Thousands of Brisbanites have opened a new bridge in an unothodox fashion, with a concert featuring some of Australia's best musical talent as well as one of the great names of the Brisbane music scene.

Such an opening is hardly surprising considering it is named after one of the Brisbane's seminal bands, the Go-Betweens.

The Go Between Bridge, which joins Brisbane's CBD to West End, is set to open to traffic on July 5, but last night was the scene of a one-off concert.

As the sun set over the Brisbane River, artists including Josh Pyke, Bob Evans, Angus and Julia Stone as well locals Yves Klein Blue and The John Steel Singers took to the stage.

Each of the artists played a Go-Betweens song in their set, before Robert Forster, one half of the creative duo, took to the stage belting out solo numbers as well as Go-Between classics like Streets of Our Town.

Forster told Triple J having a bridge named after his band was a surreal and unexpected honour.

"It was thrilling, but also proud, it's slightly surreal having a bridge named after a group because when you start a band you think about certain things you might get: A gold record, or playing in some fantastic venue or those type of things, but something like having a bridge named after you is not one of things that comes to mind," he said.

Forster and Grant McLennan, who died in 2006, formed the Go-Betweens in Brisbane in the late 1970s.

It was a time when the music and arts scene came up against fierce opposition from the police and the state government.

While the band never achieved huge commercial success, they are widely recognised as one of Australia's great modern bands.

Forster said the concert showed how far Brisbane had come as a city since the Go-Betweens first began performing in the late 1970s.

"Politically for some reason the Queensland Police force thought 300 punk rockers were going to overthow the Queensland government," he said,

"And so there were very strong police actions against students, punk rock and bands in general because it was just sort of seen as this far greater threat than it actually was.

"At the time the Bjelke-Petersen government was basically a lot more interested in things other than the arts or music or infrastructure for things that young people could do.

"They were more interested in mining, real estate and bags of cash being sort of snuck under desks, than they were in what the people wanted or what the people needed in terms of music or the arts in general.

"So it was a dark time. It was a time when there was no encouragement for anyone that wanted to do anything creative, basically you had your friends, you had your band, you had places that you could find to play and that was about it."

But despite this Forster remains a loyal Brisbane resident.

In another sign of the changed face of Brisbane, Lord Mayor Campbell Newman approved wholeheartedly of the name for the bridge which was selected in a public vote.

"The band produced music that just absolutely lives and breathes Brisbane," he said.

The Go Between Bridge will host a community market next Sunday before opening to traffic early the following week.