One of Australia’s most cherished cultural escapes, The Gum Ball, celebrates a very special 20th anniversary in 2025, running across three days and nights, 25th, 26th & 27th April 2025.
A supreme live music and art experience held on the majestic bushlands of Dashville (Wonnarua) Lower Belford, Hunter Valley, NSW, the festivals survival is a remarkable feat in today’s world, clearly earning its praise as an institution in both the local and nationwide music scene.
And today, the organisers are pleased to announce the first half of the live music program, twenty acts, which pulls artists from all ends of Australia and when pieced together with the next twenty (due in early 2025), amounts to a fantastic aural journey across a myriad of genres, styles and moments.
Please welcome to the stage as part of the first round of acts,
Ben Lee | The Peep Tempel | Grace Cummings | The Stems
Elana Stone | Kim Churchill | 78 Saab | Karen Lee Andrews
The Ripple Effect | Boing Boing | Johnston City
Jack Davies & The Bush Chooks | Vanilla Gorilla | Playlunch
Claude Hay & The Kung Fu Mustard | Quality Used Cars
Camino Gold | Delivery | Fungas | Goon Gremlins
With the additional prelude concert on Thursday 24th April, The Gum Ball is an incredible live music escape, designed for all ages and inclinations, boasting an enviable reputation as one of the best laid-back festivals in existence.
A lot has happened since that clear crisp morning in 2004, when an enthusiastic young Matt ‘Magpie Johnston, fresh from a solo around the world adventure, sat at the foot of his parents’ bed asking for permission to host a festival in the front yard of his family property. It’s a story of triumph through adversity, as Kev Carmody wrote, “from little things big things grow”. So with a vision in sight and the blinkers on, a twenty year old music enthusiast set about his goal to create a festival with the catch phrase ‘enjoy music the way nature intended’. With the support of friends and family Magpie pushed through some pretty full on physical, mental and financial hurdles, through passion, tenacity and DIY doggedness, to build not only a festival, but also a supreme place of gathering.
Dashville, aptly named after Johnston’s father, Dash, is an incredible space. This 3000-capacity live music venue and campground, which harnesses the natural landscape, flourishing through age old permaculture principles, provides something truly amazing and wholesome for the music loving community.