The best bands at Singapore’s 2017 Laneway Festival and the Australian pair who’ve taken the event global
Laneway’s Singapore line-up includes Nick Murphy/Chet Faker and Clams Casino. The music festival’s founders talk about how their little 2005 alley party in Melbourne grew to become an international draw card
In 2005, Danny Rogers and Jerome Borazio decided to throw a bit of a party in Melbourne. They had no idea where it would lead. That party, known as the St Jerome’s Laneway Festival, took place in an alley and attracted about 1,400 music lovers, which prompted Rogers and Borazio to think about taking it to other cities.
Under the abbreviated name Laneway, it has since become a musical behemoth with eight editions across three continents – including, since 2011, Singapore. The seventh edition of Laneway Singapore, with a line-up that includes Nick Murphy/Chet Faker, Jagwar Ma, Clams Casino and Aurora, will take place on January 21 on the Meadow at Gardens by the Bay.
Laneway’s runaway success has been largely a result of its musical policy: evidently created by music lovers for music lovers, the festival consistently delivers a well thought-out line-up of high-quality acts, with an emphasis on indie and alternative rock but also some electronic and hip-hop artists, in an environment that isn’t overly commercialised. Rogers takes care of the music, and says he just tends to book acts he likes – over the years they have included the likes of Sigur Rós, Stereolab, Tame Impala, Florence and the Machine, The National and Belle and Sebastian.
It’s a formula that travels well: acts appearing in Singapore have included James Blake, Jamie xx, FKA Twigs, St Vincent, The 1975 and Grimes. “Music speaks for itself,” says Borazio. “It transcends nationalities and cultures. We found there was a lot of demand for this kind of music in Singapore.”