Festival 411: Australia’s Splendour XR Featuring 50 Artists, Lightning, Yoga, Forums & Giant Mushrooms

But, in between, it’s also presenting the inaugural virtual Splendour XR July 24-25, which will stream globally on a single time zone, 12 p.m. to 2 a.m. Australian Eastern Standard Time (or GMT +11).

The 50-plus acts booked for Splendour XR include The Killers, Khalid, Masked Wolf, Charli XCX, Vance Joy, Grimes, CHVRCHES, The Avalanches, Tash Sultana, Phoebe Bridgers, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Little Simz and Amyl & The Sniffers.

The challenge, explained Secret Sounds co-founder Jessica Ducrou, was not to feature the acts in the same setup.

“The idea was to provide options for them in formats and production to best represent themselves and to provide diversity,” she said. “I’ve seen some of the artists’ moments, and the richness is amazing. Some are in green screen to appear onstage in a 3D way, or playing on a Gaudi building in Barcelona. Others are in a rehearsal studio, in the back of a truck, a lounge room or in a venue from people who’ve been lucky enough to do a show.” 

Secret Sounds partnered with U.S.-based social VR platform Sansar, whose team worked on groundbreaking virtual world pioneer Second Life and Sansar’s incubation at Linden Lab.

Using historical photos, topical maps and Google Maps, Sansar rebuilt Splendour’s North Byron Parkland site, using the opportunity to add giant mushrooms, sunflowers and angels.

Sansar impressed with its work on Glastonbury’s virtual Lost Horizon event in 2020. 

But for those buying tickets from A$21.99 ($16.31), Secret Sounds wanted to provide the same experiences that physical patrons have.

These included the joy of meeting up with friends, going from stage to stage to catch the notes, mind-expanding political debates in Forum and being awed by spectacular art and visuals accompanying DJ sets in the Tipi Forest. It also encompassed learning from First Nations storytelling, yoga and meditation, Kundalini dance, tantric wisdom and Taoist philosophy in The Global Village.

“Secret Sounds also wanted people to experience the concert from any device, either passively as a viewer, or deeply interactive to the extent that they could be fully embodied, walking on the grass in VR,” added Sansar president Sheri Bryant. “Sansar is the only company that offers a robust mobile experience, the ability to join from web, and a highly interactive gaming experience through desktop PC and in VR.” 

While Lost Horizon used 16 cameras, Splendour XR has 63.

The result will be “the most impressive virtual live event that the consumer market has ever seen,” according to Bryant.

“Between IRL recreations, myriad viewing opportunities, large brands doing never-before-seen virtual activations, the ability for deep audience interaction across multiple platforms, and the lineup Splendour has brought to the table – we are convinced any fan will walk away saying the same thing!” she said.

Splendour XR audiences can tip artists, advise them of crowd reaction, chat via mobile, ride a mobile avatar carousel and order a drink in a sponsored tent and have that drink delivered to their door within the hour.

Ducrou and Paul Piticco, who set up Splendour in 2001, had reservations about whether the virtual event would do justice to the thirst for camaraderie and new experiences of the festival’s following.

“They’re the true devotees, who have ownership of Splendour,” Ducrou explained.

In February 2020, fans snapped up all 50,000 tickets to Splendour in less than an hour. Some passionate fans of the festival have met partners there, gotten married on site and made annual pilgrimages to Splendour with their children.

“Splendour has always been inspiring to me, the way so many people contribute to an energy unlike any other festival I’ve worked on,” Ducrou observed. “The sense of community and comradeship, both from the audience and the people who work on it, is something I’ve never felt elsewhere.”

Ducrou warmed to a virtual event after noticing how her children hung out with friends post-COVID during video game sessions. 

There was also Travis Scott’s Astronomical concert on Fortnite, Australian artist Reuben Gore’s recreation of the Splendour site for Minecraft, and a Bob Lefsetz blog, which asserted, “Promoters stop being lazy, start thinking about how you actually operate in this new era!”

Whether Splendour Byron Bay becomes a physical/virtual hybrid in the future remains to be seen – but that would help solve the problem of the festival’s typically quick sellout.

“If we do go ahead, I’d envisage a whole new team to put the virtual version together,” Ducrou said. “It’s a complicated model, and it’s been more demanding than the ‘real’ project.”