Review: MMVAF 2017
Maroochy Music And Visual Arts Festival hit the Sunshine Coast for it’s third annual festival at the weekend and put on an unforgettable party.
Whether it be music, art, billiards or beers that brought you to MMVAF over the weekend, you could guarantee all those boxes and more were ticked with a strong lineup of artists, live art activations and non-stop music all in the one place.
Brisbane rapper Mallrat warmed things up when she hit the stage around noon wearing a little double-denim and mesh number backed by DJ Denim. The party really kicked off however, when Northeast Party House took the main stage. Complete with t-shirt missiles and confetti canons, Northeast played back-to-back hits as people flooded to the front of the stage to join the party. Frontman, Zach Hamilton-Reeves, struggled with his vanishing voice from a strenuous few months of touring, but was backed up by a sea of people singing word for word to tracks like ‘Calypso Beach’ and ‘For You’.
Hip-hop duo Horrorshow followed onto the stage with a set full of gender-specific drug references that got a huge response from the crowd. Horrorshow's MC, Solo, wore a Huffer tee during his set while one of the lads backing Yung Billy Davis rocked Goat Crew.
Obvious crowd favourites, Gang Of Youths took us into the evening as they played their set directly after finding out their latest album, ‘Go Farther In Lightness’, just hit no.1 in the country, so their energy levels were extra high. The crowd were crazy during this set though with every second person up on someones shoulders.
The Presets played banger after banger from a varied collection of songs, both new and old, that were familiar with so many people in the audience, including tracks like ‘My People’, ‘Ghosts’, ‘This Boy’s In Love’, ‘Talk Like That’ and so many more.
Alison Wonderland finished off the night playing a DJ set with an impressive visual and lighting display, topped off with confetti and even pyrotechnics. Her music definitely suited the time of night as everyone was still on a high from The Presets’ show and were eager to go out with a bang.
Music aside, what’s great about MMVAF is the laid-back atmosphere and open layout of the festival. There’s never a shortage of things to do between sets with market and food stalls, a communal pool table, art exhibitions, live graffiti and plenty of photo ops. There was also The Love Suite stage which had DJs spinning all day to ensure you never went a minute without a beat to get filthy to.
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All photos: Ellie Feiss