Since its establishment in 2008, Mullum Music Festival (MMF) has become a favourite regional event that transforms the sleepy town of Mullumbimby in northern NSW into a bustling music mecca.
As MMF celebrates its tenth anniversary in 2017, Festival Director and original mastermind Glenn Wright reflects on how it all started as an effort to bring live music into the town on a larger scale. “I'd been living in this area for six or seven years and not much happened in Mullum,” Glenn says.
"The afternoon of the [first Mullum] festival, this massive electrical storm hit and all the power went out in Mullum."
“Everything seemed to happen in Byron [Bay] and people would be sitting in Mullumbimby cafes planning and investigating the possibility of putting on events in Byron all the time.
“I was sitting in the Poinciana Cafe one day and thought 'this is ridiculous; everyone is here but everyone is planning to put events on in Byron, so why don't we do one here?'.”
So MMF was born, an annual party that sees the usually quiet town spring to life and flooded with visitors. Though it wasn't always that way.
Glenn recalls the first year of the event, where it seemed even Mother Nature didn't want the festival to go ahead.
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“The afternoon of the festival this massive electrical storm hit and all the power went out in Mullum except for the street with Civic Hall; it was the only block in Mullum that had power,” Glenn says.
“Two of the three roads into Mullum had been blocked by emergency services, so I hadn't sold a lot of tickets and it was a horrible night because I was worried we were going to lose power.
“Where at 7 o'clock the place was empty; amazingly by 8 o'clock it was full and we pretty much sold out that opening night and had a great festival. Since then if we haven't been selling out, we get very close to it every year.”
This year MMF hosts an exciting line-up of Australian and international artists including English-born, New Orleans bluesman Jon Cleary appearing with his Absolute Monster Gentlemen, Irish songstress Wallis Bird, Melbourne's Tinpan Orange and many more.
2016 Mullum Music Festival - image suppliedA particular highlight for Glenn is the return of New Zealand crooner Marlon Williams. “For me personally, it's really exciting to have Marlon Williams come back,” he says.
“He's one of those artists that performed in the festival when no one knew who he was and he's performed twice now. He's coming back to headline the Friday and ten-year anniversary celebration; it's nice that one of the acts that's done really well is coming back to the festival.”
MMF has aways prided itself on being the 'no-hassles' festival, with almost the whole town getting in on the action. “Because all the venues are in the town, the town becomes the focal point of the festival,” Glenn says. “In fact, the town is showcased.
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“So we use all the cafes at some stage, we use the farmer's markets on Friday morning, the Civic Hall opens the festival and then all the venues open up Friday night, Saturday and Sunday.
"Pretty much anywhere in Mullumbimby you will run into music and you will run into people going to different shows at the festival.”
