Dance Music, LGBTQIA+ Excellence & 2000s Icons: What This Year's Summer Festivals Taught Us

As the dust settles on our New Years festival season and turns to Laneway, it’s hard not to reflect that this Summer has been one of our strongest in terms of calibre of artistry. International headliners poured in to celebrate the best time of year for Australian music fans for the first time since the great pause. 

Fans flocked to massive stages at Falls Festival, Beyond The Valley, Field Day, Lost Paradise, Wildlands and many more to experience a new era of Australian music at festivals, one that was clearly focussed around some extremely exciting themes. 

Australia for the first time for many feels on top of the live music world as music curators across the festivals tapped into the worlds in which are not just dominating the charts globally, but are also reflecting the true moment of creative excellence that the globe is currently engaging with. 

As we look back on the festival lineups and the amazing performances, here are the key takeaways from what we’ve learnt this Summer.

We Need More LGBTQIA+ Representation On Lineups

One thing that stood out extremely prominently on festival line ups this year was the amount of amazing queer artists who are redefining their place on the Australian festival circuit. Lil Nas X headlined both Falls Festival and Lost Paradise with pride and ferocity. 

His show was a showcase of black queer excellence, joined on stage by a line of amazing dancers who lifted the crowd’s energy to extreme heights. Its choreography was reminiscent of some of the great pop star’s shows of all time, as Lil Nas X sung and rap perfectly over booming rap beats, orchestral breakdowns and major brass sections.

The pop-sensation is a beacon of hope and representation of the power of openness and authenticity as he steps on the backs of his haters, homophobes and any doubters. There was a power in his confidence, showcasing his culture powerfully on his sleeve uplifting many of the LGBTQIA+ community in the crowd and proving that in the face of trauma, they can and will be excellent.

Also featuring on both festivals artist was MAY-A, who is proving and moulding a path for a new kind of unadulterated rock star. She performed with a 4 piece band, with a ferocious, clearly pop punk inspired energy, as MAY-A posed as an emphatic frontwoman, with her original tracks providing for major singalongs with a clear dynamic of adoration between fan and artist.

Also featuring on Wildlands Festival across the country, Beyond The Valley and Field Day was Remi Wolf, who is an amazing, fierce live performer who wears her identity on her sleeve. Her music is described as equal parts funky, upbeat and infectious, tackling everyday issues with amazing indie songwriting tropes and a magical surrealism. 

While just a handful of artists have been described here, it was amazing to see the breadth of genre and performance across a range of queer artists, all who dominated their respective stages. Platforming LGBTQIA+ artists on this level across Australia showcase the beauty of their community, in opposite fashion from the traditional treatment of LGBTQIA+ identifying people in often hyper-masculine spaces, i.e Australian festival crowds. Let’s hope that the only people who were made to feel uncomfortable while they performed were any homophobes in the crowd who couldn’t handle watching an artist be themselves. 

Dance Music Is Well And Truly Dominating Lineups

Dance music is absolutely dominating mainstream festival line ups this year. While traditionally Lost Paradise and Beyond The Valley are dance music havens, Falls Festival also heavily tapped into the electronic music world, hosting some of the biggest names in dance music at their own dedicated stage. Before this year, it would be rare to have an electronic heavy act for the festival, but their line up reflected a shift towards an underground dance music focus. 

They hosted huge names including Ben Bohmer, Mall Grab, Peggy Gou, Luude, CC:DISCO!, DJ Seinfeld just to name a few, with a total of 19 dance acts on the bill, which made up nearly 40% of their overall bill. 

At the festival, fans came out in droves to support their favourite live acts alongside their favourite alternative acts. One of the first acts to perform at Falls was dameeela, who pumped monster bass and soul heavy dance tracks into the festival’s dance heavy stage. Later in the weekend Mall Grab pulled one of the biggest crowds of the festival, capping off what has proved to be his biggest calendar year to date. He delivered on all fronts, traversing his fan favourite original club tracks to everything from heaving breaks, uptempo rave tracks and piano driven house tracks.

While Field Day often features a diverse lineup heavily in the world of dance, this year’s festival has a very specific dance focus. While previous years featured rap dominant line ups, the balance skewed to dance music, with the likes of BICEP, Charlotte De Witte, Diplo, Dom Dola, Honey Dijon, Kaytranada, Patrick Topping, Pretty Girl, SG Lewis, Ninajirachi, Jennifer Loveless all performing huge sets from the world of dance music. While a non-headliner focussed line up, both BICEP and Dom Dolla both pulled the most extravagant crowds of the day, with electronic dance proving to be the true the face and identity of New Years day in Sydney. 

Lost Paradise, Wildlands and Beyond The Valley have been known for their dance music curation and once again they delivered, with fans flocking to these festivals right across the country. Festivals such as these started off as boutique focussed dance music festivals and in 2022/23, they’ve become the hallmark of the Australian music festival circuit, not just in quality and creativity, but also commercially with their ever growing capacity. They are delivering what once was an exclusive tastemaker space to a mass market, growing dance music in Australia and are a beacon of representation that dance music is currently heading towards an anthemic peak.

Throwback Acts Still Work. A Nod To The 2000s

As festivals now cater towards youth born between the ages of 1996-2004, the style of throwback acts are changing significantly, one now with a distinct focus on the early 2000s. No two figures are more iconic to the 2000s than Nelly Furtado and The Wiggles for Australian youth, both for their cultural hits, and ability to please our parents as much as us. This year's Summer festival lineups taught us that you can wack in a throwback act without it being gimmicky or cringe, but to strike a specific nerve with the current crop of festival fans. 

At Falls Festival, fans adored the Wiggles as they performed through all of their classic fan favourite tunes that most of the crowd probably last saw in an RSL club in the early 2000s. Alongside Captain Feathersword, Dorothy The Dinosaur, Henry The Octopus and Wags The Dog, fans sang and danced in perfectly synced choreography for tracks like Fruit Salad, Wake Up Jeff, Sweet Potato/Hot Potato, Big Red Car. It was a truly iconic moment, seeing a group of people who soundtracked the punters childhoods perform on one of the most iconic stages in Australia. 

Just outside of Melbourne, Nelly Furtado broke her performing hiatus to grace the stage at Beyond The Valley as it’s mega-headliner. While we were not in attendance, clip after clip was released from the festival of her performing a mashup of her smash hit Say It Right with BICEP’s Glue live on stage with Dom Dolla. Furtado performed exclusively at Beyond The Valley for her first show in over five years, performing some of the biggest pop songs of the '00s, including Promiscuous, Say It Right, Maneater and I'm Like A Bird.Following her performance at the festival she posted saying, "Last night I played my first show in five years. Happy New Year! The stage felt like home. Thanks to everyone who was a part of it and to everyone who shares my music online bringing it to a whole new generation of fans. It is a very rewarding feeling. Very grateful."

While the debates as to whether booking throwback artists is healthy for Australian music are totally valid and I definitely stand on the side of not having them, witnessing them live highlighted the impact of them. There’s nothing like seeing tens of thousands of youth on New Year's Eve dance in sync to Fruit Salad or Bed Red Car, despite how much I’d love for that energy to be expended into emerging Australian acts.