Philips Backyard Reverb Weekend delivered uninhibited fun
Photo by Molly Harris.
Since its inception in 2013, the Phillips Backyard Festival Series has had its ups and downs. After being cancelled for two consecutive years due to COVID-19 and forced to watch a rival music festival, Langford’s Rock the Shores, close permanently due to lack of talent availability, the future of the popular summer event was uncertain.
But after securing considerable star power in the past two years — The Beaches, Peach Pit, Lord Huron, and Fleet Foxes — it’s clear that Phillips Backyard is here to stay. This year, armed with an extraordinary lineup and enough craft beer to fill Victoria’s inner harbour, the 2024 Reverb Weekend was perhaps their best offering yet.
The Phillips festival site was divided into two sections. The lower half of the grounds was home to food trucks, games, and merchandise. The upper half was the stage area and beer gardens. It was well organized, flowing seamlessly and allowing for constant entertainment, even when no bands were playing.
My most anticipated band of the entire weekend headlined Friday, day one of the festival. After dropping out of the 2022 Rifflandia lineup due to tour fatigue, Black Pumas finally found themselves in Victoria for Reverb, hot on the heels of their second studio album, “Chronicles of a Diamond,” which came out in late 2023.
The Black Pumas duo — singer/songwriter Eric Burton and Grammy-award winning guitarist Adrian Quesada — is one of the finest R&B groups on the scene today. Burton’s voice is infectious. Hearing him on the radio, you’d think it impossible that he could sound the same live. And yet, he does. The Black Pumas make their craft seem effortless, and it was a privilege to behold.
On Saturday, Phillips brought in Cleveland’s Cautious Clay and Chicago’s Earl Sweatshirt as their two major attractions.
Cautious Clay’s set was enjoyable if low key. What most impressed me was the wide array of instruments he employed, from the saxophone, to the keyboard, to his trademark flute. Midway through his performance, as he pulled out his flute for the first time, he held it in one fist and raised it to the audience. “This is the first instrument I ever played,” he said, “and it’s the reason I’m not a real estate agent anymore.”
Following Cautious Clay, Earl Sweatshirt delivered a different experience — and one that I admit wasn’t my favourite. Though a talented musician, Earl’s music is slow-paced and heavily lyrical. It was clear that the majority of the crowd, including myself, didn’t know his songs, which caused so many of the moody, contemplative tracks to fall flat in a capacious live venue. That, combined with barebones production design — I’ve seen high school theatre productions with more elaborate lighting — led to him being my most forgettable headliner of the weekend.
On Sunday, day three, I arrived right as the gates opened in order to see Posh Coat, one of Victoria’s fastest growing local bands. Their stylish and lively set epitomized my favourite thing about the Phillips Reverb weekend — the diversity of music, both in genre and origin. Performers like Posh Coat, alongside Trophy Dad, Current Swell, and Astrocolor brought locality and down-to-earthness to the proceedings, while bands like DRAMA and Jungle — the Sunday headliners and my two favourite sets of the weekend — reminded me just how big the world really is.
DRAMA, the Chicago-based duo of producer Na’el Shehade and Via Rosa, shocked me with their energy and soul. Shehade’s dark, infectious beats combined with Rosa’s sunny vocals, which felt infused with lavender and honey, to create an unmatched mood of optimism. If there had been clouds out on Sunday, DRAMA would’ve driven them away.
However, if there was one band whose performance will forever stay in my mind, it was Jungle’s.
Their sellout crowd was rowdy. Their production design and choreography were flawless. Their gigantic beach balls, which exploded from either side of the stage midway through their set, hit me square on the forehead twice but were a lot of fun regardless.
And their music? Perfect. The London group’s trademark eclectic style — mixing elements of dance, soul, and funk — was a showstopping way to end the weekend. Having just performed two of the largest festivals in the world this summer in Coachella and Glastonbury, the band could have chosen to take it easy in front of a relatively small Victoria crowd. They did anything but.
Lydia Kitto, who joined the project in 2023, has some of the most captivating stage presence I’ve ever witnessed. She’s loud, she’s boisterous, she’s having the most fun of anyone there. It felt like the crowd had no choice but to dance, if only just to match her energy and prove to her that we were an audience worth having. I can’t say I knew more than a few of Jungle’s songs prior to this weekend, but I can say without a doubt that they’ve gained a new lifelong fan.
Jungle’s set wrapped up around 11:00 p.m. Afterwards, festival-goers flooded the streets of Victoria, riding a high only possible through the group catharsis of live performance. Some of us went home, while others stayed out for as long as they could, refusing to let the night end.
