It's been a few years since Soundwave Festival went under, leaving punk and rock fans with nowhere to go festival-wise, but earlier this year the brand new Good Things Festival was announced to inject that bit of punk, pop punk, post-hardcore and rock back into our veins.
With a sweet bill filled with The Offspring (playing Smash in full), All Time Low, Stone Sour, Dashboard Confessional, Northlane, Boston Manor, The Used and more, the festival travelled the east coast this weekend and we caught it in Sydney on Saturday for its first ever event.
Here are our highlights!
Babymetal and their synchronised badassery
Japanese metal act Babymetal are equal parts savage and kawaii and it's really a sight to behold. The entire band are dressed in black drapey outfits and heavy face make-up, adding to their mystique. While the frontwomen Su-metal, Yuimetal and Moameta are busy dancing and singing in ninja-like black and gold outfits, their band are chuggin' away on their guitars with white facepaint and low-key looking like Voldemort.
The crowd are INTO it though - we loved one dude in the front row mimicking absolutely every move the girls were doing and another dude at the back headbanging so hard on his mate's shoulders, we thought he was gonna break his neck.
All Time Low politely declining to do a shoey
All Time Low know way better than to do a shoey, come on. That shit is dirty. Even though the crowd were chanting for the band to do a shoey almost between every song, the band were having none of it! Guitarist Jack Barakat did chug a can of vodka someone threw up on stage though.
The Baltimore quartet had the coveted golden hour slot and made perfect use of it, digging up old favourites from So Wrong It's Right and Nothing Personal, as well as their newest cut Birthday. Our favourite thing about the All Time Low boys is that they always look like they're having the most fun in their lives every single time they play. To close out the Good Things festival run, the band also played a surprise set at the official party at Brisbane's Brightside!
The Used's Bert McCracken bringing his daughter up on stage
Many Sydney fans already know that the charismatic frontman of The Used moved to Sydney years ago to build a family and now calls the city home (and the Sydney Good Things show his "hometown show"). So it was no surprise that his family - including his young daughter Cleo - were side-of-stage watching dad, and Bert took this opportunity to pull her up for some primo stage time. Young Cleo got to dance with dad, sit on his shoulders, mosh out with the fans and generally steal the hearts of everyone in the crowd for about five minutes. Jealous much? Us too.
The killer female-fronted local acts on the bill
It's well-documented that many of Australia's festivals - particularly the heavier ones - lack much gender diversity on the bills, so it was awesome to see local female-fronted acts like Brisbane's WAAX, Melbourne's Ecca Vandal and Sydney's RedHook absolutely kill it on Good Things.
WAAX have already oiled up Fall Out Boy's crowds so opening up Good Things was an effortless feat for the punks, while Ecca Vandal's been touring the UK for the better part of six months, touring with the likes of Incubus and Frank Carter. RedHook are still pretty new to the scene but their frantic blend of rap/rock/punk is a winning combo, so we're glad they got the opportunity to strut their stuff at Good Things.
