Luckily, the second category seemed to dominate North Byron Parklands on Sunday, which presented arguably the strongest line-up of 2017.
Channeling the uproar following the verdict in the killing of Indigenous teen Elijah Doughty, A.B. Original’s set was more crucial than ever – and packed with even more fury and venom at the Mix Up Stage. Frequent chants of ‘No Justice, No Peace’ were sandwiched between the duo’s bangers including ‘January 26’ with Dan Sultan and ‘Dumb Things’ cover with Paul Kelly. It was eye-opening, hard-hitting stuff from the Australian rap heroes.
Client Liaison jumped onstage at the Amphitheatre in their vast array of loud throwback outfits, sliding effortlessly through synth-heavy, head-bopping anthems like ‘Off White Limousine,’ ‘Hotel Stay’ and even a silky cover of ‘Music Sounds Better With You’ by Stardust. However, they birthed one of the festival’s biggest talking points by bringing out national treasure Tina Arena for a short medley, including her immortal ‘Sorrento Moon.’ Huge vibes.
From there, little relief was offered before the Amphitheatre started packing out once again for West Coast rapper ScHoolboy Q, who performed his sole Australian show at Splendour. It was a set that never lost momentum, ranging from the undeniably great hook of ‘Break The Bank’ to the hypnotic haze of ‘Studio,’ while barks echoed from the crowd to signal his guest verse on ASAP Ferg’s ‘Work (Remix).’
Constantly calling for more circle pits than your average hardcore show, ScHoolboy kept the energy high when he paid tribute to his TDE colleague Kendrick Lamar – performing ‘m.A.A.d City’ and ‘Humble’ – before wrapping it all up with ‘That Part’ and ‘Man of the Year.’ While many punters hurled their piss-stained sneakers onstage in the hopes that ScHoolboy would do a shoey, he refused – but still gained unanimous crowd approval with one of the festival’s most essential sets.
One of the frontrunners from the global grime explosion, Stormzy was assertive on the Mix Up Stage – spitting rapid bars over jittering, UK production. ‘Big For Your Boots’ was heavy – Adele shoutout and all – while ‘Where You Know Me From’ got the Mix Up Stage even rowdier. Still, punters were given a chance to catch their collective breaths when Kehlani collaboration ‘Cigarettes & Kush’ takes things along a slower R&B route, while he finished with breakout single ‘Shut Up.’
That’s it for another year. Bring on 2018:
