DEFCON : Tour of Duty. 12pm-10pm. Birrarung Marr, Melbourne, Australia.
Music: Progressive House, Tech House, Hard Dance, Alternative Dance and Techno

I woke up on Saturday morning at 5am (07 Feb '08) in Sydney to catch a plane to Melbourne at 8:15am in order to get to the Defcon Music Festival by 12pm at Birrarung Marr (a newly developed parkland in the city). Getting off the plane , my two friends and I caught a taxi straight to the Crown Casino for an hour before heading to the Festival. I knew in advance by watching the weather channel that the temperature that day was going to be very hot in Melbourne, but by 11am, it was scorching! And the wind was even hotter! I had reservations as to how good the event was going to be at first, and the oppressive heat was dampening my enthusiasm even more.

But we arrived, to what is basically a dirt park (literally dirt) - and entered to what would have at best been 100 people at the event. As the heat passed 40 degrees celcius - the main stage (named HQ) was alive - and there was matting laid out in front of the stage to serve as a dance floor). Barely a tree in sight for shade, the only cover from the heat were scattered camoflage tents throughout the event. Water (bottles) were at a premium price ($5.50) but there were two water tanks providing free water all day/night. There was a man who sprayed water from a hose all day on to the crowd dancing in front of the main stage, which probably kept some dancers from heat exhaustion.

I walked around the event and visited all three stages (the best in my opinion being PLATOON stage) playing Hard Dance music. The third stage was called ACADEMY . The crowd slowly headed towards 200-or-so by 1am and was about 300 by 2pm. At this stage though - the temperature had hit 46.4 degrees - and the intermittent wind felt 10 degrees hotter. By 4pm the crowd was 500-or-so and clouds had started to appear in the sky. Between 4pm and 5pm - the temperature dropped by 17 degrees to a reasonable 30 degrees, and as this happened - the crowd ballooned past 1000 people. At around 5pm it felt like you were actually at a music event - as the vibe increased throughout the event. By 7pm there was more than 1500 patrons at the event. I thought ALEX M.O.R.P.H, HARDSTYLE MAFIA, CHRIS LIEBING, KYAU & ALBERT, BEXTA and ARCHIE all played great sets. I started taking pix of the event as soon as I got there, but it wasn't really practical to take too many before 4pm (except the stages, DJ's and MC) - as the heat was taking it out of everyone - and no-one would have been bothered with photos, but I scored heaps of pix of people - lighting - DJ's - Crowd etc. from 5pm and well into the night. By the time the event had finished - I walked out of there feeling that it had all been worth it - heat and all. My friends and I went back to the Crown Casino for the remainder of the night/morning until our flight back to Sydney at 6:15am Sunday morning.

Line-Up...

PLATOON Stage: Lupco, Hardstyle Mafia (trance/hardtrance), Johnny L, Archie, Dark Sin, Ben Jackson, John Hardy v's Astroboy and Bexta.

ACADEMY Stage: Chris Liebing (tech), Mind Electric, Butterbox, Special Ed, Chardy, Jon Rundell (techno house) and Subharmonic.

HQ Stage: Kyau and Albert, Alex M.O.R.P.H. (trance), The Thrillseekers (trance), Steve Strangis, Mike Nichol and Solarstone.


(On returning home - the full effects of the previous day were displayed to me as I watched the News on TV. On the day i was having fun at the music event - numerous bushfires had ravaged the outskirts of Melbourne - ripping through entire communities - burning thousands of houses to the ground - tearing through hundreds of thousands of acres of bushland, leaving 5000 people homeless and killing at least 180 people (this figure will rise - authorities say). Most people had no warning and it was too late by the time they realised they were in trouble. Many were burnt in their cars while trying to flee their homes. The 46.4 degrees was the hottest day in recorded memory in Melbourne - and the fires on Sat 07 Feb '08 were the worst fires in Australia's history (eclipsing the 75 people who died in Ash Wednesday). Appeals have been set up Australia-wide to help support those left without anything).

Drail.