Bluesfest 2018 Review @ Tyagarah Tea Tree Farm Byron Bay

The 29th Annual Bluesfest festival was a big and bad-ass behemoth of high calibre music.

It was a gathering of top-quality musicians who have long, since mastered their craft and carved themselves into the pages of history, and of musicians from our own time still busy carving themselves in with every fiery lick and howling note of the throat.


Bluesfest means business. And people travel from across the country and from every rung of the generational ladder for a five-day stint in Byron Bay because they know this.

Unlike many other festivals, Bluesfest doesn’t muck around too much with big, world-changing motifs or counter-cultural agendas; leave that for the artists it seems to say.



This festival is about the blues. It’s about rock & roll and it's about soul. It’s about giving us the chance to see the best of the best shine on Australian soil.

And after 29 years, much like the artists who play its five stages, it has mastered the art of delivering the goods.



Jimmy Cliff



As a member of a younger generation, there were a number of incredible artists who I was ignorant to on the line-up. Jimmy Cliff was one of these.

I had only gone to Jimmy Cliff so I could ensure I was close for Robert Plant, but what I received was a ray of pure, Jamaican sunshine. Now 70-years-old, Jimmy leads a big, ol’ reggae band complete with djembe percussion, skanking guitars, trumpets, sax and back-up singers to boot. 


Dressed in traditional African attire, with his arms constantly open and a big, undying smile upon his face, he took us in like family and walked us through classics that made me realise who he was.


‘I Can See Clearly Now’, ‘Reggae Night’, ‘Wonderful World Beautiful People’. He even did ‘Hakuna Matata’ for God’s sake.



There truly is nothing more infectious than seeing an old man lost so wholesomely in the revelry of a pure and deep joy. He lifted us all up to his height and I will forever remember him now as the King of Good Vibes.




Robert Plant and the Sensational Shape Shifters



Safe to say the mood was great and the energy levels high as we waited eagerly for the man himself to come on stage. I was glad I had been tactical about snagging a close spot.

As the throng got real thick real quick, and as soon as that icon and gem in the crown of the '60s stepped out on stage, it got real loud too.

 He entered with that familiar and famous soul-shattering howl and was met by an equally colossal roar from the crowd.

Whatever doubts stood as to whether or not Robert Plant still had it were slain in an instant. He was joined and supported by a band of musicians who like himself have probably been playing for over half a century. Musicians who have mastered their instruments like an extra limb.


Click here for photos from Day 1 of Bluesfest.

They swung us through every corner of the mind and across the whole spectrum of sound. It was passionate. It was calm. It was psychedelic. It was clean. It was hard rock. It was soft. It was spiritual. It was sexy.

It was weird, Dionysian magic and it was positively bursting with fiery love. It was playing like I had never seen.



Most of the set was new material and despite the fact that almost everyone was there to taste some Zeppelin, their playing, power and presence was so awesome that no one seemed to mind.

But when they did, at the very end, whip out ‘Babe I’m Gonna Leave You’ and ‘Whole Lotta Love’ people lost their f#$%ing minds.




Yirrmal



Yirrmal is a personal favourite of mine. A cheeky and soulful man from up Arnhem Land way and grandson of Dr. Yunupingu.

Yirrmal is a skillful musician who blends the energy of rock and blues with the soul and spirit of his own culture and language. 

He is a man on a mission to bridge the gap between two worlds and he does so in a way that can be funky, wild and fun then all of a sudden chilling.


When he sings in his own language you can feel a depth of emotion that sends shivers up your spine and goosebumps across your skin.

Most of all, he achieves a moment of sincere connection to a culture and genre of music whose roots go way, way back past even Robert Johnson and the blues itself.




Leon Bridges



All the way from Dallas Fort Worth, Texas, Mr. Leon Bridges and his incredible band slid smoothly on stage with style and poise and had the crowd grooving and moving within moments.

Sweet as sugar Leon mixes together a tasty concoction of Motown, wholesome, gospel soul, jazz and gentlemanly romance.

Click here for photos from Day 2 of Bluesfest.

Although the music itself is incredible, it is Leon’s presence and power as a storyteller and Casanova that pulls the audience into his world, and into the palm of his hand. There is something so simple and wholesome about his approach and it works like a charm.



Wooing us with sweet love sonnets like ‘Coming Home’, ‘Brown Skinned Girl’, ‘Mississippi Kisses’, the very suave ‘Smooth Sailing’ and the soul saving ‘River’.

All the while joined by the beautiful Brittini Jessie who ensures jaws are on the floor while she taps away at the tambourine and carries Leon’s voice with the backing of her own, gentle melodies.



But don’t think Leon is about to let himself be pigeonholed as the good-natured gospel boy forever, no no. He’s cutting new and neon paths with his fresh, finger clicking, neo-jazz material.

He’s only released two songs off his new album, but he let us hear around four during the set. And let me tell you it is sexy, more slick and combed through with collar popping, grease lightning.

I tell you there wasn’t a single soul who wasn’t getting down to it like it was a New Orleans parade.


Jackson Brown



Whether he was strumming behind the guitar or sitting behind the big, black piano that was plopped in the centre of the stage, Brown was able to paint his stories and dreams into our minds with the prowess of a musical author.

With his incredible band in the back seat, he wound down the window and drove on down the highway past songs like ‘Take It Easy’, ‘Running On Empty’ and ‘Doctor My Eyes’.


I did my best to keep up with lyrics where I could among older fans who knew every, single word to his library full of songs, and absolutely refused to let him go until he came back on stage for the infamous encore ‘Stay’.



Tash Sultana



Tash walked calmly on stage to a loud welcome. Undoubtedly one of the most anticipated acts of the festival, the crowd was huge.

For those of you who don’t know, Tash Sultana is a solo musician and an eight-armed goddess, who somehow manages to build together huge and cohesive soundscapes through her spaceship of loops, pedals, guitars, drum pads, synths, keys, horns, beat-boxing and a freaking pan-pipe.

Click here for photos from Day 3 of Bluesfest.

She knows very well how to toy with the audience. To build the energy up to a crescendo then suddenly stop. Making the crowd hang in the silence while their nerves plead for her foot to hit that pedal, allowing the jungle of noise she’s just spent the last ten minutes creating to fall on them like a monsoon.



And when she does let it drop, she lets it drop with everything she’s got. Head banging and shredding like some kind of mad She-Slash over the top of intricate networks of tones and beats like 'Murder To The Mind', 'Jungle' and 'Notion'.




Tash is a liberated witch of musical spell-craft and without fail she always gets the crowd just as deeply into it as herself.

Filled to the point of overflow with incredible energy, skill and an otherworldly ethereal spirit, Tash Sultana was one of the best performers at Bluesfest. And she was up against some mighty competition.




John Butler Trio



At first I was unsure if John Butler and his amigos would be able to follow Tash. But I was quickly forced to eat my own thoughts.

Sheer talent aside it was also John’s birthday, his 18th year at Bluesfest, a full moon and he was headlining. Safe to say everything was aligned for him to bring out all the fire in his soul, and that’s what it was. Pure fire.




John Butler is a musician in his prime. Having ripened through the many phases and seasons of his career he now stands at a point of mastery. He’s always been on my radar, but as more of a background gypsy with a good heart.

What I witnessed at Bluesfest however, was an emerging archetype of blues, rock, folk and soul step through the fire and into league with the greats.



Holding the stage with his cheeky charisma and weaving new material in with favorites like ‘Zebra', ‘I Used To Get High' and ‘Better Than’ he had the audience raving like lunatics and singing along like a single entity. 



Though the songs we’re all enflaming and on point, it was the jams that he went off on with the band that showed his ability and put him on level with the best of the best. There really are no words for the holes in space and time that John is able to rip with his guitar.



The only other act to match The John Butler Trio’s calibre of musicianship was Robert Plant & the Sensational Space Shifters, and that’s saying something. It was jaw dropping, bone shattering, soul touching and ground shaking all at once.

Click here for photos from Day 4 of Bluesfest.

In the middle of the set, he had a host of fellow Bluesfest musicians stretch out a huge ‘STOP ADANI’ banner across the stage while Adrian Burragubba, a local man from where the Adani mine intends to plop itself, spoke passionately about the land he needs help to protect.

It was a powerful statement as well as a testament to the greater causes that John tries to use his music and spot in the limelight for.

Lionel Riche



Although I felt like the festival had reached its peak and was complete after the combined effort of Tash and John on Sunday, I still made sure I went to catch Lionel Riche out of sheer principle.

I mean I never listen to him, but like many others I was compelled to go and humour some strange corner of my soul by watching him groove away in his sparkling silver suit, blaring his equally sparkling and blinding smile in front of a giant disco ball that spun and sparkled on the stage screen behind him.



I watched with confused emotions as he rolled through the sentimental ‘Hello’ that was chorused by the crowd. I danced awkwardly between revelrous Baby Boomers while he swung his way through ‘All Night Long’.


And finally, I retreated from the festival after clapping my hands to his rendition of ‘We Are The World’, which he performed in tribute of his collaboration with the King of Pop himself, Michael Jackson.

It was all so cheesy, and yet such a perfect and humorous note to end such an awesome and dynamic festival.

Click here for photos from Day 5 of Bluesfest.

Bluesfest promises a lot and delivers a lot. I was overwhelmed by the calibre of music I had the chance to experience. God knows what the organisers are going to lay upon our poor souls next year for Bluesfest’s 30th anniversary, but I’m going to make sure I’m there for it.

Thank you Bluesfest for an unforgettable five days.