Looking Back At Splendour XR
Credit: Splendour XR
Last weekend, we had the pleasure of viewing Splendour XR - the digitised version of the much-loved Splendour In The Grass festival. The star-studded event saw virtual punters enter the digitally-recreated North Byron Parklands to deliver the first ever Splendour XR experience.
With artists given free creative reign on their sets, it was interesting to see how they chose to approach their time on the virtual stage. Artists like Charli XCX (pictured above) took advantage of the event’s VR capabilities. By skipping the bells and whistles of a mock stage and opting to use a green screen, Charli was projected onto the event’s famous Amphitheatre stage. Others like Amyl and The Sniffers, Vera Blue and The Killers took to more traditional stages, projected to various platforms across the XR Parklands. Performances like these were reminiscent of real-life sets, and brought a festival vibe straight to our screens.
During other sets, at times, Splendour XR felt more like a virtual showcase for pre-recorded performances, rather than a festival experience. The artists who opted for more unconventional settings certainly didn’t do so in vain. But sets like Vance Joy’s rooftop performance, while stunning and well-executed, at times just reminded us of how far we were from a realistic festival experience.
Splendour XR felt like a first step into a world of possibilities for virtual events. And while it left us with a bittersweet feeling, missing real-life festivals, it also made us question what the term ‘festival’ means to us nowadays. Sure, not every set felt all that reminiscent of the muddy magnificence of Splendour in its more traditional days, but that’s the reality of most events in 2021. We’ll welcome in-person festivals back with open arms, but we’re intrigued by the idea of virtual festival experiences, and how they hold the potential to transform our understanding of festivals as a whole. Splendour XR was an ambitious effort to bring worldwide music lovers together, in a time when we needed it most.
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