Obzfest was what one would expect from a weekend at the end of another year that always seems to be a month too long. There was debauchery and depravity, and a sense of ‘where to from here?’ when the music ended. Like a bad Christmas office party, when they turn on the lights and people are told to go home, when co-workers have drunkenly snogged each other and doused their spirits with spirits to numb their mixed feelings of unsurety and hopeless expectation, Obsfest felt like that kind of inevitable scramble toward the edge. The precipice that is 2009. Running away from the aftermath of 2008.

Highlights were Hog Hoggidy Hog’s cover of Johnny Clegg’s “Spirit of the Great Heart” just before midnight on Saturday. Fletcher from African Dope also did a cooker set with some rastas in the parking garage of Independent Armchair Theatre that same afternoon. A girl with a voice like Nutella spread on a winding gravel road also rocked our world. Her name might have been Natasha Baxter. It was love while she played.

Apparently the reason that Obzfest was so disjointed is because of a council by-law for 2010 that bans street events. So the nucleus of Lower Main Road was no more. In it’s stead, the wide, open field with the hi-tech stage. At R20 entrance, a lot of people chose rather to swarm the streets. Laugh it Off was opposite the stage, and next to the bar. The organizers were helpful, the media seemed lank interested in us ‘Tossing Bergies’, and the people were up for a lag, and we were happy to provide. We’ll be back next year, older and wiser.

Be Sociable, Share!

•