Our Guide To The Five Golden Plains Acts Your Music Snob Friends Are Talking About

Some of the artists at Golden Plains each year are a little more obscure, a little less likely to crack the top ten of triple j’s Hottest 100, and more likely to bring out the inner hipsters on your Facebook feed.

When the 2016Golden Plains lineup landed, music snobs around the country took to social media to express their opinion and expertise on the bill. Everyone’s got that mate – the one who rushes to declare their love for the obscure act nobody’s ever heard before – so we waded through the smugness to get the lowdown on the five Golden Plains 2016 acts your music snob friend has been raving about.

1. Sleater-Kinney

Alt-rock trio Sleater-Kinney were one of the unanimous highlights of the Golden Plains announcement. The band last visited Australia as part of the Big Day Out in 2006, and they’ve been quick to embrace their return to our shores with the announcement of a Melbourne headline show, leaving Sydney fans patiently waiting for their own announcement.

Rising to prominence in the late ’90s and early 2000s, Sleater-Kinney might just be one of the greatest all-female bands ever. Their dual-guitar assault and free-thinking arrangements won them fans around the world in both punk and indie scenes. While they may be most well remembered for their early releases, their latest albumNo Cities To Loveis one of the finest of their career.

2. Eddy Current Suppression Ring

Headlining Golden Plains’ Sunday night lineup are the mighty Eddy Current Suppression Ring, returning to the stage after a five-year hiatus, on a day that will mark exactly ten years since they first played the festival. In a statement, Aunty Meredith said: “This wonder, this marvel, this sensational and extraordinary phenomenon is not explicable by natural or scientific laws alone and therefore must be attributed to some kind of divine agency.”

Eddy Current’s origins are the stuff of legend; a jam at the Christmas party of the vinyl pressing plant they worked at morphing into one of the most influential Australian bands of the 2000s. Their secondalbumPrimary Colourswon the Australian Music Prize in 2009.

3. Built To Spill

Despite a career that spans over two decades, Built To Spill haven’t toured Australian as often as most. Making their debut in 2008 and returning just once since then, Built To Spill were on the wishlist of every ’90s indie rock kid, and Aunty Meredith delivered.

Built To Spill came out of that indie rock scene in the ’90s that brought us such bands as Dinosaur Jr. and Pavement, releasing albums such asPerfect From Now OnandUntethered Moon.After 23 years together they’re still a visceral force, both in the studio and onstage.

4. Violent Femmes

How can the band that wrote ‘Blister In The Sun’ be the boastful choice of a music snob? Glad you asked. Because with every band that has ever been labelled a one-hit wonder, there are a legion of fans that support them to this very day.

Don’t get me wrong; this support is not unwarranted. The eponymous debut from the Violent Femmes was a tour de force which helped give rise to the genre of folk-punk. It’s an album so beloved in punters’ hearts that last year it wasplayed in full at the Sydney Opera House.

5. The Necks

Just as much art as it is jazz. The Necks are the band that your hipster jazz friend plays when he finally convinces you to listen to “just one song”. The Sydney three-piece play a style of improvisational and experimental jazz, with the majority of the songs clocking in around the hour mark.

Starting with their debut albumSexin 1989 (one song, 56 minutes in length), The Necks have released 17 albums, usually featuring no more than two tracks, but always being filled to the brim with some of the most interesting jazz in the world.

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