Ken West, founder of the Big Day Out, has died at 64
By Dan Condon

Thursday 7 April 2022 9:30pm
Ken West is outdoors in a crowd, smiling. He wears sunglasses, an orange shirt and a walkie talkie.
Ken West at the Perth Big Day Out in 2006

Image:
Sophie Howarth

Share
Facebook
Twitter
Mail
The Big Day Out was at the forefront of Australian music festivals for 22 years

Ken West, the founder of iconic, ground-breaking music festival the Big Day Out, died peacefully in his sleep this morning. He was 64.

"We bring unfortunate news that, Ken West; a father, husband, mentor and most of all a legend, has passed away peacefully in his sleep on the morning of the 7th April 2022," his family said in a statement this evening.

"Our family would appreciate respect and privacy during this difficult time.. Ken was big and noisy in life, but passed quietly and peacefully."

The Big Day Out was a music juggernaut through the 1990s and 2000s, bringing the world's biggest rock and electronic acts to parks and showgrounds around Australia and New Zealand for 22 years.

"I think there was a period in time there that it was the best festival in the world, and every band I knew wanted to do it," West told Double J's Inside the Big Day Out podcast in 2019.

West organised the first Big Day Out for January 1992 at Sydney's Hordern Pavilion. It featured 21 bands, headlined by Violent Femmes, and most famously featured Nirvana at the peak of their Nevermind fame, as part of their only ever Australian tour.

BDO_2000x1125.jpg
Double J does The Big Day Out
For more than two decades, the world's biggest touring music festival was the must-attend event of the Australian summer.

The festival soon became a roadshow, and was soon staged across six cities every summer.

Its headliners included Neil Young, Metallica, Foo Fighters, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Kanye West, Muse, Pearl Jam and The White Stripes, and its undercard was always jammed with dozens of the hottest acts on the planet at that time.

The Big Day Out changed everything
"Sometimes in life, it's a slow-motion version of a critical incident," West told Double J about taking the leap to organise that first event.

"The boat's sinking, the cyclone's coming. You just know that it's now or never."

West's 1992 event ended up being far more ambitious than his business partner, Vivian Lees, had anticipated.

"He didn't really tell me the extent of what he was doing," Lees told Double J in 2019.

"He actually conceived this show, good bands, multiple stages, good food, rides, a place where you can get a drink and treat people nicely," Lees said..

"He did it and you couldn't doubt that what had happened was fresh and new and worth pursuing."

Skip FacebookFireFox NVDA users - To access the following content, press 'M' to enter the iFrame.
Skip Facebook PostFireFox NVDA users - To access the following content, press 'M' to enter the iFrame.
In the 1980s, West had success putting on shows for artists like Ramones, Deborah Harry, Nick Cave and The Birthday Party, The Beasts of Bourbon and The Church.

Big Day Out became a rite of passage through the 1990s and 2000s, and flipped the way live music was presented in this country on its head.

"It literally changed the landscape of how artists toured, how punters consumed music, and how we as a festival delivered it," former Big Day Out National Event Co-ordinator and current Frontier Touring Tour Director Sahara Herald told Double J.

Music festivals existed in Australia before the Big Day Out, West just had visions of a different approach.

"Rock festivals, at least in Australia, before the Big Day Out were all about being in the country, drinking beer and getting stoned," he wrote recently.

"Normally it was a campout and facilities were shit, the production was shit and if it rained it was a mudfest. I hated that whole hippy bullshit concept.

"I wanted urban mayhem but with good drainage, toilets & production. I wanted people to learn about music, go as hard as they wanted & be able to get home safely at the end of the night."

Its importance was heightened due to Australia's place in the world, both geographically and culturally.

"It was passionately produced to drag Australia up by the jockstrap to kind of go, 'Your time’s come, we’re not isolated'," West said. "It was important. It was really important."

Inside_BDO-EPISODE1-2000x1125.jpg
Listen to the podcast
Listen to episode one of Inside the Big Day Out

Its impact on the lives of millions of young music lovers is matched by what it did for those on stage.

"There’s life before the first Big Day Out and life after the Big Day Out," The Living End's Scott Owen told Double J in 2019. "It is a pinnacle moment."

"It was a real badge of honour," said Adalita, frontwoman of Magic Dirt. "A real prestigious thing. It’s like taking music seriously in Australia and putting the bucks behind it and people going out to see music and making it valid in such a huge way. That’s a massive statement."

The explosion of Australian alternative music in the '90s was synonymous with the Big Day Out. The festival took fledgling bands out of the pubs and in front of thousands.

"You kind of felt like a big shot when you did those festivals," Frenzal Rhomb frontman Jay Whalley said.

"It gave all the bands the chance to play to huge audiences," said Clouds' Trish Young.

"I'm loving living in the now..."
Big Day Out ended in 2014, after being bought by US concert promoters C3 Presents.

Following the festival's final shows, West had kept a low profile.

"After a lifetime living in the future, I’m loving living in the now," he told Double J in 2019.

"Thinking more than doing, advising without judging. I’m in a rare position and I know it."

Ken Viv 1
Viv Lees and Ken West
Image:
Sophie Howarth

Earlier this year, on the 30th anniversary of that infamous first Big Day Out, he shared chapters of a book he'd written about his experiences with the Big Day Out on his website.

He stated that the book was completed and that he hoped to release it this year.

"The Big Day Out provided me with the greatest job in the world," West wrote.

"Working and partying with incredible artists who motivated me to create beautiful complex events. Human alchemy was taken to its limits. Continually evolving and growing for over 20 years."

Check out Inside The Big Day Out for interviews with Ken West as we tell the story of the illustrious chapter in Australian music.
https://www.abc.net.au/doublej/music-reads/music-news/ken-west-big-day-out-founder-died/13832090?