At the top end of the 2020 Laneway billing are three names that a certain vocal majority are more than familiar with.

Boasting over seven million Instagram followers between them, The 1975, Charli XCX and our own Ruel, are leading this year’s charge.

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There have been some who will mark the enlisting of these acts as ‘the death of Laneway’ as they once knew it. These acts all lean heavily on pop and have fiercely loyal fans, who are predominantly female and young.

For sure, it’s a departure from the Laneway Festivals of yore.

Never afraid of expansion or evolution, organisers of the very first St. Jerome’s Laneway Festival are now celebrating its sixteenth year and for the Sydney leg, it’s the first year in a huge, open field venue (The Domain).

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What began as a small-scale event, bringing together a travelling circus of the freshest electronic and indie rock acts, has changed with the music industry landscape it supports.

You’ve heard it a million times before but, in the age of music streaming, and with increasingly younger generations' music listening habits, the trends are constantly shifting. As the OG Laneway punters grow older, there’ll be many who don’t like that change.

With music easier to access than ever, and musicians raised on a massive back-catalogue across all genres and eras now coming to the fore, the songs hitting the charts today ain’t like what they used to be. And nor should they be.

Not only that, we can all more easily get a feel for how many supporters bands have. A quick check for Facebook followers, fans on IG or the number of monthly streams they get on Spotify can give the general public and festival bookers alike a window into their popularity. And particularly now that Laneway are booking larger and larger venues, the amount of tickets needing to be sold to fill a venue is ever-expanding.

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Whatsapp The crowd watching The 1975 at Laneway 2020. Photos by Russell Privett for triple j.

If you look at just some of the acts along the way, you can see a shift. Line-ups through the years have featured artists like: Yo La Tengo (2007), Clap Your Hands Say Yeah (2008), Four Tet (2009), The xx (2010), Warpaint (2011), M83 (2012), Bat for Lashes (2013), Lorde (2014), Flying Lotus (2015), Flume (2016), Tame Impala (2017), Mac DeMarco (2018), Gang of Youths (2019).

Conversely, whilst some people are calling this the ‘pop year’, Laneway has also seemingly been prioritising more and more Aussie acts as headliners and across their line-ups.

Even the Australian contingent this year are notable for their rabid fanbases. 2018’s Hottest 100 #1 boys, Ocean Alley, true believers, DMA’s, worldwide streaming record-breaker, Tones and I, and the ever-prolific King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, to name a few.

Considering this is the first year every leg of the Australian Laneway shows were open for everyone from age 16+, the inclusion of The 1975, Charli XCX and Ruel makes even more sense. And of course, it makes sense that they’d be banking on sellable artists.

On r/triplej when the line-up was first announced, user SpeedySammy noted: “Really targeting that under 18 age demographic.” Echoing that idea of a transformation in the festival’s ideology, Redditor tdlan proclaimed that “Laneway really has sold its soul. Awful lineup aside from Earl and Gizz. Take me back to 2015.” Another commenter, facts-of-life, agreed, saying “It's such a shame. I miss when this festival had a specific niche.”

But, of course, as we all know: for every opinion on the internet, there is an equally passionate and opposite opinion. “This is a very good line-up," thought McNippy. "Everyone in my group is stoked. Just because you have different taste doesn't mean its bad.”

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Whatsapp Charli XCX at Laneway 2020. Photo by Russell Privett for triple j.

Who’s to say popularity equals lack of quality?

Back in early 2019, Ruel became the youngest ever male performer to headline and sell-out the Sydney Opera House, twice in a row. Instagram fan accounts dedicated to the singer are plenty. You’ve got everything from your basic @ruel_is_my_fav, there’s daily updates via @ruelnotified and, of course, a catalogue of his posts on @ruelstiktoks.

Waiting for him to show up at this year’s Sydney Laneway, fans are packed in and seconds before the show starts the wet weather begins in earnest. But chubby raindrops be damned, the crowd stays put. And in the front row of this particular Ruel show, waiting for two hours in the heat (now storm), was 16-year-old Asia.

“We’re pretty keen,” admits Asia, who’s already seen him live twice before this. “He’s my favourite singer and since he started I’ve just been obsessed.”

She has “no words” for what his shows are like and still has his signature that he inked onto her phone case. “I mean, he’s gorgeous but he’s got a really sweet voice as well. He’s just incredible.”

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Whatsapp Ruel fans at Laneway 2020. Photo by Russell Privett for triple j.

A few people down you’ve got Jamie and Emma, both aged 19, who agree that “He’s so talented at such a young age.” Do they think he’s cute? “I mean, I think I’m a little old for him,” says Jamie, but admits that she probably has “stalked him on social media.”

Depending on who you are, ‘stan’ is either an insult or a rallying cry. A stan is just a hardcore fan, sure, but there’s also a distinctly ~online~ element to it.

And there’s huge crossover potential throughout the different communities. As 18-year-old Alia explained, coming off having just watched BENEE: “I got into her because I’m a fan of Ruel. A lot of Ruel fans are also fans of BENEE.” Similar kind of vibes, you see. (And sure enough, Ruel himself turned out side of stage to watch the 20-year-old New Zealander perform).

As our own Richard Kingsmill found out late last year, Ruel fans are not to be trifled with. After making a throwaway gag about how he thought the crowd at Billie Eilish’s Hordern Pavilion gig was louder than that at Ruel’s, he incurred the wrath of Stan Twitter.

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Listen to Ruel’s Hordern gig on Live At The Wireless down below and catch Billie’s here.

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Elsewhere on the line-up, you’ve got Charli XCX, whose fans are aptly named ‘Charli’s Angels’. The community came under the media spotlight late last year when, after one fan asked that Charli pose with his mother’s ashes, it was thought by some that their demands were too much.

At the time, Charli vocally dismissed the idea that her fans were exploiting her. “Hear it from me first,” she posted on IG, “I do not think my fans have been abusive towards me at meet-and-greets: please stop saying they have been.”

Clearly the Angels show a level of devotion that many outside of the fandom don’t understand.

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Amongst the Laneway crowd are Lucy (24) and Bridget (28) who, when asked which act they’re most excited to see, reply swiftly in unison: “Charli XCX!” As for her appeal, “I feel like she’s one of us,” says Bridget. “I just love that she’s normal, and a hard worker. People don’t realise how much she does behind-the-scenes and for other people, and how hard she’s worked to get here.”

“I really feel like I’d be friends with her if I met her,” echoes Lucy. “She’s so involved with fans.”

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Whatsapp Matt Healy of The 1975 at Laneway 2020. Photo by Russell Privett.

As for The 1975, NME said it back in 2017: “There are few bands with fans as loyal as The 1975’s fans.”

In a candid 2018 interview with The Brag, lead singer Matty Healy railed against the idea of pop being lesser, and that genre must define the artist. “Australia has such a tribal affiliation to what it assumes is cool or alternative or left,” he said. “Going into pop music, the biggest genre in the world and changing it, changing what it means to people and subverting it, that’s ten times more punk than any bullshit view of what punk is.”

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As Laneway 2020 comes and goes, the fandoms will persist.

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And as the organisers inevitably turn their full attention to locking down next year’s line-up, they’re seeing firsthand how modern attitudes to genre have transformed the scene.

Danny Rogers, the Co-Founder and now Managing Director of St Jerome’s Laneway Festival, is keenly aware of how far they’ve come since programming new talent based on venue capacities of 1500 to 2000 people.

“I’m conscious of the fact that I'm 45 now,” says Danny, “so sometimes I feel a bit weird that I’m booking for younger people.” But within the programming team there’s people of all ages, and their main focus is always the audience. “What are the 16 to 23 year old festival goers listening to? They’re listening to everything. Pop is crossing into rock. Hip hop is crossing into country. And acts that we all love, that might be thought of as more alternative, are writing pop hits. It’s difficult to define.”

“We’ve gone younger this year and that was deliberate.”

“The festival’s always been diverse,” says the director. “We haven’t just booked indie-rock bands, we’ve always kept it very multi-genre anyway. So this year has lent more pop and we weren’t afraid of that.”

In terms of the business side of things, Danny says they’re 20% up in ticket sales across the board from last year. “We’ve consistently been bringing in a younger audience, which is telling us these kids are really starved for great opportunities to see music.”

It’s not just a matter of ensuring the festival’s survival, though. At this year’s Brisbane Laneway, over 5,000 attendees were under 18 and from that group 4000 were in the door before 1pm, which meant that newer acts – those playing earlier, like Sycco and DVNA – were playing to thousands. “How cool is that?” adds Danny.

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“Not wanting to big-note ourselves, but what’s really great about the local talent is they really want to play Laneway,” he continues. “It’s a real honour and something we don’t take lightly; supporting new and developing Aussie talent. We think that’s a really important journey for the artist to take, to go from playing 2pm to being the headliners.” (As was the way with returning artists like Flume and Gang of Youths).

When asked about the apparent swing towards featuring more Aussies, Danny points out that they've always been really supportive of local acts: “Australian music culture has never been stronger, and all festivals are playing a really important role in celebrating that talent.”

“Local artists are playing on the same bills as huge international artists and they're just as good, if not better. I’m really passionate about that continuing to happen.”

Times goes on and St. Jeromes' annual big summer blowout moves further from its beginnings as a boutique Melbourne party (held in an actual laneway). The now international touring festival is bigger than ever, and this isn’t even its final form.