The Australian V Festival was an Australian music festival, and a spin-off of the British V Festival. Like all V Festivals, the event was primarily sponsored by

Virgin Mobile Virgin Mobile is a wireless communications brand used by seven independent brand-licensees worldwide. Virgin Mobile branded wireless communications services are available in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Colombia, Chile, Kuwait, Saudi Ara ...

. In Australia the event was also sponsored by airline Virgin Blue. The V Festival was televised exclusively in Australia by

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

, and from 2008, also by its sister channel VH1. In 2008 the festival expanded to four shows, with

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

and

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...

being added. Since the 2009 V Festival the event has been in hiatus, with the official website stating "V Festival Australia is taking a break at the moment".

Artist lineups

Artist lineup 2009

The festival's first announcement was made on 18 November 2008, with the second announcement occurring on 11 February 2009.

Artist lineup 2008

The festival's first announcement was made on 28 November 2007. The festival's second announcement was made on 10 February 2008. It included the return of the

Venue, the festival's fourth stage, which featured local and international

DJs A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music festival), mobile ...

.
* *

Mika Mika is a given name, a nickname and a surname. Notable people and fictional characters with the name include: People known just as Mika * Mika (singer) (born 1983), Lebanese-born British singer-songwriter Michael Penniman, Jr. * Mika (footbal ...

was originally featured in the first announcement, but cancelled due to recording commitments.

Artist lineup 2007

The festival ran two shows in its inaugural year: one at Centennial Park in

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

on 31 March and one at Avica Resort on the

Gold Coast Gold Coast may refer to: Places Africa * Gold Coast (region), in West Africa, which was made up of the following colonies, before being established as the independent nation of Ghana: ** Portuguese Gold Coast (Portuguese, 1482–1642) ** Dutch G ...

on 1 April.

Sideshows and others

Best of V Festival (Mini V) 2007

The promoter of the festival, Michael Coppel, declared Melbourne a "festival graveyard", and did not book a venue for the festival in the city, despite the fact that several very successful

Big Day Out The Big Day Out (BDO) was an annual music festival that was held in five Australian cities: Sydney, Melbourne, Gold Coast, Adelaide, and Perth, as well as Auckland, New Zealand. The festival was held during summer, typically in January of eac ...

festivals had been held in Melbourne since 1993.

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

also missed out on the festival, disappointing many Victorian and South Australian fans who were hoping to see

Pixies A pixie (also pisky, pixy, pixi, pizkie, and piskie in Cornwall and Devon, and pigsie or puggsy in the New Forest) is a mythical creature of British folklore. Pixies are considered to be particularly concentrated in the high moorland areas aro ...

on their first Australian tour. To make up for the omission, a "Best of V Festival" series of concerts was organised, also called "Mini V", in which the Pet Shop Boys, Groove Armada, Gnarls Barkley and The Rapture played in Melbourne (at the

Sidney Myer Music Bowl The Sidney Myer Music Bowl is an outdoor bandshell performance venue in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It is located in the lawns and gardens of Kings Domain on Linlithgow Avenue close to the Arts Centre and the Southbank entertainment precinct ...

) on 3 April, while Pixies, Jarvis Cocker, Phoenix and New York Dolls played in Adelaide (at the Thebarton Theatre) on the same night. The following night (4 April) the line-ups swapped cities with Pet Shop Boys playing in Adelaide and Pixies playing in Melbourne. The move was controversial, however, with tickets for one night at the Melbourne show costing only slightly less ($110 in Melbourne, $99 in Adelaide) than a festival ticket ($124), and double that to attend both nights. The promoter responded that the similar cost was to do with the economics of scale regarding the smaller capacity venues in Melbourne and Adelaide.

V Festival Sideshows 2008

The Best Of shows did not return in 2008, for several reasons. Firstly, Melbourne was given a full V Festival for 2008, due to the availability of the newly renovated Showgrounds. Secondly, Adelaide, after again missing out on a full-scale festival, received, along with other capital cities in

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

, a variety of sideshows from V Festival artists, intended to replace the Best Of shows. The sideshow schedule was as follows:

References

External links

*
V Festival 2007 on Virgin MobileOfficial Virgin Group site
{{Virgin Group Rock festivals in Australia