Vivid Finale

So in the end, despite my initial enthusiasm, I didn't end up seeing much of Vivid Enofest. However, yesterday was the last day, so I thought I'd do some last minute checking of it out. I got to see Fire Water, some of the light shows, and the big finale Pure Scenius.

Fire Water was reminisent of Pyrophone Juggernaut, the big outdoors fiery musical spectacle I saw at the Sydney Festival, insofar as they were both... Big outdoors fiery musical spectacles. They were also both very arty, and both had people wearing odd costumes in a not so subtle effort to get fire-retardant outfits on the cast and crew. This one, however, had more of a plot. Thematically, it was some kind of tribute to the early convict settlers of Sydney, and to that end it started with some people yelling a list of names, and transportation sentences. Seems most people got 7 years, though being stuck in Australia at the end of those 7 years couldn't be much fun. The plot was, more specifically, a dramatic recreation of the Three Bees incident, when a convict ship caught fire in the harbour, and the guns inside it went off. I can't help but compare it to Pyrophone Juggernaut, and it doesn't really compare favourably. The music wasn't quite as good, though similar in style, and I felt that a lot was lost by the audience not really being able to feel the heat of the fire quite as vividly, due to the boat being a decent way into the water. Still, it was enjoyable, and the decorations around the event were pretty cool:

Barrel of fire! As seen in the apocalypse.

The aftermath. My attempts to actually capture the boat on fire
before it sank failed, as I am shite at photography.

After Fire Water, I checked out some of the random light sculptures around the MCA and the Quay. I didn't have much time before Scenius, so I didn't go right into The Rocks or up to Observatory Hill, but then I wasn't so amazingly impressed by what little I did see to feel that I was missing out. The only thing that really impressed me was this awesome druids sculpture.

Because druids are awesome.

And so then there was Pure Scenius. This was an improvised three-part concert of which I only bought a ticket to the third part, which I now moderately regret. When I walked into the concert hall, I recognised Brian Eno and Jon Hopkins sitting around on some couches set up at the front of the stage with their fellow musicians, just "having a yarn" as some audience member behind me put it. Once the audience was full, the light went down, Eno stood up, a violinist played a weepy solo, and Eno lamented the end of this great tour which had taken him "from one side of the Opera House stage to the other." After some more random banter, he went to his laptop and started making some music, as the other musicians got up from their couches, one by one, to join him on their respective instruments. The music was amazing, variously ambient, minimalist, and trancey. Then a bit over an hour later there was a somewhat awkward standing ovation during which Eno claimed they weren't planning on an encore. He eventually relented, on the grounds that there were so many bald heads in the audience who had come to lend him their support, he just couldn't let them down. They then proceeded to blow everyone's mind.

So it was pretty good! For quite a long time Eno has been one of my greatest musical heroes, so it was a pure joy to have had this opportunity to see him, and for the experience to be even more spectacular than I might've hoped.