Ahoy! I haven’t really been online at all these past few days. All of the time and energy I had lying around these past seven days went into the completion of an insanely long essay I had due. On top of that, I had my last two exams for the year, and began a brand new additional job. ARGH! With all that now out of the way, I can finally open up my web browser for more than just study purposes, and write some stuffs.

On Saturday work sent me off to the Stereosonic Music Festival, a mega-sized (I was told roughly about 40,000 attendees) dance festival held at the Royal Melbourne Showgrounds. The likes of Armand Van Helden, Trentemoller, TV Rock, Booka Shade, Fedde Le Grand, Riot In Belgium, Bumblebees and many more played live sets or spun some records over seven areas. Sydney’s Van She (the subject of my very first ePROFILE) were also on the bill for the event. Aside from last months Sneaky Sound System show (it doesn’t really count because I could barely see them due to the shitty venue… OH, P.S. - Sneaky gig review coming later this week,) I haven’t seen these boys play a proper live set since March last year. Tres excitement was I.

A few hiccups (Van She scheduled to play at 6pm. Sound issues see Van She play at 6:25pm) meant that their set was cut down from the planned 1 hour to 35 minutes. Pretty disappointing, but thankfully they delivered what was probably their best live show that I’ve caught to date, and all in such a limited frame of time. It was all rather impressive.

At about 6:15pm Nick (Vocals/Guitar) and Matt (Bass) climbed themselves atop of the stage speakers and - whilst tech-minded crew members tinkered about with sound boards and such - sat on them up in the sky, playing on their respective instruments until everything was sorted. Because that’s the kind of good blokes the boys from Van She are.

The show kicked off with Sex City, before launching into a seriously FIERCE performance of the new single Cat & The Eye. As the song finished I began thinking how it was probably the best live performance of a song I’d heard and seen all year. Making things just that little bit prettier; the sun was in a prime position, I was right in between the loud speakers up the front, and a gorgeous breeze began flowing through the area. So very lush! An absolute STACK of new songs from the upcoming album were played (all of them completely flooring me in brilliance,) with the absolute pop classic Kelly closing their set.

Took some ace pictures (see end of post) and managed to snap Nick’s incredibly gorg slide down the speakers in the bunch. There was a bit of playful rock star jumping around played by all as well which added to the already entertaining show.

The most surprising (and most personally gratifying) moment was when Nick went and dedicated a song in my honour. It actually completely blew me away and kind of made me a bit speechless for a while after. It’s not every day a band or artist you really admire and respect dedicates a song to you in a performance, and I was pretty bloody stoked! In hindsight, I’ve had a few sterling highlights musically this year, but I don’t think anything really beats that. Pretty spesh…

Am catching the boys again for the HOT BBQ Music Festival, this coming New Years Day, January 2008 at Birrarung Marr in Melbourne. You should come, we can have an ale and a boogie together. In the meantime, why not download the ‘She’s 2005 self-titled E.P. from iTunes, and keep an eye out on December 18th for the digital release of the new single Cat & The Eye.

PART II ON ITS WAY: I spoke to Tomek, the bands drummer, not too long ago on the phone for the radio show. I’ll be posting the full audio file of that chat later in the week.