Crossing No Man's Land With Birds Of Tokyo & Other Tales From The Deni Ute Muster

Our first stop is The Blessed Bean, one of Wagga's prime coffee roasters and a welcome addition to our mission to check out as many hipster cafes as possible in our lifetimes.

The coffee is good, the service even better and the lunch menu is split into "burgers" and "not burgers"  — ah, men and women after my own heart. 

It's a long, flat and boring drive towards Deniliquin, four hours, the landscape changing drastically into barren, dry plains. 

Not gonna lie, driving into and around the Deni Ute Muster is incredibly overwhelming. We see a huge pilgrimage already set up of every size, shape and colour of tent - and ute. We pick up our media passes, though it has zero instruction as to where we go for our accommodation. Once we've set ourselves up amidst the army of rent-a-tents, we bravely go for a gander amongst the dust and witness a smattering of very Australian happenings already — punters high-fiving cops, Cold Chisel soundchecking themselves at 3 in the afternoon, girls in Daisy Dukes and boots getting hosed by fireys... 

Over at the Ice Break day stage, Christie Lamb's very Nashville sound brings a lot of families to park themselves in front of the stage's pallet seats. The sun is still high in the sky so 10-gallon hats are plentiful — some are even tipping them as they dance awkwardly (and drunkenly) in front of Lamb's set. It's clear the festival aims to be a family-friendly place, as there are children's carnival rides and a family marquee, but parents are kept occupied with market stalls selling exhaust pipes for your utes (this is a bit weird to me), Akubra hats, leather goods, organic skin care and custom license plates.

The festival site is not yet buzzing or rowdy though by camping festival standards; it's still 4pm and quite early in the day. We suspect throngs of people are getting pissed on the cheap near their tents and cars, grouped in a ring around the main festival site, after which they'll wander in for the main stage bands from 6pm. That's not to say plenty isn't happening: terrible wrestling is taking place near the main stage — seriously. So bad. One guy is wearing rose-print tights — while elsewhere people gather to watch whip cracking, bull rides and the Milwaukee dunny-building challenge. Morgan Evans even reveals there was a huge proposal earlier in the day, consisting of a ton of utes spelling out "marry me", to be viewed from a helicopter above the mayhem. 

As the sun sets, we head out on a tour of the festival site with Ian Kenny and Adam Spark of Birds Of Tokyo, and shit gets real pretty fucking fast. The air is thick with wood fire smoke and everything basks in an eerie red glow, and the cheeky BoT boys decide the main festival site is too tame and they'd like to see some more grit. Watching the guards let us out into the Ute Paddock feels symbolic and in minutes we notice the atmosphere is different; more grim.

The dust is swirling in the dusk sun and as we turn down a particular alley of utes, things feel particularly post-apocalyptic, especially because a group of maybe 10 people are burning shit in the middle of the dirt road and there are literally dozens of cans just strewn around. They are definitely on something hard and a muddy (we hope) dude with a frenzied look in his eyes leads his clan of drunk bogan zombies around our buggy, grabbing things from the vehicle and trying to clamber on. This is where things get really terrifying - maybe our Periscope video doesn't do it justice but suffice to say, the experience is a waking nightmare from the pits of Deni hell. 

Back through the safety of the gates, soon after The Wolfe Brothers wrap up their palatable blend of blues rock, ending their set with a drunken singalong, Birds Of Tokyo take to the main stage with the perfect arena-tune, Weight Of The World. They pounce into When The Night Falls Quiet as humans adjoined to mullets and cowboy hats rise onto shoulders and wave their stubbies (XXXX, of course) in solidarity. I'd Go With You Anywhere invites a huge rush of people towards the stage for some reason and a guy next to us even does a shoey in celebration.

Their sound drops out momentarily here but people don't seem to notice or care. Plans is next and it's the biggest hit so far with the crowd — its barreling drums and very singable lyrics seem to inspire the crowd to celebrate being true blue Aussies. The whole band are wearing Cold Chisel singlets in support of their fellow headliners and they've absolutely packed out the field they're playing in, ready for the legendary rockers to take the stage. Their last two songs, Lanterns and Circles, are perfect to go out on, the crowd chanting their lyrics back to Kenny like he's the king of the castle. 

Morgan Evans is charismatic and knows how to work the crowd — even newer songs like These Are The Days get the crowd pumped, but he slips in mini-covers of Thinking Out Loud, Uptown Funk, I Can't Get No (Satisfaction) and Teenage Dirtbag which take on new shapes in his capable bluesy voice. 

With what sounds like an old American working song fading out, the men of the hour and rock royalty Cold Chisel kick into Standing On The Outside, the crowd responding immediately. Barnesy's commanding voice matches the sass exuded by his outfit — a black shirt unbuttoned down his chest and above-the-knee leather boots. After hearing blues or country music all night, it seems Chisel's all-Australian pub rock is what Deni has been hankering for, and the band's set (the first on their One Night Stand tour) really awakens everyone. They play classics such as Cheap Wine and Khe Sanh and, after two hours, one of Australia's best-loved rock bands fade to black.