Lost Paradise

When the music finally shut off at 3am, people kept calling for more. We ventured into the Shambala Fields yoga and meditation area on the morning of day two. They've got free workshops running from sunrise to past sunset each day, from laughter yoga to guided meditation and sound healing, to something called Yogapalooza.

Unfortunately we missed that session, but we find an enterprising pair of very young bleach-blonde kids setting up stall under a shade cloth, offering woven bracelets and the like. The pair had no doubt come from the well-equipped kids area, offering movies and circus workshops and even karaoke and yoga for the young ones while mum and dad slipped off to get a drink or watch a band. In our pockets are mobile phones, wallets, gum and lint. We promise to find something to trade and to come back, and she gives us a little insect repellant as a parting gift. We later bring back noisemakers and glowsticks, but she had long sold out of wares.

The cool river snakes through all the campgrounds and along the back of the festival site itself, and in the baking midday heat, people are cooling off. Many have brought inflatable couches, blowup toys and even surfboards. There's a rave happening down river from our campsite, a big group of people sitting in the water each day, drinking and partying to bass music pumped from nearby speakers.

Wild Honey, Mosquito Coast and Mossy continue the trend of having some more laidback, chilled bands starting out the afternoon on the main stage as some respite from the heat and pumping DJ stages, but even the baking heat doesn't discourage the dancing electro crowds. DJs get the nightclub-style house and party tunes cranking from early afternoon, and even as the temperatures linger past 30 degrees, the tiny scraps of shade at the Club and Disco stages don't seem to bother the dancers.

People are here to party, the second last day of , and they're making the most of it. Elsewhere, the cabinet circus tent hosts speed dating, story time, variety shows and even a shotgun wedding. It's the one totally dark, cool spot in the entire grounds, so people are there just as much for the shade as for the entertainment.

There are games dotted through the festival site, giant jenga and badminton and horse shoe and croquet sets to play with, and a volleyball net or two that seem to have lost their accompanying balls way too early. Bad Dreems kicked things up a notch on the main stage as the sun finally gave way. The Adelaide rockers, with a heavy 80s Australiana sound somewhere between Midnight Oil and The Go-Betweens and The Saints, are currently the best rock band in the country right now; that's just my own opinion, but watching them jump from little venues to large theatres and now onto key festival slots late into the night with heaving throngs of passionate fans losing it to their retro working-class rock and roll, it's hard to deny they've tapped into something.

Something harsh and raw and angry, with songs about Australian masculinity and bloke culture, love, and oblique references to dissatisfaction with government and society in general.

• Terrains à vendre (Innédit - Les Mariages de Paris) (French Edition);
• Lost Paradise!
• Breathless: Secrets tear a family apart. (Breathe Book 1).
• Asian American Panethnicity: Bridging Institutions and Identities (Asian American History & Cultu).
• The Loser Attitude.
• The Work Of The Trustee In The Church: Money, Money, Money!
• Long Island Railroad, The: 1925-1975 (Images of Rail).

The four piece are dirty and loose and downright menacing at points. Frontman Ben snarls and barks into the microphone, chugging away on his guitar as he prowls the stage. He bangs his head with his hand, with the microphone at one point.

This is actually how he normally plays, but tonight he's angry about something, yelling at the crowd between songs. Towards the end, he says something about a fiance.

Review: Lost Paradise Festival, A Feast For All The Senses | HuffPost Australia

But it all works to make their sound even stronger, more unhinged, more compelling. Just months ago, they were playing small gigs, now they're commanding crowds on big stages and making an outdated, very 80s sound work in There's not a more vital and exciting band in Australia right now. Supplied Bad Dreems in action. But the night belongs to Sticky Fingers.

Review: Lost Paradise Festival, A Giant Party In The Bush

The Sydney reggae rockers arrive drenched in controversy, their frontman Dylan's problems with substance abuse -- and well-publicised allegations of at least two tirades against indigenous musicians -- preceding them. They've planned to take an indefinite hiatus, and Lost Paradise is one of their very last handful of shows before disappearing for a while. Judging from the crowd reaction, an absolutely packed moshpit with barely a spot of room in any direction, their fans don't want them to go. Their set is a pretty standard formula they've been churning out for several years, opening with favourite Land of Pleasure before a long set of their dreamy, groovy rock'n'roll tunes, but even considering their somewhat predictable stage show and the controversies threatening their future, they're still one of the most entertaining live acts going around.

People dance, girls swoon and jump on shoulders as the five boys from Newtown -- each with a uniquely bad haircut, each with their own garish 70s-tinged dress sense -- have one of their last real rockstar moments before heading off into the sunset. The familiar twinkling synth lines ring around the valley, the groovy bass and guitar rhythms seemingly put out their own dance-inducing energy, and Dylan's entrancing, haunting voice echoes for what could be the last time in their home state.

They play the headline slot, deservedly, on the big stage and send punters off with one last reminder of why they made it so big in the first place; they're just a super solid, impressive band. The promised heat respite didn't come on the festival's last day. It's not too much of a stretch to say that you could have an incredible time at Lost Paradise without seeing a single band, so overflowing were the side attractions.

Nevertheless, we're here for the music. Meg Mac is the first act we catch on the main stage, and she's belting through a beautiful, haunting performance accompanied by a small choir of backing singers. She's one of Australia's most beloved young performers, and she's on-form here tonight, but she's kind of the wrong vibe for a festival otherwise comprised of dance music and upbeat rockers, and not exactly the perfect fit for getting punters amped for the night ahead. San Cisco did a better job, their sweet indie-pop numbers getting crowds jumping and dancing into the early evening, before British visitor Nadia Rose turned things up a few notches with her high energy London hip-hop and grime vibes.

This was far more to the audience's liking. With an all-female support crew in her DJ and hypewoman, the MC confidently strutted the stage on her first Australian visit. Day one headliners Rufus took to the stage, shrouded in darkness, amidst swirling smoke and pulsing lights, and turned in a typically entrancing, beguiling set of dreamy, melancholic dance-pop. The trio are now veterans of the late night festival slot, so this wasn't much that we hadn't seen before, but their performance never gets any less interesting or bewitching -- retro 80s-style synths, crooning vocals, driving beats and a stunning light show form the bedrock of the Rufus sound, which can equally inspire enthusiastic dancing or quiet, introspective swaying, depending what point of the night you're personally at.

Their mysterious sound pulsed through the forest late into the night, mingling later with the old-time bangers coming from the most popular new addition to Lost Paradise -- 'Your Mum's Disco'. A wooden cabin equipped with stereo speakers and an iPad, but no DJ, Mum's Disco drew the most passionate crowd of the weekend. Why, you may ask? Because the iPad was linked up to a Spotify playlist of retro classic guilty pleasures like 'Nutbush City Limits', the Venga Boys and Dolly Parton, with punters encouraged to queue up their favourites for the crowd to enjoy.

Lo-fi, but high fun. Lost Paradise is famous for its costumes. Each year, organisers ask punters to embrace the 'escape' element of the festival so evident in its hidden location and spiritual focus -- no grungy skate shoes or sweaty singlets here, instead a sea of festival-goers dressed as angels and devils, echoing butterflies and birds, men and women alike decked head-to-toe in glitter, glow sticks, flowing loose dresses, lurid makeup, fluoro wigs and shiny alien-like clothes.

In between, others opted for NBA team uniforms, some dressed as Popes or clergy, and one clever group came as an entire Mario Kart race, complete with cardboard racecars around their waists.

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The must-have accessories were oriental-style paper umbrellas, while a competition for best totem pole saw huge flags and light displays looming high above the crowds at any given moment. Skegss would have been the first act of the second day for many at 4. As the sun dipped behind the mountains and heat finally relented in the valley bowl, fans were met with a bizarre and frankly disappointing set from the slacker rockers, with near-incoherent stage banter and a set of droning, unimaginative surf-pop songs near-indistinguishable from one another.

The trio managed an upbeat and energetic set, but channelled their energy into jumping around the stage and bouncing off one another rather than coming up with stage banter beyond "everyone having a good time? Suddenly it's 9pm and I'm eating a kebab at Mum's Disco while dancing to Outkast's 'Hey Ya' with a group of girls dressed as Ghostbusters.

The ironic banger tunes don't let up - Daryl Braithwaite's 'Horses', Neil Diamond's 'Sweet Caroline', Dolly Parton's 'Jolene', every word shouted and screamed into the ink-black night sky. Mum's Disco had the perfect spot, nestled snugly between the bars, the food and the other larger stages, meaning most punters had to wander past at several points in the day, and it never failed to disappoint.

Who knew that young adults would pay several hundred dollars for a ticket to a music festival, but remain highly entertained by a Spotify playlist of songs from before they were born? Sampa The Great and Little Dragon entertained on the main stage with colourful and upbeat sets of hip-hop, electronic and soul-tinged dance-friendly tunes, but the night belonged to Sydney rockers DMA's who put in arguably the best set of the weekend. With huge euphoric singalong choruses unashamedly inspired by Britpop heroes Oasis and Blur, and with a fashion style maybe best described as 'lost and found bin at suburban op shop', they didn't exactly fit the bill for the glitter and glam-filled festival, but they blew many away.

Serving up anthemic rock songs, full of passion and feeling, DMA's would have converted many fence-sitters into full-blown fans as they clsoed out the main stage. Day three, the final day and New Year's Eve itself, saw Dean Lewis bring his emotion-charged folk-pop songs to hungover crowds early in the afternoon. Seemingly every one of his plaintive, confessional songs are about lost love and heartache, or at least a lovelorn over-emotional teenager's cliched rom-com idea of love, all about dancing in hotel rooms and late night cab rides and leaving town and loving someone either not enough or far too much, each seemingly custom-created to soundtrack the climactic moment or end credits of the tearjerker romantic movies they rip their stories from.