Simply Bushed set Heel Toe Polka world record at Tamworth Country Music Festival

The bid appeared to have fallen agonising short, missing just 30 of 500 people necessary to set the record.

But after an official recount with the Guinness Book of Record judges, the final figure turned out to be 521.

The band has sent away all the paperwork and is waiting for it to be verified, but lead singer Paul Grierson reckons they’re “gonna get it”.

“It looks like we missed counting one of the circles,” he said.

“After we went back through the paperwork, the official number has come back as 521.

“The reason why it’s an odd number is there was a little girl dancing with her mum and dad, so they were dancing as a trio.”

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It was a close run thing for another reason – one of the requirements was for everyone to dance for five minutes.

“When we stopped playing to try and get another 30 people to join, we had just ticked over that five minute mark,” Grierson said.

“We had been playing for five minutes and three seconds.”

Despite the drama, Grierson was “absolutely elated” with the outcome. 

“Every when I thought we had missed out, I was so happy and it was such a joyful event – so it’s even better to set the record,” he said.

“To have more than 500 people come out and support us, that’s why we love this community.

“That’s what’s important to us, and that’s why we did it. We’re going to email everyone that was involved a copy of the official certificate.”

The record attempt took more than half a year to plan. When asked if there were other world record attempts in the works, Grierson simply laughed.

“I’m working on my mullet, so I might see what the existing record for that is,” he said, tongue in cheek.

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