I have a soft spot for Waihi Beach Hotel. It’s an unconventional live music venue in that the site has a restaurant (Italian-themed), cocktail lounge with fancy armchairs, a normal (yet very nice) bar, motel rooms that are pitched as ‘privately contained units’, and a space out the back for gigs.
It’s also a wee bit out of the way on the New Zealand live music circuit, yet not so much it should deter any band from going there.
Waihi Beach is always summer to me, even in winter. Think baches (inherited weatherboard and cashed-up new), family campgrounds, mini putt, gorgeous beach, an epic Mexican street food spot called The Secret Garden, and the guaranteed smell of fish and chips come dusk. You probably wouldn’t travel there for a gig from Tauranga unless you were really into the band, which leaves the inland Waihi (population 5k ish) and Katikati (also around a population of 5k) the closest towns to provide patrons after Waihi Beach locals and holidaymakers.
And yet, Waihi Beach Hotel (circa 1967) has long been a tour stop for many an impressive group. For example, The Feelers, Daffodils, Soaked Oats, and Marlin’s Dreaming.
On December 29, 2023, the list was extended with another stellar band: Drax Project. This is a band that has opened for Lorde, Christina Aguilera, Ed Sheeran, and Camila Cabello. I first heard them like many did, through Woke Up Late, a 2017 track I would play as I stepped off the train at Paddington to head into the hustle and bustle.
Fate, or more likely an algorithm, got me hooked on it for a wee while through the video, the original one filmed in Wellington, replete with reminders of home: a bakery, hotpotched homes on hills, berms wider than UK roads, a graffitied artillery battery, and op shop fashion. In the glum state of an English winter I retreated to its scenes, mollycoddling homesickness instead of putting a noose around its pain in the arse throat, until spring arrived in the old country, bringing daylight, daffodils, and new tunes. Which is where I left my interest in Drax Project.
Until Waihi Beach.
Now I know I took pictures at the gig as I have them on a screen. But I also know I spent most of the time at the gig thinking ‘these guys are incredible’. And they are that, incredible. What a band. What musicians.
Coming off the stage in the picture above is bassist Sam Thomson. I have one more shot to take and it is this one of Ben, wiping his brow. He’s given the audience his all, along with his friends (lead vocalist and saxophonist Shaan Singh who is pictured below, drummer Matt Beachen and guitarist Ben O’Leary, who went to school at nearby Katikati College).
They’ve done the encore and the lights have come up. The bulk of the crowd has left, though some remain, staring at the stage as the show comedown kicks in.
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