‘Like a pub crawl but with bands’ hits street
A free live music event has taken over the road outside the Mad Cow, welcoming some surprisingly high profile Australian performers alongside local bands.
Art Vs Science (famous for ‘Parlez vous francais?’ in 2011) will be playing the big outdoor stage on Friday straight after Pete Murray (‘Better Days’, ‘So Beautiful’), Chloe Terare, Late November and Comfort Royale.
On Saturday the gigs will start at 6.30pm, with artists rotating through seven Flinders Street venues, including The Bank Nightclub, Mad Cow Tavern and the Townsville Brewing Co where headliners like Greta Stanley, Horrorshow and JK-47 will perform for free.
On Sunday a similar roundrobin method will be used between bars. Festival director Lachlan Welsh said the weekend gigs are staggered so people can follow the musicians from venue to venue and not miss anything.
“It’s like a pub crawl, but with bands,” Mr Welsh said.
This is the last big weekend of music before Townsville plays host to Tropic Sounds.
“We are trying to revitalise live music in the city,” Mr Welsh said.
“Especially after Covid, venues have gone to the easy DJ sets or trivia, so we’re trying to get live and original music
back in there.”
Townsville-based musician Isabelle Reynaud (pictured far left) from Comfort Royale said this weekend’s Tropic Fiesta was one of the biggest events she’s performed at locally.
“Something like this really encourages the public to come out for live music, because they can wander anywhere and find music,” Ms Reynaud said.
“They don’t need to have a strict plan.”
Ms Raynaud said she really hoped the people of Townsville came along.
“There are live-music lovers who always come, but we’re playing multiple times this weekend so it can’t just be them turning up,” she said.
“We’ve got a lot of awesome local bands and that’s being enhanced by bringing in guys like Art Vs Science.”
For more detail on the Friday street event, search Tropic Fiesta: Street Beats.
For more detail on the weekend venue performances, search Tropic Fiesta: East End Fiesta.
They’ll be followed by Tropic Sounds on Saturday, May 27.