Crank It Up festival to bring rock ‘n’ roll enthusiasts to Batemans Bay
A woman who lost her home in the Black Summer bushfires hopes third time’s a charm for her long-held dream to host a music extravaganza repeatedly postponed for fires, floods and Covid.
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As the south coast emerges from the shadow of the Black Summer bushfires and the Covid pandemic, Rock ’n’ roll enthusiast Leisa Tague is hoping third time’s the charm.
Her long-held dream of hosting a multi-day music extravaganza was first slated for early-2020.
But Ms Tague and husband Chris Tague have been forced to postpone the Crank It Up music and car enthusiast festival multiple times as the host city of Batemans Bay, south of Nowra, faced bushfires, floods, and then Covid lockdowns.
“Our venue was converted into an emergency bushfire recovery centre in late-2019,” Ms Tague said.
“So, we postponed for that. Then we got struck by Covid.
“We’ve had to cancel two times because of bushfires and three times because of Covid.”
Ms Tague said her own home was destroyed in the 2019-20 bushfires, but she remained determined to host the event.
In January 2022, the festival was slated to take over the coastal town before Covid restrictions forced the Tagues to abandon their plans, again.
Ms Tague said the postponements were far from devastating, though, and had actually enabled the festival to grow even larger.
“We just keep getting bigger and bigger,” she said.
“Every time we postpone, we write another grant application or we find another sponsor.
“We started off as a one-day event at the Batemans Bay Soldiers Club, and now we’re a three-day event in the main CBD.
“It’s been great that it has been able to grow. Each time it got postponed, it made people more determined to be a part of it.”
From Friday November 18, the festival will take over the Batemans Bay CBD, starting with a classic car cruise to Moruya.
Later that evening, Melbourne band The Detonators will play a ticketed event at the Soldiers Club on Beach Rd.
Live music will continue throughout the weekend at two stages in the CBD, featuring acts like Cherry Divine and The Suede Cats.
Among the performers taking to the stage is south coast-bred band Minnie and The Moonrakers, which will play two shows on Saturday.
Lead singer Siobhan O’Brien said residents were clamouring to celebrate the return of live music amid an uptick in large-scale, local events.
“When you live through something like the bushfires and then Covid, particularly on the south coast, it was a real double whammy,” she said.
“We faced losing everything, which I think was a real awakening for people.
“People are going bonkers for live music now, it’s just phenomenal.”
Ms O’Brien was living in Bawley Point with husband and lead guitarist Gregory Powell and their three children when the fires struck.
The devastation wrought by the blaze and the ensuing lockdown spurred Ms O’Brien, a former journalist, to pursue music.
“The fires were horrible and life changing,” she said.
“My husband has always been a musician, so while we were isolated I decided to take professional singing lessons.
“It sort of just exploded from there.”
The band has since toured across southeast Australia, having just returned from a set of shows in Victoria.
Its members include drummer Ken Holm and Narawallee-based bassist Steven Hladio, who received an OAM as a conductor.
Since the end of lockdowns, Ms O’Brien said a new generation of entrepreneurs had sprung up through the south coast.
Earlier this year, Huskisson, near Jervis Bay, played host to the South Coast Food and Wine Festival.
Then in October, the Wanderer Festival proved a roaring success for the far south coast town of Pambula.
But, with a catalogue tracing rock ’n’ roll, jazz, and swing, Ms O’Brien said the Crank It Up festival had a special appeal.
“We live in such a fast paced, disposable kind of society,” she said.
“Rock ’n’ roll is a nostalgic sort of thing, not only for people who have known that style, but for newer generations.
“Perhaps, they don’t even know what they are seeking, but when younger people see rock ‘n’ roll, they are like: holy shit. This is really cool.”
For Ms Tague, rock ’n’ roll music embodied a “happier time”.
“The music was just happy,” she said.
“The thin people love about rock ’n’ roll is how danceable it is.”
Ms Tague said the festival was also a chance for locals to remerge from the shadow of disaster and rebuilding.
“We’ve been under development for the past three years,” she said.
“There’s been the new bridge, swimming pool, and the aquatic centre. There’s been a lot of construction going on.
“The town has felt very disjointed.”
Now, for the first time in years, Ms Tague said all the shops on central Clyde St were full, with the bridge also complete.
“We will be the first event that really gets to use the new space in probably three or four years,” she said.
“We’re hoping moving forward the event will also grow with the town.”
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Originally published as Crank It Up festival to bring rock ‘n’ roll enthusiasts to Batemans Bay
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