Fairgrounds brings the big city festival experience back to Berry NSW

Day one of Fairgrounds has transformed the town of Berry on the New South Wales south coast into a major music hub usually reserved for the capital cities.

Vance Joy headlined the first day Friday after just wrapping up his Nation of Two world tour in Dublin two weeks ago.

Pond, likewise recently wrapped up their world tour in Mexico City a few weeks ago before descending on the “town of trees”.

Fairgrounds is making Berry, NSW an international music centre this weekend with day one also including Chicago rapper Saba as well as showcasing Sydney’s Pist Idiots, Tyne James Organ and Body Type, Melbourne’s Oh Pep and Rolling Blackouts C.F. and Mackay’s Tia Gostelow.

The event itself is a tourist boom for the south coast town. Berry is always a high profile destination for Sydneysiders wishing to escape the tall towers for the tall trees. Fairgrounds focuses their incentive to visit into this weekend.

What is really pleasing about Fairgrounds is the amount of stage time devoted to Australian music. Yes, it’s nice having Billy Bragg and The Breeders on the Saturday bill but the music fans are here for the Australian music with Fairgrounds hammering the diversity of the Australian music industry. It is a beautifully curated line-up.

Saturday features three very different but all brilliant Australian acts with the alt-rock of Courtney Barnett, the alt-country The Teskey Brothers and the absolute pure soul of Sampa the Great.

Its great that the kids are also covered making Fairgrounds a full-on family event. While the parents take turns at the big stage, the Little Fairgrounds stage is featuring Paw Patrol, Nicholas Ridiculous, Krazy Koala, Circusworks, Bunny Racket, Battlebird and Artist Storytime.

And if that’s still not good enough for you, Albo, the honourable Anthony Albanese MP, is around hanging out with Billy Bragg.

This is year three of Fairgrounds. I have a feeling it will be an annual event for a long, long time.