Cylinders And Crowd Surfs On A Summer Send Off

On Saturday and Sunday we farewelled our Summer Sessions tour with Summer Bright Lager on the Sunshine Coast and Coolangatta strip. Crewsy, Hazz, Robbie and Coby linked up with us and the bands, scoring everything from freight trains at Kirra, grinders at Greenmount and even a sneaky point break a short drive from Noosa. 

As Greenmount delivered rippable walls through to Kirra on Saturday afternoon, even longer lines began to build outside the Coolie hotel for the first QLD gig with The Belligerents and Alex Lahey. The NSW and WA gigs were heaving, but we didn’t have to sneak inside behind the scenes as we did at Coolie. Before the supports even started up their soundcheck the line was spiralling around the wall. 

Alex Lahey may have round it up in the mid-afternoon but that didn’t stop us continuing on into the night, despite having a double up the next night at the Sunshine Beach Surf Club. We punched it north to the Sunshine Coast late that night, linked up with Hazz and Jake Vincent for a bush walk the next morning and rinsed ourselves on a well deserved surf before heading to the gig.

Self described band groupie, Mitch Crews, was on tour from Byron to Noosa and is moments away from kickstarting his own band from the aftermath: 

“That was the closest I’ll ever be to being on tour with a band. It was pretty good living a life similar to the bands from Byron, Coolangatta and then to Noosa. I was pretty much a groupie on tour. 

“I Milked free beer at every stop and had a mental time. We had heaps of swell around at the time too. We would surf, then head off to the event to sink a few beers and watch the bands. The Belligerents were especially sick! I’d never heard of them prior to Byron and just thought, ‘they’re really fucking good’. Alex Lahey was rad too and blew us away. 

“When we went to Noosa it was only my second time up there. We met up with Hazz and went for a long walk through to one of the point breaks there, it was a little fat and burgery but we managed to chip into a few fun ones, then we went to the gig and truly ripped the lid off it.

“It pissed down mid-way through the Noosa gig and there were still 200 people lined up outside who hadn’t got in yet, they were that psyched on the bands though that they stuck it out in the rain. It was a little bit of a bummer with the downpour, but it was a sick night regardless.

“Noosa was the last show of the tour and we made sure to give it a proper send off!”

It’s Autumn now but the Queensland coast is still delivering summer-esque temperatures. Get out there snag a wave, crack a tin and let’s hope to see everyone again next summer.