"I love it here. I can honestly say this festival changed my life," she told some 15,000 music fans on Thursday as the three-day Mundi Mundi Bash, near Broken Hill, hit its straps.
Chambers - who spent years travelling the country in the 1980s and '90s, performing with brother Nash and parents Diane and Bill Chambers in the Dead Ringer Band - recalled flying into Broken Hill three years ago to play the bash.
"We were down in Broken Hill, and it was the last day, and all the music had stopped, and everybody was driving through town to go home, with their caravans, towing their caravans," she said.
"I started watching all of these caravans drive through town, and I started thinking about my childhood, of growing up in the outback, where I lived in a little handmade van made by my dad.
"He made it with his hands, and I grew up living in this little van, and I started getting really homesick. And I was like, You know what? I don't want to fly everywhere anymore. I want to get a caravan, and I want to tour like that."
So she did.
Chambers bought an off-road caravan and a Chevy Silverado and has spent the past three years "touring in my caravan because of the Mundi Mundi Bash".
"You guys inspired me," she said, adding she set up camp at the festival a few days earlier, this time with caravan, and her guitarist dad, in tow.
"We've been staying here and hanging out and just absolutely living the dream in that caravan - playing music all over Australia," she said.
Chambers' set was loaded with crowd pleasers, from We're All Gonna Die Someday, Not Pretty Enough and Pony to The Captain, Barricades and Brickwalls and her searing, now signature cover of Eminem's hit Lose Yourself.
Day one also featured sing-along sets by Mick Thomas, Caitlyn Shadbolt, Ross Wilson, Rose Tattoo and The Angels.
Thomas was backed by the Far West Subtext Choir, featuring 54 students from Wilyakali and Barkindji country, Broken Hill, Menindee, Wilcannia and Lake Victoria.
They had travelled to the festival with the support of the Australian Literacy and Numeracy Foundation and closed out their performance in Barkindji language.
A new world record - for the largest human image of a country - was also set on Thursday with 9161 festival-goers dressing in blue on the red dirt plains to form a map of Australia and raise more than $250,000 for Beyond Blue.
Event director Greg Donovan says the bash is more than a festival.
"It's a community, and it's the best showcase of what outback NSW has to offer," he said.
Birds of Tokyo, Missy Higgins and Iota's Ziggy - 50 Years of Bowie tribute play the bash on Friday, while Kate Ceberano, The Cat Empire and Hoodoo Gurus top the bill on Saturday.
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