Too Cool For School: Campus A Low Hum 2010

Written by Molly McCarthy, Photos by Rachel Brandon

My favourite memories from Camp A Low Hum 2009 are as follows: dance party by the swamp, midnight hunt for blackberries and disco in the pine forest. Sounding very weird yet strangely wonderful? Well, fortunately, Campus A Low Hum 2010 was just the same.

As a break from tradition this year, ‘Campus’ was not located in a lush camp featuring a swamp, blackberries and a pine forest, but rather on an abandoned school site, hence the slight name change for 2010. Yet, just as usual, Campus ran by the same rules – ‘students’ arrived on Friday 22nd January with no knowledge of the band line-up and little knowledge of any other events planned for the festival. But, with the promise of “the most inspiring, revelatory, exciting and dreamlike period of your entire life”, dedicated followers and newcomers alike stormed Bulls for another weekend of… well, a little bit of everything.

To match the name and location change, Campus was given a complete back-to-school makeover. And this went beyond the ID cards and Year-Books (timetables) handed out on the first day. There was a little something for both the good and bad kids of Campus: A+ students could load up on themed stationery in the merchandise room, while detention dwellers could add their ‘art’ to Physdicks – a physics textbook covered in enough tagging to earn someone a lifetime in detention. We found that drawing an ugly caricature in physdicks was a good place to vent our anger at the drunken fool who had ruined the end of Seth Frightening’s enchanting set on Day One.

Although hailed as one of New Zealand’s best music festivals by the likes of MTV Europe and Lonely Planet, Camp A Low Hum – now in its fourth year – remains relatively unknown. “Going to Bulls?! Why?” and “Camp what, sorry?” were common responses when I informed others of what I considered to be the most exciting trip of my summer.
Arriving on the Friday night to the pleasant experience of putting a tent up in the dark and in the rain, many campers had to rethink their wardrobes for the continuing torrential rain of Saturday – Day One of Campus. A trip to the local Army Surplus store led to a conversation with the somewhat bemused proprietor, who informed us that campers from Wellington (just two hours from Bulls) had spent up large in the store – having brought only shorts and tee-shirts, with the assumption that Campus would be much sunnier than Wellington. But, as the Wellington campers had predicted, Campus really could make the rain go away – by the time The Dodos’ lively performance rolled around on the first night, I was able to take off my gumboots and raincoat - and leave them in my tent for the rest of the weekend.

Organised by music promoter Blink, Camp A Low Hum is the natural development of Blink’s earlier works of music promotion – a combination of tours and zines, that saw new-but-promising bands touring the country and my 16-year-old self ecstatic that someone was willing to put on an all-ages show. Camp A Low Hum has always promised to be a music festival like no other – a music festival for those who were sick of the hectic nature that surrounds most music festivals. Held in places that most people haven’t heard of before (Ohau, Wainuiomata, Bulls), with limited tickets and with no line-up clashes, Camp allows audiences to avoid huge crowds, hot and dusty stadiums and worst of all, the pain of choosing between two acts playing at the same time, but at opposite ends of the festival.

As usual, many of the best things at Campus occurred away from the stages, but that isn’t to say that the music wasn’t highly enjoyable in itself. Divided between three stages, Barn, Assembly and Pool – so named because it was, indeed, in an empty swimming pool – 60 bands played throughout the day and night over Days One, Two and Three of Campus. Highlights from the jam-packed timetable included Bandicoot and The DHDFDS, whose onstage antics translated well to the pool and its heaving crowd; East Brunswick All Girls Choir, whose drunken ramblings never failed to amuse; Thugquota, who made the best use of the pool’s warped acoustics with a sound-effect-laden set; Dent May and Jens Lekman, whose sweet melodies and lyrics created the happiest of moods; The Ruby Suns, who filled the pool with pop and balloons; and Dan Deacon, who, aside from playing an incredible set of dance beats, dance battles and interpretive dance, also took it upon himself to run many of the extra-curricular activities happening around Campus.

Because, far from Big Day Out’s sad collection of dodgy-looking carnival rides, Camp A Low Hum has always provided excellent entertainment as much off the stage as on it. Day Three saw the school’s gymnasium transformed by ‘Professor Deacon’, for “Let’s Get Physical” – a PE class that even the least physical of us could enjoy. For 45 minutes we ran, jumped, danced, hopped and even formed a tunnel to Deacon’s wild dance pop. “I’d love PE if he was my teacher!”, was the general sentiment of those who hadn’t been foolish enough to wag the class. The gymnasium was also host to Day One’s Orientation (think ‘Top 40’ hits from the 90s) and Day Three’s Leavers’ Formal (cue prom dresses, limbo and more Top 40 hits).

But even events not recorded on our timetable will remain firmly listed in my “Favourite Memories of Camp 2010”. A pair of migrating bouncy castles were soon well known (and well jumped on) by everyone in camp - their location began as a rumour that quickly spread on the first night (“Someone said there’s a bouncy castle around here...”). Our discovery of an island covered in geese – and a makeshift bridge to this island - was another highlight of Campus. Although the geese were soon frightened off by the drunken bush-bashing of the friend who had made it over first, there’s always something pretty exciting about secret islands - even if you have to risk laddering your stockings to get there.

At midnight of Day Three of Campus I turned 19, and, between Bang Bang Eche’s wild renegade show and going to the Leavers’ Formal in an appropriately floral and puffy dress, this will be one birthday that I remember forever. Who knew that school could really be so cool?