So, my weekend wasn’t all falling off my horse and going for grinding 15km runs…
We also went to Phillips Backyard Weekend party on Sunday – the day that had the best bands- in my opinion. And it was a blast!
We saw Built to Spill, John and Roy and Dan Mangan and the Blacksmiths.
All good, all of them.
I particularly enjoyed Built to Spill’s retro 90’s comeback style, and then John and Roy were a relaxing listen. I actually found it difficult to listen to them in a big crowd-type atmosphere, as their type of West Coast chill music seems to be best listened to around a campfire on the beach at night with good friends.
Also Dan Mangan and the Blacksmiths- classic. He still had to play ‘Robots’ of course, but cleverly intermingled Robots with another, newer piece that escapes me at the moment. They were good, though I have heard uneven reviews of his performance as of lately. There are no complaints on this end though!
The weekender is an affordable, easy to get to excursion and I highly recommend it. Sunday’s passes cost approx. $35/day and that is pretty reasonable to see the level of bands that were playing. Beers are $5 and the only quibble I have is that Merridale ciders raised their prices to $7, instead of having 1 tix price for all, so I stuck with the beers. I mean, I like ciders but for an extra $2? I’ll stick with the beer, thanks…
Check them out next year, the sound is even better and improved from the past year (some technical issues from what I heard), and we had no bad experiences at all!
The adventures of Mr. Oats 