, but it was hard to resist surprise guest Tina Arena as the audience flipped their collective lids to ‘Sorrento Moon’. (“My mum would have absolutely vomited,” exclaimed one girl gleefully on the way out.)

The same went for Fanning’s own stagecrashers: most of Powderfinger (no sign of original drummer John Coghill), whose appearance acually managed to stay a surprise for most people who weren’t in the Gold Bar or checking Twitter. Marking ten years since their last Splendour set, the band tore through ‘Baby I Got You On My Mind’ and a warm ‘These Days’ that had strangers hugging and feeling like no time had passed since those days at all. And other locals shone on front of adoring crowds, with highlights ranging from Kilter’s stellar surprise party, peaking with Lanks and Woodes invited onstage, Peking Duk’s massive set with a crowd to match, to Confidence Man’s gloriously bitchy sex disco – they might be the best festival act in the country right now – and Kirin J Callinan’s arch, hysterical, ten-year-ahead-of-everyone-else larrikin synthpop. But the heart of the festival was Paul Kelly: everybody’s rock dad and his flawless band drew one of the most surprisingly intense crowds of the weekend for a flawless, emotional set in the GW McLennan tent on Saturday night.

From the tight but oddly lacklustre Queens Of The Stone Age to the triumphant closer LCD Soundsystem, the seasoned headliners had their charms – but Splendour this year absolutely belonged to the younger names. Julien Baker, Gretta Ray, Lil Yachty, Allday (and guests including Asta and Japanese Wallpaper), Mallrat, Maggie Rogers, Hockey Dad: the under-25s owned the place whether they came toting pin-drop, heart-stopping honesty (Baker and Ray) or teenage-feelings party anthems with raw little hearts (Allday and Yachty).

With a bill that was strong from the tiny text to the biggest names, stages running like clockwork even at the pointy end of each night, refreshingly low levels of anti-social behaviour, and (crucially) no reports of transport dramas for the departing hordes in the vein as last year’s bus jams, Splendour was well and truly settled in for its fifth year – the final year of its trial run – at North Byron Parklands.