Funded by the past and surviving Aboriginal peoples of Australia
In September 2023, a series of mysterious posters of No Fixed Address started appearing in locations across London. Featured the iconic Bleddyn Butcher photo of…
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In September 2023, a series of mysterious posters of No Fixed Address started appearing in locations across London. Featured the iconic Bleddyn Butcher photo of…
Continue reading...There was a lot of love in the room at the Adelaide launch of 'No Fixed Address' and the opening of the related exhibition in…
Continue reading...Ricky Harrison and Sean Moffatt from No Fixed Address travelled from Gippsland to Sydney in mid-May to do some publicity for the 'No Fixed Address'…
Continue reading...A selection of published and previously unpublished works
I’d always fancied getting married in a kilt. And so, when it came my turn to tie the knot earlier this year, it was in full Scottish finery—kilt, sporran and a short black jacket with silver buttons. The wedding was a tremendous success. The bride was as beautiful as a fairy princess (I must admit to a slight bias I fear), the bagpipes rent the air, the ceremony was short
The Scots cannot claim to have discovered the chemical process of distillation, the extraction of alcoholic spirit from fermenting grains, but there are many who would agree that they have perfected it. Whisky, from the Scots Gaelic ‘uisge beatha’—literally, ‘the water if life’—has accumulated over the centuries an aura, a mystique, that sets it apart from other liquors. The origins of whisky are shrouded in Scotland’s Celtic past. The knowledge
It’s feast or famine in Edinburgh, the ancient and beautiful capital of Scotland. Every August, in an unparalleled orgy of cultural consumption, the staid city changes pace and plays host not only to its world-renowned International Festival and associated Fringe but also to Britain’s only television festival, a film festival, a jazz festival and an acoustic music festival. While the International Festival is similar in style and content to many
Australia has always been an accurate mirror of the world’s music scene, reflecting and balancing US and UK trends and styles. As the most typical Australian city, Adelaide going into the 1970s provided a fascinating microcosm of the state of play in world music. The emergence of the rock album as an artform in its own right, a process started by the Beatles with Revolver and Rubber Soul in the
As the ’80s began, the Australian pub rock boom was in overdrive. The new ‘door deal’ system had increased band receipts enormously and had given the top touring bands a measure of financial independence. Many of them took the next logical step—a trip overseas to test the water. Mi-Sex, Midnight Oil and The Angels undertook largely self-financed exploratory trips to the US in 1980. On the recording front, an impressive
From the peak of Friday On My Mind’s world-wide success for the Easybeats in late 1966 and early 1967, the story of Australian rock’s attempts to capture a world audience in the rest of the decade is rather a sad and sorry one. Group after group rose to prominence in Australia and entered the annual Hoadley’s Battle of the Sounds. Those that didn’t win either broke up or rethought their
As the sixties dawned the prospects for Australian rock seemed bright. Johnny O’Keefe, the undisputed leader of the rock pack, was hurriedly preparing for his first American promotional trip. The first crop of Australian rock singers and groups were revelling in the exposure provided by the new TV rock shows like Six O’Clock Rock and Bandstand and the newly introduced Top 40 radio was playing their records. When O’Keefe hit