Dror Eyal: The festival circuit
It would be easy to dismiss Oppikoppi as the valley of drunken louts; to concentrate on an estranged man committing suicide; on the drunkenness, debauchery and the sexual harassment. But in any society of 15 000 odd people, including those whosnuck in under duvets in the boot, there will be a suicide case, 22 reported cases of sexual harassment, about 240 musicians and lots of dust. Add alcohol and you have a recipe for disaster.
To do that, however, would be to ignore the fact that The Oppikoppi Festival of Rock is the premier South African music event. To do that would be to ignore the fact that the South African music scene has come of age and that this year’s festival was a festival of revelations and integration.
It may have been the Blues and Jazz stage that precipitated it, the combination of Koffi, Gito Baloi, Pops Mohammed, Vusi Mahlasela and Louis Mahlanga. Or it may just have been the fact that South African rock bands are picking up on hip-hop sensibilities But for every white power T- shirt scattered through the crowd there was a melanin-enriched face to counter it. It’s about time.
To concentrate on the politics and logistics of the festival would be to ignore the fact that the Oppikoppi Festival is a snapshot of the South African music scene, a scene that is alive, diverse and coming of age. To do that would be to ignore bands like the amazing Sugardrive who, feigning amnesia about everything they ever learned in rock school, purveyed a new sound that mixed loops, feedback, trip-hop rhythms, drum’n’bass aesthetic, and a rock sensibility that didn’t so much bring to mind Captain Beefheart as reinterpret it, acid-jazz style. It would be to dismiss Battery 9’s new show, new outfits, new image and dynamic onstage interaction that would have impressed Prophets of da City with its hip-hop overtones.
But where are the songs off the new album? “There are no new songs. Gris is just remixes,” says Paul Riekert. To concentrate on the politics of a festival this size would be to dismiss bands like Durban’s Anarchy, who stepped on stage in Ku Klux Klan outfits.
The 8 000-strong crowd at the main stage went berserk. They were still going berserk when Anarchy removed their outfits to reveal dark skins and afros underneath the sheets and got down to what could only be described as staccato death metal. Hey, who could resist a lead singer called Elvis?
Due to a delayed overseas trip the Springbok Nude Girls were also there. So were several Arno Carstens clones – that haircut, that leopard skin vest, those khaki pants, that little ethnic necklace. The ultimate post rock sacred cows? The first South African mega band? Their performance looked a little tired; they’re not as exciting as they were two years ago?
Sixty bands into the festival and it was becoming hard not to be cynical. However, it is campus bands like Maties FM’s Seven Head Scream that really impressed as they cruised through their set of uneasy listening sounds, hyperenergetic stage show and brooding darkness with the aplomb of veterans. At times they sounded like John Leydon’s new band; at times like the next big thing.
But then again maybe the next big thing are Seed. Their rage-against-the-machine sound was hard and fast. Their rhythms were tight and their vocalist sounded like Henry Rollins with a throat infection.
Five minutes into the set and I was somewhere in the crowd, jumping about – to my left a Cannibal Corpse T-shirt, to my right two Sepultura’s and an “I hate myself and I want to die”.
Upstairs at the Blues and Jazz stage the Oooze cabaret was in full flow. In the best afrikaans story-telling tradition it told the warped tale of distorted love in South Africa. Twisted girl next door characters floated in and out like ex-girlfriends while Luscious turned the world on its head and played some mean guitar.
It’s 1997 and The Oppikoppi Festival has grown into a monster – awesome, inspiring, and dangerous. It’s the amazing Birdtribe laying down complex textures of sound. It’s Valiant Swart walking about in a T-shirt bearing the legend “No one knows I’m Elvis”.
It’s knowing. Its No Friends of Harry’s comeback gig on the western front stage mixing with the sounds of Koos Kombuis’s umpteenth gig on the main stage. It’s the pop-punk sounds of Scabbie Annie.
And it’s also the kitsch kultuur of the Honeymoon Suites. It’s a 6am hot shower in a corrugated iron cubical. It’s Matthew van der Want and Chris Letcher; karma-free food; vetkoek and mince. It’s 68 bands, three stages, 6 036 minutes, one long weekend of music magic. It’s surviving.