On Saturday, Holidays’ experiment lastly went down on the Bellwether, a multi-room venue that opened in LA final 12 months. MATES was arrange as a correct pageant, with the venue’s largest room because the “mainstage” equal, and a smaller upstairs room as a facet stage. All through the evening, concertgoers might additionally take a breather at a pizza restaurant in one of many bars, or on a patio the place Alex Lahey, Banoffee, Georgia Maq, and Japanese Wallpaper — all Australian artists — DJ’ed. (One bemusing throughline with the DJs — just about everybody included a remix of 1 Brat remix or one other.)
Fittingly, the evening kicked off with WAAX, an Australian band with an extended historical past in Brisbane; Burns had been a fan, and ended up briefly taking part in in a rebooted iteration of the group final 12 months. Led by their dynamic frontwoman Maz DeVita, WAAX had been by far the extra aggressive finish of MATES’ lineup — a caustic punk uproar that just about belied the array of dreamy indie to observe.
MATES’ schedule had minimal overlap, that means followers might see most of each artist’s set. Proper after the blistering WAAX, there was the calmer, reflective Claud. Amidst songs mulling over relationships — together with an important new one referred to as “Deadbolt” — Claud had a dry humorousness and joked about Shrek after taking part in “I’m A Believer,” the Neil Diamond-penned Monkees traditional Smash Mouth coated for the film. “I acquired you to sing alongside to ‘I’m A Believer,’” they deadpanned in between songs. “I guess you weren’t anticipating that right this moment.” An viewers member howled “I like Shrek!” Claud: “Shrek is superior. Shout out Shrek.”
For some time, these vibe shifts continued apace: Subsequent was one other Australian act, Jaguar Jonze, whose stage presence was already too highly effective for the tinier stage upstairs. After Jonze’s finale — a throbbing, dance-tinged cowl of “Coronary heart-Formed Field” — the downstairs venue grew packed for Yot Membership’s wistful bedroom-pop. Again in 2019, Yot Membership mastermind Ryan Kaiser went viral on TikTok with “YKWIM?” His set principally targeted on this 12 months’s Rufus, however it nonetheless indicated one thing about MATES: When you began observing the group, it turned evident this was a special, ascendant era of indie. On-line, Gen Z, all that stuff — the pageant was dominated by youngsters fervently singing alongside or filming songs by numerous acts that had wildfire success on TikTok.
