Henry Appleyard

Where: Okura Bush Reserve, Auckland NZ
When: 16 Feb 2019

Last Saturday, tucked away on Auckland’s North Shore, a colourful palette of harem pants, straw hats, devil sticks and sun-kissed faces cruised into Okura Forest Festival. One of only three bush reserves of its kind in the North Island, the sunny day paid homage to environmental sustainability, non-profit organisations, and most of all, the accompanying musical message of Aotearoa. 

With ticket prices ranging from $15 to $150, all profits went to protecting the Okura Bush Reserve. Considering it cost around $25 to see the Daffodils alone at The Tuning Fork, this was a steal for over 15 local bands and workshops going throughout the blue-skied day and moonlit evening.

The bush reserve revolved around the Okura Community Centre – a relatively small field that housed a large inflatable stage and a surrounding entourage of food trucks (pizza ovens!) and stalls that ranged from back relief clinics to book and clothes sellers.

It was hot. Like deadly sun kind of hot – sunscreen was a must! I arrived around midday to Samoan-born Michael Levin Sesega (Levi) playing a chilled acoustic set that tapped along with a cajón and fluttering saxophone lines. A powerful, grizzly tenor voice rang out over the relatively vacant grounds as streams of other performing bands, with gear in hand, made their way to the backstage tent. Playing on the back of supporting The RVMES, check out Levi at The Portland on the 22nd with Bartells and The Morning Light.

Next up was Odds & Ends, described as a love child between indie and funk – maybe a little more of the former than the latter. Frontman Koen Aldershof led the four-piece looking like he had just strolled off a Hawaiian beach… with a smile to match. Croaky, throat-driven vocal lines overwhelmed a mix of groovy guitar licks and anchored bass/drum rhythms that the band corrected the sound engineers on – “what? you want to turn my voice down!” laughed Koen. Favourite song of the set was Tasty which really brought some much-needed funk to a small and static crowd.

Rock had its chance to enjoy the sunshine next with Ultrasound. This 3 piece of young local dudes trailblazed a set of energetic guitar anthems that included the likes of Steppinwolf’s Born to be Wild and Jimi Hendrix’s Foxy lady. Despite a little off-key grungy vocal, this group geared up the venue and received a warm applause from their original Smokefreerockquest Best Song Pieces that beautifully captured the harmful effects of smoking.

After grabbing an 8$ handmade pizza and a cold glass of kombucha, I joined the crowd as they began to meditate to Franko Heke around 2 pm. This purely acoustic set saw mantras being sung by the self-proclaimed spiritual warrior who also did a breathing exercise workshop later on in the day with his partner. Paying homage to mother earth and the overall mission of the festival, his low reverberating voice got the crowd’s hips swaying and vocal cords singing along to the likes of Wairua, which he performed to over 2.5 million people during  The World Culture Festival in New Delhi.

After catching a friend of mine freshwater scientist Mike Joy at a workshop about solving our freshwater crises, I strolled back to the stage to see local psychedelic star Brendon Thomas under the alias Sonar.Suite for his stand-alone set. Wearing an awesome blue/purple patterned shirt that complemented his sunburst hollow body guitar, the dreamy, distorted tones of his sound were dubbed over with fine precision, playing the part of rhythm, lead and bass to the likes of Prototype by OutKast.

At 4 pm was Three Letter Acronym (TLA) whose name sticks out on any programme. The five-piece, whose interests range from musical theatre, EDM, blues to indie, played a rad set that a had rockier, funkier, pop overtone that finally saw a decent cluster of people begin to dance in front of the stage. On the back of releasing their debut album last year Remember Friday, they played songs Obsessed and Love of My World – lookout for this group. 

Up next was the wonderfully funky Molly + The Chromatics. Their hot temperament of grooves falls in suit with the likes of Hiatus Kaiyote, Fat Freddy’s Drop and Erykah Badu or Hollie Smith. On the back of their Magic Wonder tour, this 6 piece sounded tight – a well-refined polymorphic potion of Wah guitar, screaming horn section and blissfully smooth vocal lines.

It’s always a pleasure to hear Tom Taylor’s duo key combo which acted as both bass, piano and leads synth, with Round Buddha band member Chris Townsend filling in on the drums with remarkable efficiency. So far these guys were the absolute crowd favourite, having responsive shouts, claps and cheers that acted like a pantomime of extra instrumentation. Go catch these guys, if you haven’t already, next at the Mount Maunganui Summer Soiree on the 9th of March.

Aucklander Harry Parsons was on at 6.30 pm with a soothing singer-songwriter set that was joined by drums, bass and guitar. On the back of winning Smokefreerockquest in 2013 and consequently signing with NZ publisher Songbroker, the set sounded well planned but clashed somewhat with the upbeat vibe that the previous act ensued. His latest single Friendsis out now.

A 3 piece of youngsters The Screamers came on for an energetic set that saw their guitars almost bigger than themselves but with a sound as big as any act that played the festival. Playing hard-hitting rock drivers, I caught up with them after to catch their faces of joy from achieving their first-ever show.

NZ soft rock legends James Reid & Hamish Gee from The Feelers were on next to the delight of the crowd. Devil sticks and jugglers moved into the almost full stage floor as the two experienced rockers played a slew of their biggest hits including Venus and Stand Up. Openly missing their rhythm section, they still kept the audience happy throughout their set. 

From across the ditch, International Tourist was a pleasant surprise of gipsy, electro house with a violin/clarinet dynamo that graced the ears and ushered bodies into fits of ecstatic dance. Darkness brought out the fullness of the stage lights, which were great for a festival of this size, and the pizza ovens next door acted as a half-decent smoke machine.

Joshua’s clarinet and Alexandra’s violin sang to one another in the electro-klezmer Balkan disco style that was infused with Ungus Ungus Ungus DJ producer Max Mannequin who bobbed along in the middle maniacally – it truly was a fantastic ride that left the audience wanting more.

This feeling was quickly abandoned upon the arrival of the next act. A little after 8.30 pm, Strangely Arousing took over the stage with their reggae-inspired jazz, funk, rock, mash up – it’s probably best not to try categorise these guys. Forgiving the obvious pun, this five-piece really was strangely arousing. On the back of many, many performances, including winning Battle of the Bands in 2014, lead guitarist Lukas Wharekura led a musical parade of genre-morphing numbers that slammed the stage floor. Just when you think you have the song’s vibe sussed, a sudden jut would pull it into another direction that kept the tempo, and the audience, on its toes. Go see these guys if you can…

Running past the programme time, Blunderbuss Jones and Daffodils finished up a great wee festival in its sixth year running. Starting with only a few hundred attendees, Okura Forest Festival has now evolved into a fully-fledged musical/environmental awareness bonanza that needs more attention – hopefully, one day with more native birds!

Big props to all the acts and the amazingly determined organisers from the local community and Friends of Okura Bush, as well as the business that are promoting a more cyclical, less linear way of running an earth-friendly economic model.

Written for Radio 13