Photo: Aaron Sammut

This year’s Parklife looks set to be a behemoth: a sold-out crowd, some top-notch international acts, and a beautifully warm day to boot. Let’s see if it lives up to its promise.

Gold Coast indie-dance trio Panther DLX have obviously listened to their mothers’ advice: make do with what you’ve got. In front of a small crowd, the trio play a very solid set of their well-written, if a little derivative, electro-house pop songs. Today, the Fire Stage, tomorrow … ?

Photo: Aaron Sammut

Bang Gang dudes Bag Raiders deliver a noisy, sweaty set of electro-tech on the Air Stage – these Sydney kids have impeccable DJ credentials, and know how to get a crowd moving, as they crank out a mix of indie-inflected dance tunes alongside the harder stuff.

Photo: Aaron Sammut

Photo: Aaron Sammut

Hawnay Troof emerges wearing a too-tight suit, but soon the overheating Californian is stripping to leopard-skin jocks to change. He’s already asked us to scream for him ten times. Shouting to a backing track with help from hypegirl “Malison Moldflap” he sounds like karaoke, but energetic, combat-rolling karaoke.

I would’ve loved to have described Ajax’s set on the Air stage, had he actually shown up today; an announcement at his scheduled start advises the very large crowd that his flight from Adelaide has been cancelled. Why stay in Adelaide for the week anyway? The Stafford Brothers step up and fill his shoes as best they can.

Metro Area’s Morgan Geist and Darshan Jesrani are as cool, collected and confident as hell on the River Stage – the New Yorkers uncover all kinds of connections between contemporary minimal and old-school disco, and also spin some lost electro classics. If this is a taste of their forthcoming Fabric mix, it’s going to be pretty damned amazing.

Boy 8-Bit is starting up on the Fire Stage a little early but nobody seems to mind; there’s a good-sized crowd on hand to enjoy his bloopy, rolling nu-electro set, including more than a few disappointed Ajax fans, who are enjoying the set nonetheless.

Photo: Aaron Sammut

Photo: Aaron Sammut

The eighties are still alive and well – at least they are if Dragonette’s spunky electro tunes are an objective measure. Singer Martina Sobrara comes on like a modern-day Cyndi Lauper as she struts around the Fire Stage, and tracks like Black Limousine and I Get Around deliver the bouncy pop thrills in spades.

Diplo is perhaps best-known as M.I.A.’s ex, but he’s also a mean DJ. It’s just a shame that he chooses to augment his Riverstage set with a random MC who keeps exhorting “Brissie” to “make some noise” as Diplo quietly drops some rather ace tunes.

At this point, owing to an emergency of some sort, entry to the Riverstage is closed – the ten people who aren’t there get to see Spod at the Ku Stage. The attendance is disappointing, but the music isn’t. Spod jumps around, stamps like a horse and cranks the bubble machine up while Seja Vogel ably assists on keys.

Goldfrapp go the whole hog in their stage show: stuffed owls, harps, a ton of backing musicians. Even so, just Alison Goldfrapp by herself would be captivating: she sings like an angel in tracks taken from all four of the group’s diverse albums. At 45 minutes, this set’s only fault is that it’s over too soon.

Photo: Aaron Sammut

It’s easy to complain about perspiring drunks rubbing against you, clashing timetables and filthy toilets, but the best moments make it worth braving the sun, sweat and extraordinarily bad fashion choices. We’ll be back.

CHAD PARKHILL, ALASDAIR DUNCAN, JODY MACGREGOR & SCOTT HARMS

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