Almost a year to the day of opening up his very own handcrafted producing den, Singing Bird Studios, Simpson’s now set to unleash a raucous gathering of raw rock talent into the backstreets of Frankston.
Glamorously titled Flippin’ The Bird – it’s the perfect celebration of thrash and bash in the most fitting of domains – between the concrete slabs of a carpark within eyeshot of Simpson’s varnished new recording hub.
According to Simpson, it wasn’t a case of booking the bands everyone wants to see but honoring those who’ve had special involvement with Simpson, his studio and his band. “It’s a combination of bands we are friends with and bands that have some affiliation with the studio and the area,” Simpson says. “We also booked a few acts that we just really like, it’s a pretty self-indulgent thing really, we felt it was important that we didn’t just book bands in order to pull a crowd, we knew the bands we like would do that anyway. Plus we booked our own bands cause why the fuck not. I play in Don Fernando and the other organiser Stu plays in Scratch & Sniff.”
A festival awash with some of Melbourne’s most exciting heavy bands will welcome the likes of King Parrot, Clowns and Batpiss to the carpark. Simpson’s very own Don Fernando will also perform along with other underground luminaries such as Join The Amish, Pagan, Grindhouse, The Maggot Men, DesertKingdom, Scratch & Sniff, Elusive Haze and Stiff Richards.
A genre-sprawling affair entering and residing in head-banging territory was ultimately a natural amalgamation for Simpson. “I’m mostly into heavy rock, some metal, punk, stoner, that kind of stuff so we went with a lineup that reflected that. We might change it up a bit next year, but we felt that it was also important that the festival organisers were into the bands.”
It’s a unique, daring setting for a festival but something perfect for metal and punk. Simpson believes the experiment will pay off and the location could be its biggest asset. “As far as we know it’s the first street festival in an industrial area.” Simpson explains. “It’s a concrete amphitheatre, it’s a bit bleak and industrial, perfect place for a metal/punk festival. Let’s just say we’re not going to make flower necklaces and sing kumbaya – its gonna be heaps of fun but its gonna be brutal –bands back to back all day on the same stage.”
To bolster the stomachs off all involved, Flippin’ The Bird won’t offer concrete sandwiches, but instead a fine selection of food trucks adding a different type of spice. “We have Cajun Kitchen who will be doing tasty cajun wraps and fries and we also have The Long Table from Red Hill bringing a bit of gourmet action, they’re putting together a tasty menu including some killer snags. In the booze department we have Young Henrys Brewery to supply their craft beers and cider as well as your standard VB on offer for the old school crew.”
We’ve seen the emergence of the Village Green and Chelsea Heights Hotels as promising outer suburb live venues while Frankston’s Pier Hotel has just launched its own bandroom to the delight of residents of the area. Simpson hopes this trend continues to strengthen. “I think it’s great to see more bands hitting the suburbs, Pier Live is cranking up again down here and that’s great. It really helps when bigger name bands come out to the ‘burbs because it helps create a scene where there are more young bands coming through who have something they can feel a part of.
“We are trying our best to also be a part of that, obviously with this festival as well as the all-ages shows on our indoor stage and all our other services. It’s a big community that we need to foster and support and it’s important that musos have places where they can play live.”
By Tom Parker
