Big Red Bash delivers impressive three day outback music festival

The Big Red Bash outback music festival held 2nd – 4th July in the Simpson Desert Birdsville, located more than 1,500km west of Brisbane, attracted more than 7,500 festivalgoers of all ages  to experience top-tier Australian musical performances within the unparalleled beauty of the desert landscape.

Away from the main stage, attendees enjoyed a plethora of activities where there was something for everyone. From desert dance parties and sunrise yoga to sand dune surfing - there was no shortage of fun. Families enjoyed fun runs, art workshops, and acoustic campfire sing-alongs, while adventurers explored 4WD desert expeditions and wildlife spotting.

The Birdsville Big Red Bash is an all-ages, dog-friendly camping event that offers up an Australian adventure for families, grey nomads, camping and caravanning enthusiasts and intrepid travellers.

Festival Founder and Managing Director of the Outback Music Festival Group Greg Donovan shared “It’s always a mix of extreme happiness and relief that we’ve delivered another successful event when we hit the end of day three. And sadness that it’s coming to an end. We run on adrenaline and the energy of our performers and our amazing crowd during the event, and then before we know it an event that is twelve months in the making is over. This year had so many highlights, we’ll cherish the many new memories made along with all our festival goers. And within a few days of our final bump out you won’t even know we created a mini city in this pristine outback setting.”

Headlining the Birdsville Big Red Bash were Oz legends, Tina Arena and Jon Stevens joined by an epic lineup of over 30 artists including Ian Moss, Colin Hay, Tim Finn, Diesel, Baby Animals, Vanessa Amorosi, Mark Seymour, Richard Clapton, Casey Barnes, Shane Howard, Pierce Brothers, Bjorn Again, Mi-Sex, Chocolate Starfish – Bat Out of Hell, The Rolling Stones Revue starring Phil Jamison, Tex Perkins and Tim Rogers, Furnace & the Fundamentals, Ash Grunwald, Fanny Lumdsen, Sarah McLeod, Hayley Mary, Steve Balbi and Amy Ryan.

2,754 Big Red Bash festival goers Freeze-Frame Danced their way to a new world record for the “most amount of people doing a Freeze Frame Dance” - adjudicated by the Australian Book of Records - beating the previous record of 1,308.

While they smashed the Freeze-Frame record, Birdsville revellers fell short of toppling the current Nutbush City Limits Dance record of 6,594 boot-scooters which was set at sister event the Broken Hill Mundi Mundi Bash last year. This leaves the door wide open for the Mundi Mundi Bash to once again set a new world record when the event is staged next month.

A dance with a worthy cause at its core, the Nutbush has been raising much-needed funds for the Royal Flying Doctor Service since 2016, with this year’s bush dancers raising an impressive $46,800 for their amazing work, bringing the total raised for the worthy cause to an impressive $114,000.

To date, Outback Music Festivals has raised an impressive total of more than $1 million for the cause since 2016.

The Birdsville Big Red Bash is supported by the Queensland Government through Tourism and Events Queensland and features on the It’s Live! in Queensland events calendar. The Birdsville Big Red Bash generates more than $20 million in economic benefit for Outback Queensland.

The Big Red Bash is produced by the Outback Music Festival Group, which also stages the Broken Hill Mundi Mundi Bash taking place in outback NSW in August.

For more information, visit www.bigredbash.com.au.

Images. Credit: Matt Williams