Alex Casey and Gabi Lardies dissect their Laneway 2025 experience.
Gabi Lardies: Hi Alex :))))))) Congratulations on not getting sunburnt. Everyone I talked to at Laneway yesterday was braving the sun for one thing. Charli XCX. How was your brat experience?
Alex Casey: We will talk about the rest of the day later but you are absolutely right, brat was thick in the air (and emblazoned on many chests / hats) from the moment the gates opened. I saw so many girls with teeny tiny “brat” stickers stuck to their bare skin, but my all time favourite brat merch was bespoke Disney-themed ‘brat-a-touille’ T-shirts?! Which is all to say, everyone was primed to go fucking crazy when Charli XCX finally came out at 8.45pm on the mainstage, myself included.
GL: That moment when the green banner dropped was just [chefs kiss].
AC: Wasn’t it just? The typography, the jump-scare bright lights, the roaming camera.
GL: The girl was not fucking around. Hardly any chit chat and just hit after hit. Being a small person about 100 metres deep in the crowd, I was reminded that this larger than life party girl is indeed probably around my size. Most of my glimpses of her were via the big screen, so thank goodness she performs for the roaming stage camera just as much as for the giant amorphous pile of limbs and iPhones in front of her.
AC: My partner rightly observed that she had the stage aesthetic and bravado of a professional wrestler, intended entirely as a compliment. She knew exactly what we all wanted from her, and it is truly remarkable that she pulled off the whole set with just herself, a microphone, and a small range of fonts. Powerful amount of hair, powerful ruffle skirt, powerful presence to behold.
GL: Such an acute observation! Charli really is out there on stage presenting herself as a prized fighter. I too couldn’t help but notice that the entire stage presence could have bought a flight ticket with only hand luggage, surely her little top, skirt and banners would fit in a wheely bag, with a bit of space to spare for maybe 20 pairs of speedy sunglasses. I loved when she said “There’s a rumour out there… that I love to party.”
AC: That wasn’t the only rumour she was forced to address onstage – all day speculation had swirled about whether or not Lorde would join her for the ‘girl, so confusing’ remix, just as she had done at Madison Square Garden last year. Surely the home city summer festival is a slam dunk cameo, and everyone was frothing when the song started and Charli said something like “I’ve just realised where we are… this could go off”.
GL: When she said, that a little pin pushed up against my hopes to see the duo live together, because she seemed oblivious to the fact that sooome of us have been speculating about a Lorde appearance for months – like you only just noticed this is Lorde’s hometown? That didn’t bode well. The next few seconds were a bit of a roller coaster – first there was a quietly stated, “she’s not here tonight,” then “make some noise for the girl.” uhhh not a great choice of words.
AC: From where I was standing I heard “she’s not here tonight” and then a deflated kinda “hrrrmph” from the crowd, but then “MAKE SOME NOISE FOR ELLA”. But then no Ella? Girl, so confusing indeed! Even when she didn’t come out at the start of her verse a part of me hoped she might still just be rushing through the rafters backstage.
GL: Lol, certainly made for an anti-climax, but I don’t think the crowd held it against Charli, we continued with our jumping and yelling along. I did find her set a little short – it was all wrapped up by 9:50, I thought we had another 10 minutes!
AC: Yeah, all was soon forgiven and forgotten, especially as there are so many reasons she couldn’t have made it (lost in head, scared to be in pictures). As much as I love all the huge dance-y hits – ‘Guess’ went particularly crazy as did ‘I love it’ – I also really loved the slow sad ones like ‘I might say something stupid’ and ‘everything is romantic’.
GL: ‘I might say something stupid’ is one of my fave songs :’) I’m so glad she played her emo hits. It’s good to have a touch of feelings in the party zone.
AC: Speaking of feelings, I also gotta go on record and say that I was truly moved to tears by that damn Stranger Things guy (Djo) and his damn TikTok song (‘End of Beginning’). It wasn’t so much by the performance itself (in fact he seemed kinda begrudging about it), but mostly by seeing so many groups of girls arm in arm howling the lyrics. I’m definitely premenstrual here, but I was truly so touched to see everyone singing and having a nice time together, even if because of a weird TikTok song about melancholy found in a city 13,500 km away. As Charli would later say during her set: “I swear to god. This is the real shit. The important shit.”
GL: Ahahaha, I was not in the crowd, but from the little VIP platform, I saw the moment that song came on and the whole crowd put their (your) arms up and started to sway. Must be annoying for everyone to know just the one song. There was that similar singalong holding your friends vibe in the crowd for Clairo, especially, I think, during the two songs from the Immunity album she played – ‘Bags’ and ‘Softly’. I was brought to tears (from laughter) when she said something like “OK now I’m going to play a song you can really dance to, let’s lift the energy”. Then she played a song exactly the same as the rest of her soft-girl, sad-bedroom pop, and we swayed and sung along as usual.
The performance was perfect, so beautiful, and I loved her capri pants. I would have preferred if she had performed at a different location, perhaps the stage by the lake with the trees. It would have been so nice to be able to sit in the shade and not have to pretend that her music is for bopping.
AC: You’ve brought up a crucial point here: shade. I was pretty bamboozled by the lack of shade available in the main areas, and the choice for the shade sails to be made of fluffy see through white stuff? Truly what is this material and why is it snow camouflage from army surplus?
I saw a lot of burnt necks and arms, which begs another question: why wasn’t there a free sunblock station at every water station? In fact, why isn’t there a free sunblock station on every street corner in this damn country in summer? A couple of free Malibu cowboy hats simply will not do.
GL: The lakeside area, which was not properly signposted, was the only reprieve from the hot, hot sun and not because any sails had been installed there but because there were trees. I paid about $100 extra for a VIP ticket, mostly to ensure being able to sit comfortably in the shade. Alas, that was money wasted. I was on-site for about nine hours, and never in that time did I manage to get a seat under the tiny handkerchief of shade there. At about 3pm, before I had found the lakeside area, I had to sit on the floor by a pot plant to eat my pita in a corner of its shade. I was desperate enough not to care that my bare arse (miniskirt problems) was directly on the platform floor and leaving two puddles of sweat. I also expected that the VIP area would have had a sunblock station, but no. I really thought my friend was being OTT when she packed a super-sized Nivea bottle in her bag, but I think it saved my life.
Also – the water from the water stations was piss-warm!!!
AC: I was loving the piss warm water all day tbh, I realised when I got home that I think I left Laneway more hydrated and better-fed than any other day of my adult life. For lunch I got vegan dumplings from The Rolling Pin, so delicious that they compelled me to demand “we need to buy crispy fried garlic when we get home” in the middle of Remi Wolf. I got a Fatima’s pita and koftas for dinner, and Don McGlashan was in the line behind me eating a red-coloured cone of shaved ice! An incredible day of rich culinary experiences for all – although I’m told at least two places ran out of food during the 7pm-ish dinner rush.
GL: MMMmmmm my lunch pita was a Fatima’s falafel one, so yum! The culinary delights ended there for me, and the VIP scam got me once again. There was one food truck in there, where we lined up for 20 minutes and then waited another 40 minutes for a rather doughy-pizza, which we did not finish between the two of us. Too much chewing!!!
AC: VIP giveth and it taketh away. We should probably wrap this up like a Fatima’s pita, what else would you like to say about your Laneway 2025 experience? I would like to shout out the crowd – extremely considerate and safe feeling vibe all day long, with absolutely no instances of macho aggression. I saw one guy kneel down near the trees and politely do a very small and silent spew before carrying on his merry way, but that was about as messy as it got from my perspective.
GL: I rolled the dice by arriving at 1:30 to see Vera Ellen play. Happy to report I rolled a perfect full house flush double six pass me all the poker chips. They were so great! I had so much fun dancing to them and they’re my new favourite band even though I already own a T-shirt, AND I can report that though the lower back got a little sore, the 33-year-old-body made it relatively unscathed right through the day. Yippeee!
AC: I had been half joking that Laneway would be a day of DiScOvErY for me, but it truly was. I had heard a lot of hype around Olivia Dean but waited to see her live, and she was truly captivating. We then headed over the hill to see indie pop rock Eyedress, and I loved grooving out while the people next to me tried to figure out if their drugs were kicking in or not. “I just feel really chill,” one of them said. “It’s hard to know if it’s working… or if I’m just having a good time.” I can’t think of a more glowing review for a summer festival than that, tbh.