A hundred years ago: great John Maclean comes home to the Clyde – part 1
On the morning of Thursday 28 November 1918, the Imperial War Cabinet met at 10 Downing Street in London. Outside the weather was wet and…
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The art of the Australian single 1975-80
When I returned to Adelaide in late 1977 after two and a half years away in the U.K., I brought home with me about twenty-five singles. I proceeded to do the rounds of my rather puzzled university friends to show them and play to them these artefacts from the sonic revolution I had just experienced. Most of them smiled politely and poured another cup of tea, but one old school
Doug Anthony Allstars: tick fucking tock
I first heard the Doug Anthony Allstars in my rented flat in Edinburgh during the 1988 Fringe Festival. I’d gone to Scotland to cover the Festival prior to taking up a new job and was listening to a program about the Fringe on BBC Radio Scotland. Midway through the show, the host introduced a song from a hot young Australian trio who were wowing them at the Gilded Balloon in
Brian Johnstone (1950-2015)
Eulogy delivered at Brian Johnstone’s funeral, 4 February 2015, Norwood, South Australia. My name is Donald Robertson and Brian was my friend. Our friendship went back nearly forty years and actually started less than a mile south of here, in Donegal St, Norwood. It was the late 70s. I’d come back from two and a half years in the U.K. with a rabid enthusiasm for punk rock and new wave
Roadrunner once
Around three years ago, David Nichols, a former writer at Australian Smash Hits, interviewed me on the phone for a book he was doing on that magazine. He asked about the rock mags I used to read growing up, how I got into the game and my impressions of Smash Hits. He was kind enough to send me a transcript to check, but ended up only using a small part. The
When the sun sets over Carlton
It was one of those memorable car trips. Driving to Coogee last Friday night with Ralph and Hilary Kerle and Greg Taylor to see Joe Camilleri and the Black Sorrows and listening to the new compilation (When the Sun Sets Over) Carlton – Melbourne’s Countercultural Inner Ciy Rock Scene of the ’70s. Unusually for three such grizzled veterans of the rock’n’roll circus as Greg, Ralph and myself, none one of
‘I am a champion’
The date was in the calendar on the fridge—28 September—but it was a pretty low-key build up to this year’s Australian University Games in the Robertson household. Calum had picked up a knee injury playing club football with Mosman and it was touch and go as to whether he would play any part at all. He got the all clear from the physio the week before and went for a
Laughing Lennie
Many years ago, I watched a documentary on Foxtel’s Arena channel called ‘Beautiful Losers’. Made in 1997, it was about Leonard Cohen, Marianne Faithfull and Willie de Ville, in which the three songwriters and performers were interviewed about their lives and careers. Willie de Ville, who I recall as a sharply dressed, late 70s, new wave one-hit wonder from New York (the hit being the latino flavoured ‘Spanish Stroll’) was moderately
If you’re going to San Francisco …
We’re on the sidewalk at the west end of Waller St, a stone’s throw from Golden Gate Park and the final stop of our two-hour walking tour of San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district. Our genial tour guide Kurt, a chubby, moustachioed, local comedian and film maker points out a converted firehouse across the road at number 1575 where in April 1967, representatives of the local alternative community held a press conference
She came in through the bathroom window
Roll up, roll up for a London rock’n’roll magical mystery tour ‘See the window on the first floor – on the left – that’s the bathroom. There’s a drainpipe on the side wall – you can’t quite see it from here—but two girls climbed up there and got in. They took two of Paul’s shirts which he was a bit annoyed about. And that’s what gave him the inspiration to