REVIEW: Rhythm & Vines 29-31 December 2010

2010 was the first year Rhythm and Vines sold out, bringing 25,000 festival goers to Gisborne and cementing its reputation as the biggest and best New Year's Eve event in NZ. This was my first time at R&V and from a newbie's point of view I can say it lived up to all my expectations, and the on-site camping experience was great. Our own swimming pool to cool off with first thing in the morning was a definite bonus. R&V is a varied and interesting beast. 4 nights camping - 2 of those nights spent dancing to a superb mix of local and international acts, and the third bringing in the New Year with a mostly Kiwi line-up, topped off by a big fat serving of Shihad just before midnight. All manner of yob/yuuf drinking culture mixed in with the more sedate (sort of) on-site campers meant all sorts of festival wildlife was mixed in to my R&V experience. Crikey, I even saw some over 50s in attendance, and here I was thinking it'd be all drunken youthes and strict security guards.

It was a massive and worthy committment to our New Year's Eve, what with the 7 hour drive from Auckland through the pouring rain, we wondered if we'd ever see the sun again. But thankfully they were wrong about the weather! As soon as we hit Gisborne it was pure sunshine all the way and I swear the temperature got a few degrees hotter. We had arrived. R&V welcomed us in!

Settling in on the 28th, the day before the festival was due to open, was a really good call as it enabled us to get a good camping spot and chill out for a bit. Once we'd finally found the place, (due to some pretty subtle signage that we missed completely til we acquired a handy map from the local liquor store), we headed in and set up camp. We were well advised to move our tent up from between the Vines (cheers to Ian and John Wayne the pool attendants for their sound advice) to the top of the terraced hill overlooking the festival site, giving us an impressive view of the sunset, the vineyard, and of course other happy campers splashing around in the swimming pool. Good times.

The next day was spent checking out BW Campgrounds, enjoying a refreshing swim on the beach, and happily discovering that Bang Bang Eche were playing at the V Beach Box stage! We stood there with a smattering of keen punters, melting in the midday sun, while the band treated us to all the songs from their soon to be released debut album. What an excellent way to start the first day.

Back at the festival site that evening, we witnessed an awe inspiring powhiri, they put on a super strong performance and a fitting way to open the festival.

Then it was on to Hollie Smith's set on the main stage. Looking pretty striking in a well chosen outfit, (shirt and tie, finished off with some rough cut denim shorts and designer high heels) and sounding truly on form with that voice. Hollie Smith hits the spot and with the perfect balance of attitude and confidence and a soul-stirring beauty in her voice that never fails to impress. NZ's own soul siren showed us how it's done once again, backed by an excellent and tight band that played some impressively complex arrangements behind her. They set the bar high for my first night at the festival.

Next we stopped by the Vines stage for Mystery Jets. It was their second visit to R&V and they had a decent sized crowd dancing happily to ‘Two Doors Down’. It felt like the night was really warming up, though it was only 7.30 and the sun was still out. A bit of indie pop was the perfect soundtrack for the carefree summery mood permeating the festival, so what else could we do but stop and have a dance.

After a few drinks and outfit changes back at the campsite, we came back in for Carl Cox who played a very 90s Ibiza DJ set at the Vines stage. He kept it interesting by bringing out a live saxophonist every now and again to improvise over the top of his beats. N.E.R.D. where one of my highlights. At one point they asked everyone in the crowed to kneel down on the floor, and everyone did, it looked amazing. Then when the beat came back in everyone jumped back up and started dancing. Perhaps you had to be there.

Dj Jason Howson made my night as we caught the last 10 mins of his set when he dropped a mean track by Magnetic Man - 'I Need Air', which sounded so wicked it made me realise how great that song really is on a decent sound system.

The second day of the festival, 30th December was the big night for me, NYE itself following on as a pleasant post-script after all the epic madness of the night before.

We missed Popstrangers and Afternoon Raj (who were on 15 minutes early due to Hudson Mohawke not performing cos of a broken leg) so that was a damn shame, but I still managed to fit in some NZ music goodness by kicking off my day with Electric Wire Hustle on the Vines stage.

Tinie Tempah gets the award for biggest demonstration of short man syndrome, using his time on stage to get us all to promote his latest single. He made the crowd chant 'Buy Invincible right fucking now!'. Wow, almost inspired me to, erm, not buy it. Thanks. This was after the willing crowd had sung the words to Invincible to him so perfectly that he'd proclaimed 'New Zealand is the best country in the whole world!' Well, yes, but we don't need you to tell us that Tinie, I bet you say that at all your gigs.

Erol Alkan played an electrifying set at the Cellar stage (hosted by Cassette Nine). I only caught about half an hour of it but it was very synth heavy and squeeky making the build ups and breaks that much more intense. I wish I had have seen more.

Flying Lotus had a smile like the Cheshire Cat, you could spot his his glowing white teeth from a mile away, that and the sound of some frenzied upbeat jams drew us in to catch a good chunk of his set. His band, made up of a drummer and bassist were amazing. There was an accomplished easygoing brilliance to their colourful and jazz-tinged set that made me so glad to finally see him play live.

Gaslamp Killer made me laugh with his madman showmanship. There were some great random mixes to keep us on our toes, some high speed head banger moments, and he kept yelling out “You know this L.A. music!!” just to remind us all where he was from.

I caught the last (and best) 20 minutes of the Justice DJ set right in the front row just in from the left, as there was plenty of room for all the people who couldn't wait the whole 2 hours to hear 'We Are Your Friends'. These guys really enjoy milking it, they pulled all sorts of caricature poses to make sure they looked as French as possible, and came across so beautifully and hilariously pretentious that you can’t help but love them for it. They didn’t say a word the whole time of course, but one of them put his arms up to form their ‘Cross’ symbol, before they came up for their final bow. No encore, but they did ensure it was a proper huge party ending by dropping in a random T-Rex track and following ‘We Are Your Friends’ with ‘Why Can’t We Be Friends’ by Smashmouth.

We listened to High Contrast from outside our tent while enjoying a few more drinks, and an excellent view of the fire dancers up on the hill, then going to a phone charging party happening at the washroom tent (chatting round the communal multi-plugs about the joys of festival life and the recent Jay-Z gig at Mt Smart Stadium).

So on New Year's Eve, all the big international acts have swanned off to play Australian festivals or wherever else they're being paid to spend their New Years, but never fear, R&V remedies this sudden change of mood with a stonking selection of NZ talent, from Ruby Frost to The Naked And Famous, reminding you just why you love NZ so much in the first place and why you're spending it in the first city to see the sun in the whole wide world. That's right.

Flip Grater started my afternoon with a delicate and intimate set on the Vines stage. She introduced the row of security guards as her ‘interpretive dancers’, as they dutifully clapped between each song. She looked comfortable and composed, standing  with her setlist and a dainty white tea cup at her feet. Watching her play in the late afternoon sun was like having our very own private courtyard concert of beautiful heartfelt country songs.

Ruby Frost was a definite highlight of the evening, even with an early start just before 6pm, and only accompanied by a backing track and a borrowed drummer. She’d brought along her own backdrop/costume accessory – a long flexible rod with flowing transparent white cloth hanging off it, which she used for extra stage prescence and to complement her white feathery dress. I’ve seen her play a few times now, and am always impressed by her gorgeous voice and well written songs.

Lisa Crawley did a brilliant job of gracing the main stage in the 6pm slot, with a small but appreciative crowd. With the sun still out, shining it's rays of golden goodness all over the drunken wobbly heads of many in the front row. We had a little waltz to ‘Brother’ and had a laugh at the guy who had to yell out ‘What’s ya phone number?’ then Lisa’s drummer responded with ‘Smooth bro’ and started to reading out his phone number, until she stopped him.

Barb ended their set with their own New Years Eve countdown, even though they finished at about 9pm, bless them. 9pm is the new midnight! Bring on 2011. I heard ‘Leo’ echoing out over the hills as I scurried over from my tent, making the short hop, skip and a jump to the Vines stage once again. They played lots of the songs from their various bands, including a reggae version of Liam Finn’s ‘Second Chance’ and Lawrence Arabia’s ‘Apple Pie Bed’ as well as Connan Mockasin’s ‘Having a Baby’. As usual, Connan was very entertaining to watch, wearing three artists lanyards round his neck at once, and always with a weird and wily look in his eye, like he was off in his own little world for the entire set.

I have to give a quick mention of two other must-sees at R&V - The Fridge Nightclub and the Amnesty Waterslide. The Fridge Nightclub was nestled in amongst the stalls on the way to the Electric Avenue dome. It was still going at 4am on New Years Day, when I wandered past, too wired and dazed to sleep. It’s the world’s smallest night club, and they always managed to get the temperature just perfect inside, as well as providing great MCing and beats. The Amnesty Waterslide was inside the festival site and opened at 5pm each day. It was $2 donation to go on it, or free if you went down naked. Lots of naked guys went down the slide, but only one naked girl apparently.

We didn’t watch all of The Naked and Famous’ set, cos the sound was a bit muddy and we really think they should talk to the crowd more, so we can tell they’re actually enjoying themselves, y’know? A little audience interaction wouldn’t hurt guys.

Shihad topped off the evening, like some fine time-honoured tradition where we end the night with all our favourite anthems. Apparently they played the same time-slot in 2008 and I’m sure it went down just as well then.  My highlights were Home Again, especially cos they didn’t play it at their Powerstation gigs so I was dying to hear it live again, and other favourites Pacifier and Bitter. Honourable mention must go to whoever was in charge of the visuals on the big screen during Shihad’s set. They must’ve got bored and started pressing all the buttons at once cos it started to look incredibly naff. What the hell were you doing guys. I kept my eyes firmly fixed on the stage though, didn’t want anything spoiling it!

Finally, they rounded proceedings off nicely with the ‘Midnight Show’ (more firedancers onstage, dancing to: What else? - Prodigy’s ‘Firestarter’) and the announcement that “For the first time ever, Rhythm and Vines is gonna be on time with it’s countdown!” Woohoo! They were a minute late according to my watch, so we got two countdowns, which was even better. Then there were the fireworks, which to be honest were the best I’ve seen in ages.

All things considered, R&V was a success because of the atmosphere, stunning location and the mix of local and international acts. If you've never been, it's well worth checking out.

More photos of the festival available here.

Review by Dedee W and David Apple. Photography by Dedee W.