Livid 99
Brisbane RNA Showgrounds, 2 October 1999
by nic

point one i will make is how much i hate crowd surfers, thye are so rude and it pisses me off that they think they are cool i took the liberty of punching one particuarly rude young man in the middle of the back during spiderbait and he got pretty angry until the guards showed him on his way. Another young lady came over the top of the pit pumping me in the head so i screamed at her "i hope you end up in a wheelchair and everybody laughs at you" and she got angry too, I enjoyed saying it though.

I must also mention sebadoh who took to abusing the crowd midway through their set, at least one band wont cop the anti-social bullshit that goes on at such festivals. It kind of made up for the crap music they were playing i suppose.

Spiderbait put away an awesome set including the trademark 'old man sam' and absolute cracker ending, they really cut it live, if only they could talk to the crowd more. Kram was awesome as usual and he kicked over his drum kit so i was happy. They did a bit of jamming and played lots of older stuff including 'scenester' off p'tangyangkipperbang which was a pleasant surprise.

gerling are one of those fantastic gimmicks, piss funny, really hypo, the crowd went sick, but i doubt that we will see them next year. Great set though, i think they were a little surprised that the crowd went so nuts.

You Am I certainly were the best band there all day. Tim rogers is an amazing performer and the addition of david lane really filled out the set. Great set from what surely must be Australia's best live band (no wanky technology present). As the fat guy behind me said, "The best aussie band since akka dakka (acdc i believe)" and he is not far wrong. They finished with 'jewells and bullets' it was a superb version of it too, tim windmilled, jumped dropped the guitar, went into the audience, came out, resumed the guitar, solo'd, feedbacked kicked over micstands, you name it if its rock'n'roll it happened in the last song, trashed kit as well. Then tim resurrected the stage. During the set he managed to pay out ben lee as well which is always a treat, just before berlin chair he said "berlin chair one song ben lee won't steal", referring to ben lee's butchering of heavy heart that he has done about the place. I think that anyone looking for a decent live show should go catch you am i at the moment especially considering that they are touring with shihad about the place.

We saw shihad earlier in the day and they were so full of energy the lead guitarist couldnt keep himself out of the crowd. Highlights included 'my mind's sedate' and 'home again', great versions of these songs and the crowd loved it too.

Well that was most of Livid 99 from what i saw. most people i saw said offspring were shit but that was to be expected. As Tim Rogers said, 'lets forget about the fucking offspring im here to rock'n'roll' and boy did they rock'n'roll.

livid is a great festival, everyone should treat themselves to it once in a while, the wheather this year was particuarly nice too.

sorry about the length but hopefully someone is interested