Most memorable Festival moment?Well I guess the most memorable would be in 2005 when we played the first Australian Taste Of Chaos festival. It was the first night in Perth & the venue was like five or seven thousand & we were sure we’d be pretty unknown. We got up on stage & started playing & then we noticed the crowd & saw that pretty much everyone was singing the songs & we were like “did we sell all our cds in perth or something?”, so that was pretty memorable for me personally. Also playing the Warped tour in America, its like a 2 month travelling township or something, you play shows go hang out & then travel like a thousand miles & start over. There’s been other experiences, but those are probably the standouts for me.
Ideal Lineup? Well for me I would have to say Nine Inch Nails who I saw at Redding the other year when they played before The Smashing Pumpkins. The set was just amazing & I’m not really even a fan of the band, but the set was just something they really play great. Also I’d probably say Killswitch Engage they are a great band & are good friends of mine, we toured Australia with them on our first tour & made good friends with them & yeah they just play great music & are great musicians I guess. There’s others I think but those would be the 2 I’d say off the top of my head.
Tips for attending Music Festivals? Well I guess just drink plenty of water to keep yourself hydrated, stay out of the way of trouble & really just look after yourself & anyone who gets in trouble that you know & you should have a pretty good day.
I could probably go on for hours, but the one stand out for me was in 2003 at the Auckland Big Day Out. It was the set of the Queens Of The Stone Age & 2 songs in the gear blew up & they had to stop playing, everyone was pissed & the band was so bummed out. At about 11pm at night however, an announcement came out stating they were doing another set on a smaller stage & everyone just scrambled to get there. This set was just so energetic, so aggressive & so impressive & it really stood out as just one of the best shows I’ve had the privledge of witnessing while on tour.
Ideal Lineup? Well for me it’s straight up ACDC as I just love them so much, I would also say U2 once again they’re really great live & play great music. I suppose the only other band I could think of would be Cog, 5they have a great live show & just fit a festival no matter where they play. So yeah, those 3 for me.
Tips for attending Music Festivals? Well the biggest tip I can definitely give is either take or get as much water through the day as you can as it will help you so much, of course people may not take that advice as there’s other stuff to drink at festivals. Make sure you have a plan so you don’t get lost or lose time of the day & ensure you have things mapped out to know where to go for all the essentials. For me the essentials are the bar & the toilets & then the stages, so once you have the plan & the water, it’s all good.
