Australian rock
Encyclopedia
Australian rock, sometimes called OZ Rock is used to describe the various rock and many pop bands and solo artists from Australia
. Australia has a rich history of rock music and an appreciation of the roots of various rock genres, usually originating in the United States but also Britain, Ireland, Continental Europe and more recently the musical styles of Africa. Internationally, AC/DC has come to be the most well-known Australian rock band, with more than 63 million sales in the US alone.
and rock and roll
music was taken up by local musicians and it soon caught on with Australian teens, through movies, records and from 1956, television. EMI had dominated the Australasian record market since the end of WWII, and they made British music a powerful force in the late Fifties and Sixties with signings like Cliff Richard
& The Shadows
, The Beatles
, The Hollies
and Cilla Black
. EMI (Australia) also locally distributed Decca
(The Rolling Stones' label) as well as the American Capitol
label (The Beach Boys
). During this period, however, a number of local companies in Australia expanded into the growing Australian music market, which grew considerably after the emergence of the first wave of American rock'n'roll.
In 1951 merchant bank, Mainguard took over a struggling Sydney engineering firm, retooled and relaunched it as Festival Records. Its main local competition was ARC (the Australian Record Company), a former radio production and disc transcription service that established the successful Pacific
, Rodeo and Coronet
labels and competed with Festival as a manufacturer/distributor in NSW.
Several major events took place in 1960. In January Festival Records was purchased by rising young media magnate Rupert Murdoch
, and a few weeks later, in April, ARC was taken over by the American CBS company, who closed the Coronet label and replaced the Australian CBS label.
Although most of the major labels were based in Sydney, Melbourne's vibrant dance and concert scene powered a local boom in rock'n'roll and pop music and it became Australia's pop capital in the 1960s. During the Fifties luthier Bill May expanded his Maton
guitar company, becoming one of the first local manufacturers of the new electric guitars and amplifiers. In 1953 precision engineering
company White & Gillespie established a custom recording division, which their company history claims was the first in Australia to press records in the new vinyl microgroove format. The new division soon included the W&G
label and studio. In 1960 Melbourne consumer electronics company Astor Electronics created its own record division, Astor Records
, which established the Astor label and also became a leading distributor.
All through this period Australia was experiencing the effects of a rising tide of migration, as thousands fled the wreckage of postwar Europe. The majority of migrants were from the UK, and many were "Ten Pound Poms" who were able to take advantage of the Australian government's generous £10 assisted-passage fare. Also, for the first time since the Gold Rush large numbers of "non-Anglo" migrants came to Australia from places like Greece, Italy, Malta, Spain, Portugal and eastern European nations like Yugoslavia, Hungary and Poland. These immigrants exerted a powerful influence on all aspects of Australian society and notably in popular music—many major Australia pop performers of the Sixties were the children of migrants from Europe and the UK.
The arrival of American entrepreneur Lee Gordon
in 1953 marked a major expansion in Australian entertainment. He established himself with a record-breaking tour by American singer Johnnie Ray
and Gordon's now-legendary "Big Show" promotions brought to Australia—in many cases for the first or only time—dozens of the biggest American jazz, rock and popular stars of the era, including Louis Armstrong
, Ella Fitzgerald
, Artie Shaw
, Nat King Cole
, Johnnie Ray
, Frank Sinatra
, Bill Haley & The Comets, Little Richard
, Buddy Holly & The Crickets, Jerry Lee Lewis
, Chuck Berry
and many others. He also promoted local talent by using Australian acts as supports on his concerts.
In the mid-1950s Festival Records grabbed an early lead in rock'n'roll by releasing Bill Haley
's "Rock Around The Clock" in Australia in 1956 after the single had been turned down EMI/Decca. It became the biggest-selling hit ever released in Australia up to that time, and its success set Festival on its way to becoming the dominant Australian local record company for the next fifteen years.
Soon after, inspired by Elvis Presley
and Little Richard
, Johnny O'Keefe
achieved local stardom after his breakthrough appearances on Lee Gordon's Bill Haley tour. O'Keefe carved out a singular career and became a legend of Australian rock music. He hosted one of Australia's first TV pop shows, Six O'Clock Rock, became a partner in Lee Gordon's record company, Leedon, and was the first Australian rock'n'roll performer to attempt to break into the USA. Iggy Pop
acknowledged O'Keefe's importance when he recorded a version of O'Keefe's hit "Real Wild Child" in the 1980s, which he recently re-recorded with successful Australian band Jet
. For a few years, O'Keefe and other local rockers like Lonnie Lee & The Leemen, Dig Richards & The R'Jays, Col Joye & The Joy Boys, Alan Dale & The Houserockers, Ray Hoff & The Offbeats, Digger Revell & The Denvermen and New Zealand's Johnny Devlin & The Devils whipped up excitement on a par with their American inspirations.
The success of these 'First Wave' rock'n'roll acts was brief, and by the early '60s the first boom had begun to fade. Between O'Keefe's last major hit in 1961 and Billy Thorpe
's first hit in 1964, the local pop scene became noticeably blander and more conservative. The charts were dominated by clean-cut acts, like the members of the so-called "Bandstand family", most of whom were signed to Festival and were regular guests on Australia's leading TV pop show, 'Bandstand', which explicitly aimed to appeal to anyone "from eight to eighty".
An alternative to mainstream pop was instrumental 'surf' groups, for instance The Atlantics
and The Denvermen in Sydney, and Melbourne's, The Thunderbirds. Many of the players in these dance bands had come from the jazz scene, and were also strongly influenced by the R&B and "jump" music of performers like Louis Jordan. Others were inspired by figures like American surf guitar players Dick Dale
and Duane Eddy
, and particularly by the popularity of The Shadows
and American band the Ventures
. The Shadows' influence on Australasian pop and rock music of the Sixties and Seventies is still much underrated, and their lead guitarist Hank Marvin
.
These instrumental bands cut their teeth playing at the dance venues in Australia's major cities and regional towns. Like Australian jazz
bands of the period, these rock'n'roll musicians became extremely accomplished players. Because dance patrons in those days actually danced as couples to traditional rhythms, dance bands in Australia and New Zealand tended to play a wide variety of musical styles.
Johnny O'Keefe's attempt to launch an American career failed, but British-born singer Frank Ifield
was one of the first Australian postwar performers to gain widespread international recognition. He was hugely successful in the UK in the early Sixties, becoming the first performer to have three consecutive #1 hits there, and his biggest hit, "I Remember You" was #1 in the UK and a Top 5 hit in the U.S.A.. Entertainer Rolf Harris
also had several novelty hits during this period and became a fixture on British television with his variety show.
groups had a massive impact on the Australasian music scene. These bands toured Australia and New Zealand to wild receptions in the mid-Sixties. When The Beatles' 1964 Australian tour arrived in Adelaide
, an estimated 300,000 people — about one-third of the city's population at that time — turned out to see them as their motorcade made its way from the airport to the city.
The tours and recordings by 'Beat' groups revitalised the pop genre and inspired scores of new and established groups, who quickly developed a vibrant and distinctive local inflection of the 60s 'beat music' craze. The Easybeats
and The Bee Gees are probably the best-known acts from this era to gain success outside Australia, but by the mid-Sixties there were hundreds of bands working in Australia and New Zealand.
, Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs
, beat duo Bobby & Laurie
(Australia's first "long-haired" performers), the Easybeats
, Ray Brown & The Whispers
, Tony Worsley & The Fabulous Blue Jays, the Twilights, the Loved Ones
, the Masters Apprentices
, MPD Ltd, Mike Furber & The Bowery Boys, Ray Columbus & The Invaders
, Max Merritt
, Dinah Lee
, Australia's most popular male singer Normie Rowe
, The Groop
, the Groove
, Lynne Randell
(who toured America with the Monkees
and Jimi Hendrix
), Johnny Young
, John Farnham
, Doug Parkinson, Russell Morris
and Ronnie Burns. Also of note were cult acts such as the Missing Links, the Purple Hearts
, The Wild Cherries, The Creatures and the Throb, who had only limited success at the time but whose 'heavier' sound would exert a significant influence on later bands like The Saints
.
It was during the '60s that New Zealand performers began to move to Australia in search of wider opportunities. Although their origins are often overlooked (in much the same way that Canadian performers like Neil Young
and Joni Mitchell
are routinely classified as "American") these trans-Tasman performers — people like Max Merritt
, Mike Rudd
, Dinah Lee
, Ray Columbus
, Bruno Lawrence
, Dragon
and Split Enz
— have exerted a tremendous influence on Australian popular music.
Another significant Australian from this period, and one whose importance is only now beginning to be widely recognised, was the critic and journalist Lillian Roxon
(1932–1973), who grew up in Brisbane but who was based in New York from 1959 until her premature death from asthma
. She was a close friend of feminist writer Germaine Greer
, photographer Linda McCartney
, poet Delmore Schwartz
, artist Andy Warhol
and many musicians including Lou Reed
. Roxon wrote the world's first Rock Encyclopedia, published in 1969, and her writings about pop music and musicians were central to the development of serious rock criticism and rock journalism in the late 1960s and 1970s.
By far the most influential and popular music-related publication of this period was the weekly magazine Go-Set
, which was published from 1966 to 1974. Founded in Melbourne in 1966 by a group of former Monash University
students including Philip Frazer, Tony Schauble and Doug Panther, Go-Set chronicled all of the major events, trends, fads and performers in Australian popular music, as well as featuring regular columns by renowned Melbourne radio DJ Stan Rofe
and Aussie fashion designer Prue Acton
.
Go-Set also published the first national Australian pop charts in October 1966 (all charts prior to this were state-based) and it gave extensive coverage to overseas musical developments—it was one of the first international music papers to report on the emergence of Jimi Hendrix
and two staff members—writer Lily Brett
and photographer Colin Beard
– travelled to the USA and the UK in mid-1967, reporting on the famous Monterey International Pop Festival and the burgeoning music scene in London, as well as chronicling the exploits of Australian musicians overseas including Normie Rowe
and Lynne Randell
. Another aspect of Go-Set's activities was its exclusive reporting and promotion of Australia's prestigious annual rock band competition, Hoadley's Battle of the Sounds
, which ran from 1966 to 1972. Go-Set conducted a pop poll of performers which led to the King of Pop Awards starting with Normie Rowe in 1967.
Although it was explicitly established as a 'teens and twenties' magazine, in its later years, inspired by newer publications like Rolling Stone
magazine, Go-Set took on a more mature presentation, with numerous rock performers including Jim Keays
and Wendy Saddington
writing for the magazine. In 1970 former columnist Ian Meldrum
scored a world exclusive for Go-Set when he interviewed John Lennon
in London, during which Lennon made his first public announcement that The Beatles were breaking up.
As in other countries, independent record labels proliferated during this period. The local branch of the British-owned EMI
company had dominated the Australian record market since the 1920s, but in this period it faced increasing challenges from its rivals, including the Australian arm of the American CBS Records
and particularly from the Sydney-based Festival Records, a division of Rupert Murdoch
's News Limited
.
Festival had its own successful house label, and it also signed valuable distribution deals with some of the most important and successful independent labels of Sixties, notably Leedon Records
(which released the earliest recordings by The Bee Gees), Spin Records
and the Perth
-based Clarion Records. The many hits released on these independent labels comprised a significant part of Festival's total turnover.
Other important independent pop labels of this period included the Melbourne-based W&G Records
, Astor Records
– also a major distributor—and the short-lived Go!! Records label, which was set up in conjunction with the popular pop TV series The Go!! Show
.
Independent studios and production companies began to play an increasingly important role in the local record industry. Arguably the most productive and influential pop studio in Australia at that time was Armstrong's Studios
in Melbourne. Studio owner and engineer date=June 2011
was an industry veteran who had worked for major record labels, radio stations and advertising clients; and his new studio, which opened in 1965, soon became the most sought-after in the country and probably produced more Australian pop hits than any other in this era. It was also one of the first studios in the country to install 8-track and 16-track recorders in the late 1960s and early '30s, and was an important training ground for some of Australia's best engineers and producers including Roger Savage
, John L. Sayers, Ern Rose, John French
and many others.
One of the first and most important independent production companies was Albert Productions
, which signed both Billy Thorpe & The Aztecs
and The Easybeats
. It was established in 1969 by young music executive Ted Albert
, whose family that owned Australia's leading music publishing house J. Albert & Son and the Macquarie Radio Network
, which then included leading Sydney AM pop station 2UW.
Albert Productions scored many major Australian hits (released locally on EMI's Parlophone
label) with both their flagship acts in the mid-Sixties, and the Albert Productions record label, esatblished in the early 1970s, became one of the most successful Australian labels of that decade. Other significant 'indie' production houses of ther period included Leopold Productions (Max Merritt
, The Allusions), set up Festival's original house producer Robert Iredale, and June Productions, led by former W&G/Astor staff producer Ron Tudor, who went on to found Fable Records in 1923.
Many of the more progressively-oriented artists found themselves locked out of Australian commercial radio, which concentrated on high-rotation 3-minute pop single programming. This was a result of the widespread adoption of the American-inspired "More Music" format, which had been pioneered in Los Angeles with great success by the Drake-Chenault programming consultancy.
There was a great deal of innovative and exciting music produced; although few Australians got to hear more than a fraction of it at the time, this music is undergoing a major resurgence both locally and internationally, since Australia is one of the last untapped resources of 20th-century popular music.
Landmark acts of this period include Spectrum
and its successor Ariel
, Daddy Cool
, Blackfeather
, The Flying Circus
, Tully (band)
, Tamam Shud
, Russell Morris
, Jeff St John & Copperwine, Chain
, Billy Thorpe
& The (new) Aztecs, Headband, Company Caine
, Kahvas Jute, Country Radio, Max Merritt & The Meteors, The La De Das
, Madder Lake
, former Easybeats lead singer Stevie Wright, Wendy Saddington
, The 69'ers
, The Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band
and country-rock pioneers The Dingoes
.
Guitarist-songwriter-producer Lobby Loyde
(ex Wild Cherries, Purple Hearts) was another key figure in this period, most notably with his '70s band Coloured Balls, who gained a considerable following, despite media allegations that their music promoted skinhead violence. Lloyde had also played an important part in the re-emergence of Billy Thorpe and the 'new' hard-rock incarnation of the Aztecs, and his solo and band recordings in this period had a significant impact in Australia and internationally; Henry Rollins
and Nirvana's Kurt Cobain
are among those who have reportedly cited Lobby as an influence.
Rock musicals were another important development in Australia at this time. The local production of Hair
brought future "Queen of Pop" Marcia Hines
to Australia in 1970. In 1972 the hugely successful and much-praised Sydney production of Jesus Christ Superstar
premiered, and this production alone included Marcia Hines, Jon English
, theatre legend Reg Livermore
, the two main members of Air Supply
, Stevie Wright, John Paul Young
and Rory O'Donoghue. It was directed by Jim Sharman
, who went on to lasting international success as the director of the both the original stage production and the film version of The Rocky Horror Show
.
Alongside the more obscure acts was a raft of successful pop-oriented groups and solo artists, including Sherbet
, Hush
, Ray Burgess, the Ted Mulry Gang (TMG) and John Paul Young
, who became the first Australian performer to have a major hit in multiple international markets with his perennial "Love Is In The Air
" (1978) — a song which was, not coincidentally, written and produced by former Easybeats Harry Vanda
and George Young, the masterminds behind many of the biggest Australian hits of the mid-to-late Seventies. The tail-end of the Second Wave gave birth to the record-breaking Skyhooks, who bridged the transition from the Third Wave into the period of the so-called New Wave music
acts of the late 1970s and early 1980s. In commercial terms, howeverm Sherbet was undoubtedly the most successful of these.
The early 1970s also witnessed the first major rock festival
s in Australia, which were closely modelled on the fabled Woodstock
festival of 1969. The festival era was exemplified by the annual Sunbury music festival, held outside Melbourne, Victoria each January from 1972 to 1975. Although there were numerous other smaller festivals, most were not successful and failed to have the lasting impact of Sunbury. After the disastrous 1975 Sunbury festival, which sent the promoters broke, large-scale festivals were considered too risky and were only occasionally staged in Australia until the advent of the annual Big Day Out
in the 1990s.
Also paralleling a US trend was the beginning of an Australian Christian music culture. One of the first examples of this ternd was the surprise success of singing nun Sister Janet Mead
whose 'rock' arrangement of The Lord's Prayer was a major hit in Australia and the USA and earned a gold record award in the USA. Bands like Family in Brisbane, and Kindekrist
in Adelaide, started performing. Rod Boucher formed Good God Studios, which recorded a range of alternative Christian artists. Following on these foundations, later artists such as Newsboys had significant popular success.
Two important changes which had a dramatic affect the rock scene were the long-overdue introduction of colour television and FM radio in 1975. This period also saw the decline of the booming local dance and discothèque circuit that had flourished in the 1960s and early 1970s. These rock dances were a continuation of the social dance circuit that had thrived in Australia's cities and suburbs since the 19th century, and they were hugely popular from the late Fifties to the early Seventies, but they gradually faded in the early Seventies as the "Baby Boomer" generation grew into adulthood and changes to licencing laws saw pubs take on an increasingly important role as venues for live music.
From the 1950s to the early 1970s, the main venues for live music were discothèques (usually located in inner city areas), church, municipal and community halls, Police Boys' Clubs and beachside surf clubs. Bigger concerts and international tours were usually staged in the few large-size venues, such as the legendary Sydney Stadium
(originally built as a boxing arena), the Sydney Trocadero
, and Brisbane and Melbourne Festival Halls. Such venues regularly attracted large numbers of young people because they were supervised, all-ages events — Australia's restrictive liquor licensing laws of the period meant that these venues and dances were almost always alcohol-free.
According to rock historian Glenn A. Baker
, in 1965 there were up to 100 dances being held every weekend in and around Melbourne alone. The most popular groups frequently played almost every night of the week, commonly commuting around town, performing short sets at three or more different dances every night. It was a very lucrative circuit for musicians and even moderately popular acts could easily earn considerably more than the average weekly wage at that time.
The decline of the local dance circuit, combined with the fact that the baby boom
teenagers of the Sixties were now ageing into adulthood, led to the rise of a thriving new city and suburban pub music circuit in the mid-70s, which in turn spawned a new generation of bands who cut their teeth in this often tough but formative training ground.
Teen-oriented pop music still enjoyed strong popularity during the 1970s, although much of it was sourced from overseas, and the proportion of Australian acts in the charts had hit an all-time low by 1973. That trend began to change around 1975, thanks largely to the advent of a new weekly TV pop show, Countdown, in late 1974. It gained a huge audience and soon exerted a strong influence on radio programmers, because it was broadcast nationwide on Australia's government-owned broadcaster, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
(ABC). Countdown was one of the most popular music programs in Australian TV history, and it had a marked effect on radio because of its loyal national audience — and the amount of Australian content it featured.
The most important feature of Countdown was that it became a critical new interface between the record industry and radio. By the late 1970s, radio programmers ignored Countdown's hit picks at their peril. Host Ian "Molly" Meldrum also frequently used the show to castigate local radio for its lack of support for Australian music. Unlike commercial TV or radio, Countdown was not answerable to advertisers or sponsors, and (in theory) it was far less susceptible to influence from record companies. Like no other ABC program before or since, it openly and actively promoted the products of these private companies. Countdown was crucial to the success of acts like John Paul Young
, Sherbet, Skyhooks, Dragon
and Split Enz
, and it dominated Australian popular music well into the 1980s stimulating domestic demand for Australian pop and rock, with quality varying in extremes of good and bad.
In the long term, one of the most important changes to the Australian music industry in the 1970s (and beyond) turned out to be the founding of the ABC's first all-rock radio station, Double Jay (2JJ) in Sydney in January 1975. It is indicative of the conservative nature of the Australian media and its regulators that Double Jay was the first new radio licence issued in an Australian capital city in more than 40 years. It was also Australia's first non-commercial 24-hour rock station, and the first to employ women disc jockeys.
Double-Jay's wide-ranging programming policies were influenced by British '60s pirate radio
, the early programming of BBC Radio One, and the American album-oriented rock (AOR) format. The new station opened up the airwaves to a vast amount of new local music, introduced listeners to important overseas innovations like reggae
, dub
, progressive rock
, punk
and New Wave
– music that had been largely ignored by commercial radio. Double Jay also featured an unprecedented level of Australian content, and presented regular live concert broadcasts, comedy, controversial documentaries and innovative radiophonic features.
Double-Jay quickly made a significant mark on the ratings in its target age group, Its major commercial competitor was Sydney's 2SM
(then Australia's top rating and most profitable pop station). The radio broadcaster had some synergies with the more pop oriented Countdown television show, also owned by the ABC. Double Jay/Triple-J has influenced Australia's taste in rock music, and it has been a testing ground for many acts that were later played by commercial radio stations after becoming popular with the J's audience.
One of the most popular Australian groups to emerge in this period was the classic Australian pub rock band Cold Chisel
, which formed in Adelaide
in 1973 and enjoyed tremendous success in Australia in the late 1970s and early 1980s, although they never managed to break into other countries.
Other popular acts from this transitional period include AC/DC
, Skyhooks, Richard Clapton
, Ol' 55
, Jon English
, Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons
, The Angels
, The Sports
, The Radiators
, Australian Crawl
, Dragon
, Rose Tattoo
, Ross Wilson's Mondo Rock
, acclaimed soul singers Marcia Hines
and Renée Geyer
and pioneering Australian punk/new wave acts The Saints
(Mk I) and Radio Birdman
. The band Sebastian Hardie
became known as the first Australian symphonic rock
band in the mid-70s, with the release of their debut Four Moments
.
Three "Australian" acts that appeared towards the end of the Second Wave — AC/DC, Little River Band and Split Enz — and lasted into the late 1970s and early 1980s achieved the long sought-after international success that finally took Australasian rock onto the world stage.
The progression of the Australian independent scene from the late seventies until the early nineties is chronicled in Stranded: The Secret History of Australian Independent Music 1977–1991
(Pan Macmillan, 1996) by author and music journalist Clinton Walker
.
Australia's main contribution to the development of punk rock
, (not including sixties garage rock bands), consists of The Saints
and Radio Birdman
.
From their humble beginnings, Scottish
brothers Angus
and Malcolm Young
forged a hard-hitting, ball-breaking pub guitar sound, similar to Alex Harvey
but tougher. When Bon Scott
joined the band to lend his unique vocal talent, the band began their 'long way to the top', shooting to the top of the Australian rock scene in 1974 – 75 and their song "It's A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)
". This song is now widely regarded as the Australian rock anthem. The band found a degree of international success, especially with the release of their Highway to Hell
album. This was to be Bon Scott's last album. During the subsequent tour, Scott was discovered in the backseat of a friend's car, having died of alcohol poisoning (choking on vomit).
The band found a new singer in English-born Brian Johnson
and released their next album, Back In Black, in the early '80s. The U.S. took notice of the band with some of their finest songs, such as the title track and You Shook Me All Night Long
, and the album became one of the best-selling albums by a band ever, selling over 22 million copies in the U.S. and 42 million copies around the world
AC/DC are credited as a seminal influence by scores of leading hard rock and heavy metal music acts, and they are now rated the fifth-biggest selling group in U.S. recording history, with total sales of over 100 million records.
Another highly popular and lucrative band of this period is the soft-rock-harmony group Little River Band
(LRB). Resurrected from the ashes of an earlier band called Mississippi
, LRB centred on a trio of seasoned veterans. Lead singer Glenn Shorrock
had fronted Australian 60s pop idols The Twilights and singer-guitarists Beeb Birtles
and Graeham Goble
had been the core members of Mississippi; prior to that, Birtles had played bass in chart-topping Australian '60s pop group Zoot
whose former lead guitarist Rick Springfield
also became a solo star in the USA.
Under the guidance of manager Glenn Wheatley
(former bassist in The Masters Apprentices
, one of the top Australian bands of the Sixties) LRB became the first Australian band to achieve major ongoing chart and sales success in the United States. They achieved huge success in the late 70s and early 80s and their single "Reminiscing" now ranks as one of the most frequently-played singles in American radio history.
, as opposed to electronic music
, as Percy Grainger
had invented some obscure electronic instruments earlier, and Rolf Harris
was famously associated with the Stylophone. The most notable of early electronica were Cybotron, Sydney
's Severed Heads
and Melbourne
's Laughing Hands and Essendon Airport
who began to experiment with tape loops and synthesisers, but did not rise to prominence until the 1980s. Electronica had existed in the Australian classical music scene with David Ahern
in the late 1960s. By the late 1990s Severed Heads were signed to the influential label Nettwerk
records. Single Gun Theory
had been with Nettwerk since 1987. The pop band Mi-Sex
scored a major hit with the single "Computer Games" in 1980, which was one of the first Australian pop recordings to employ sequenced synthesiser backings. In 1980 producer Mark Moffatt pioneered dance technology
by becoming the first in the world to use a Roland 808 rhythm composer and MC 4 digital sequencer on record with his studio project the Monitors.
Following the punk movement several influential bands of this post-punk
era were The Birthday Party
, led by Nick Cave
, Foetus
, The Go-Betweens
, SPK
, Dead Can Dance
, These Immortal Souls
, Crime and the City Solution
, No
, Louis Tillett
, Laughing Clowns, Kim Salmon and the Surrealists
, Beasts of Bourbon
.
, Men at Work
, AC/DC
, INXS
, Midnight Oil
, and later Crowded House
, found wide success throughout the decade. Groups with international hit singles included Real Life
with "Catch Me I'm Falling", "Send Me an Angel", Divinyls
with "Pleasure and Pain", Big Pig
with "Breakaway" and Rick Springfield with "Jessie's Girl
". Moving Pictures
had a hit album with Days of Innocence
. Jimmy Barnes
and Michael Hutchence
performed "Good Times" a song by the Australian songwriting duo Vanda & Young
and it was included on The Lost Boys soundtrack
. Expatriate Mike Chapman continued his career as a prominent record producer and co-wrote "Mickey
" which became a major hit when Toni Basil
performed it.
acts, this includes occasionally critically praised, popular acts such as The Party Boys
, James Reyne
, Models
, Sunnyboys, Hunters & Collectors
, Machinations
, Johnny Diesel
, Matt Finish
, Ward 13, Hands Off, Hoodoo Gurus
, Chantoozies
, The Dugites
, The Numbers, The Swingers
, Spy Vs Spy
, Eurogliders
, Mental As Anything
, Boom Crash Opera
, I'm Talking
, Private Lives (later known as The Private), Do Ré Mi
, Rockmelons
, Stephen Cummings, The Reels
, The Stems
, Paul Kelly
, Nick Barker
, Paul Norton, Jenny Morris, The Triffids
, The Choirboys
, Icehouse
, Redgum
, Goanna
, 1927
, Max Q, Noiseworks
, GANGgajang
, The Black Sorrows
and The Zorros
.
The mainstream taste was to tap into the "classic" Fifties rock look, with a contemporary touch, while alternative rockers were often identifiable for sixties and seventies retro. At this time Goth fashion was very unusual and heavily applied black mascara was the sign of a deeply troubled person.
Many of these acts often topped the Australian charts but never gained international success. Mainstream Australian rock of the eighties was generally uncontroversial with the exception of Kylie Minogue for her limited vocal range, Chrissy Amphlett and Ecco Homo, who were deemed by some to be too sexually provocative and Yothu Yindi's "Treaty", which was commonly objected to by some because Paul Kelly co-wrote it. Nick Cave was not famous in Australia until Triple J Radio became a nationwide, prominent broadcaster. Audiences who went to The Angels' gig were famous for their good humoured response "No way, get fucked, fuck off!" to the lead singer's lyric "Am I ever going to see your face again?".
, Darryl Braithwaite and Jimmy Barnes
were very successful for many years within Australia, but remain largely unknown outside the country.
Farnham's commercial comeback was one the biggest success stories in Australian music in that decade, the former "King of Pop" spent years out of favour with the public and the industry, often reduced to working in suburban clubs, but he returned in 1986 with the album Whispering Jack, which became the biggest-selling album of that year and remains one of the biggest selling Australian records. His manager was Glenn Wheatley
, former manager of Little River Band.
Renowned artists such as singer-songwriter Paul Kelly
and his band The Coloured Girls (renamed The Messengers for America), ambient
-rock
-crossover act Not Drowning, Waving
and Aboriginal-band Yothu Yindi
drew inspiration from distinctly Australian concerns, particularly from the land, and they were critically well received within Australia, and also found international listeners.
One noteworthy group in this decade was the pioneering Aboriginal group Warumpi Band
from the Northern Territory
, whose landmark single "Jailanguru Pakarnu (Out from Jail)" was the first rock single ever recorded in an Aboriginal language. Triple J was the cutting edge radio station of the time and was instrumental in bringing this band to public attention, as were Midnight Oil
, who took the group on national tours with them. Their classic 1987 single "My Island Home" was successfully covered by Christine Anu
in the 1990s. Another memorable song of the Aboriginal rock scene is "Black Boy" by Coloured Stone
.
, Cosmic Psychos
, the darkwave
-world music
group Dead Can Dance
, Hunters & Collectors
, Hoodoo Gurus
, Scribble, The Moodists
, The Deadly Hume, The Wreckery, the second incarnation of The Saints
, Laughing Clowns, The Go-Betweens
and a new band formed by Nick Cave and Mick Harvey
, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
, developed consistent followings in Europe and other regions. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
and the side project Honeymoon in Red
were heavy on the pop cultural references to cult favourites like Johnny Cash
and Saul Bass
and lurid pulp fiction. Their pop art influenced style anticipated the Quentin Tarantino
craze of the following decade. From the late seventies to the late eighties there was also a lively Australian post-punk scene which was made up of bands that showed obvious influences of bands such as Tangerine Dream
, Wire
, The Cure
, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Suicide
. New Zealand's Fetus Productions briefly lived and worked in Australia. Of the early Australian electronica scene just a few truly memorable recordings emerged, for example "Lamborghini" by Severed Heads, "Pony Club" by The Limp "The Pilot Reads Crosswords" by Scattered Order
and the electronica of Hugo Klang. Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast
and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
were precursors of postrock. SPK
was a sinister industrial band in the early 80s and they surprised many of their fans by reinventing themselves as a fashion friendly synthpop group in the mid 80s. SPK's sound was unlike the chilly asexual minimalism of many little known experimental bands of the time. Australian Crawl
, a chart topping rock group, dabbled in minimalist composition with "Reckless", using a very simple bassline and voice, without alienating their established audience.
Use of Violin
was unusual in Australian rock bands and two bands who did were Box the Jesuit and Crime and the City Solution
.
, Lime Spiders
and The Hitmen
would serve as a link between the garage rock
revival of the 1980s and the grunge
scene to follow. From the bassy "I Don't Wanna Go Out" by X
in 1979 and throughout the eighties the Australian indie rock scene produced catchy melodic songs with heavy guitar and bass backing. Examples are Johnny Teen and The Broken Hearts "I Like It Both Ways", "I Lied" by The Pony, Too Much Acid by Pineapples from the Dawn of Time, Chewin by Space Juniors, These Immortal Souls
' "Blood and Sand, She Said" and The Scientists
' "Swampland". Some bands had a foot in both the mainstream and alternative scenes, for example, The Johnnys, Hunters & Collectors, Hoodoo Gurus, TISM
, Painters and Dockers. In 1989 the group No
released "Once We Were Scum, Now We Are God", an Ep that was in parts as hard rock as The Cult
, despite No being generally perceived as an "underground" band.
Noise rock
acts included Lubricated Goat
and People With Chairs Up Their Noses. Some of the louche pub rock names of the time were People With Chairs Up Their Noses, Free Beer, Shower Scene From Psycho, Thug, No More Bandicoots and Nyuk Nyuk Nyuck.
The Mark of Cain, one of the better and more faithful hard rock bands of the decade, formed in Adelaide between 1984-85.
The decade also saw perhaps the most concerted examination of the routine and everyday aspects of suburban and inner-city life since perhaps The Executives 1960's classic "Summer Hill Road." This approach was explored not only by Paul Kelly
and the Coloured Girls (in songs like "From St. Kilda To Kings Cross" and "Leaps and Bounds") but also by The Little Heroes
(e.g. "Melbourne is Not New York"), John Kennedy's Love Gone Wrong
e.g. "King Street" and The Mexican Spitfires
e.g. "Sydney Town" and "Town Hall Steps."
Hong Kong
's Leslie Cheung
covered Big Pig
's "Breakaway" in 1989, in this decade, one of the rare instances of a popular overseas artist covering a song by a popular Australian band (other than AC/DC).
Iconic music festivals of the decade included the Narara Music Festival
, Australian Made
and Turn Back the Tide at Bondi
.
In 1990, Boxcar
released their first album, Vertigo
. Central Station Records in Sydney was one of the leading retailers of dance music. The Sydney street press
became half and half dance music and rock.
Highlights in rock from people of ATSI background were Archie Roach
's Took the Children Away, Christine Anu
's Party and her version of My Island Home
and Yothu Yindi
's World Turning.
Fans of early punk band The Saints
were excited when Ed Kuepper
reunited with members of The Saints and played and recorded as The Aints
. Kuepper was at the time receiving praise from the critics for his album Today Wonder, that featured simply Kuepper singing and on guitar and Mark Dawson on drums.
In 1991, the band Necrotomy played live on the Peter Couchman talk show special Couchman on Heavy Metal during a period of media controversy about Heavy Metal music
.
Another acoustic act of the late nineties was Machine Translations
.
The nineties was famous for not only grunge but also eclecticism with Machine Gun Fellatio
and Def FX being popular cross-genre acts.
Cranky was well known for the song "Australia, Don't Become America".
Gerling
, an alternative rock and electronica band, formed in 1993, as was the pop–punk band Noise Addict
featuring Ben Lee
, who went on to be a prominent singer and songwriter into the following decade.
Peril
was an attempt to make the self-styled avant garde music of the Tzadik Records
label.
Musicians and music fans of the nineties tended to be less nostalgic for pre-punk rock compared to those of previous decade. The Cruel Sea
and Divinyls
were exceptions, showing the influence of the music of the sixties. Dave Graney
and TISM
continued to be popular with their irreverent commentary on contemporary culture.
Baby Animals
, a noisy band with a feisty female singer, released their eponymous debut album in 1991. They were briefly successful, however Australian music lovers preferred their feisty women foreign, for instance interest in Americans Courtney Love
and L7
. Commercial rock radio stations and, in spite of their SNAG image, Triple J
have fostered a music scene that allows female singers to mainly be mawkish, bland and demure. Examples are Frente!
and The Waifs
. At the time, groups like Frente! and The Waifs were a welcome relief from the dourness of grunge and the many alternative acts espousing angst, choofers (stoners), the Slacker
work ethic, fashionable cynicism and sarcasm, heroin chic
and the idealised suffering artist.
The Screaming Jets was a popular hard rock act from Newcastle. Having a down to earth image, they and Divinyls
were examples of bands that survived the backlash against so called Hair Rock of the Eighties (i.e. Warrant, Poison
, Europe
, Cinderella
). In 1994, hard rock band The Poor
charted at #30 in the Billboard
Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks with "More Wine Waiter Please". The Candy Harlots
' 1990 Foreplay EP reached 17 in the ARIA national Top 100 chart.
Paul Capsis
was one of the few rock acts to work with a theatre director, Barrie Kosky
.
Killing Heidi
had a hit song with "Mascara
" in 1999.
Raja Ram was one half of Shpongle
and their debut album in 1999 was Are You Shpongled?
.
Roots music continued to have a strong appeal, with acts such as Blues band Bondi Cigars and Zydeco
band Psycho Zydeco.
The comedy quiz show Good News Week
was regularly signed off with Paul McDermott
singing his rendition of Hunters & Collectors
' stodgy classic "Throw Your Arms Around Me
".
of various kinds became more popular during the 1990s, especially grunge
.
As in other countries, independent music festival
s also saw a resurgence in popularity, notably the Big Day Out
(which began in Sydney
in 1992) attracted and helped build the careers of many Australian acts as well as showcasing international artists to a local audience, and the Woodford Folk Festival
, attracting large crowds in South Eastern Queensland.
Notable Australian independent acts of the time included the Falling Joys
from Canberra
; Diana Anaid
from Nimbin; Magic Dirt
from Geelong, Tumbleweed
from Wollongong
; The Superjesus
from Adelaide; Regurgitator
, Powderfinger
, Screamfeeder
, The Sallyanne Hate Squad and Custard
from Brisbane
; Something for Kate
, The Living End
, Dirty Three
, Rebecca's Empire
, Bodyjar
and The Meanies
from Melbourne; Jebediah
, The Blackeyed Susans
from Perth, RatCat
, The Clouds, You Am I
, Vicious Hairy Mary, Caligula
, The Whitlams
, The Crystal Set
, The Cruel Sea
, Crow
, Nitocris
, Skulker
, Frenzal Rhomb
, Pollyanna
from Sydney
; Spiderbait
from Finley, New South Wales
and Silverchair
, who began as a teenage combo in Newcastle
, were discovered by Triple-J and have since become one of the most successful Australian bands of all time. The changes brought about in this period and the aforementioned bands are discussed in the book The Sell-In
by music journalist Craig Mathieson
.
Frank Bennett covered many of the fashionable alternative rock bands in big band mode. His version of Radiohead
's Creep was his most well known recording. His music was less danceable than overseas Retro swing acts Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
and Brian Setzer Orchestra. Frank Bennett was deeply ironic and only had moderate success with audiences who were attracted to the romanticised Harry Connick, Jr.
. Music in the style of Frank Sinatra
and Tony Bennett
was unfashionable in the Alternative rock scene, stigmatised by the derisive term Lounge Lizard
. Singers Dave Graney
, Tex Perkins
and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
(particularly for their album The Good Son
), also drew on the styles. By the end of the decade there was renewed interest in Lounge music
from elements of the club scene, the interest being in both the composition and the campness.
The nationalisation of Triple J
was well received across the country where there was little in the way of Australian radio content that was not crassly commercial, stale or blatantly sexist, racist or homophobic. Triple J also embraced political incorrectness, playing songs such as "Backdoor Man" by Pauline Pantsdown
, "(He'll Never Be An) Ol' Man River
" and All Homeboys Are Dickheads
(New jack swing
style) by TISM
, "Closer to Hogs" a song about bestiality
by the Nine Inch Richards and unashamed displays of inner-Western Sydney cultural chauvinism.
Several Australian rock bands saw international success in Europe and the US. Notable examples include The Vines
, who rose to prominence in the UK before becoming known in Australia, and Jet
. Jet, influenced by seminal 1960s acts such as the Beatles
and the Rolling Stones
, had their single "Are You Gonna Be My Girl
" used in an Apple iPod
commercial, and consequently have sold 3 million copies in the US alone. Another band which had great success is Wolfmother
, a hard rock band, very influenced by 1960s/1970s psychedelic rock
and heavy metal
bands, like Black Sabbath
. In 2007, Wolfmother were awarded a Grammy for best hard rock performance for their extremely successful single "Woman".
Apart from those bands which achieved international success, one of the well known Australian rock bands of the first decade of the 21st century was Grinspoon
. They first achieved success in the music industry in 1995 after being Unearthed by Triple J, and have been a mainstay of festivals such as the Big Day Out ever since.
A wave of female fronted, PJ Harvey
-esque bands emerged in Australia during the early 2000s, most notably Little Birdy
and Love Outside Andromeda
. And with the phenomenial success of Missy Higgins
, artists such as Sarah Blasko
and others have found themselves a strong following.
There has also been an abundance of modern rock bands who have been influenced by the alternative and progressive scenes. Bands like The Butterfly Effect
, Karnivool
, Mammal
and Cog
have all seen success, with The Butterfly Effect probably gaining the most international attention.
, seemingly a catch-all term for somewhat more laid-back acoustic music covering blues, country and folk influences, came to some prominence, including Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu
, The John Butler Trio, and the plaintive harmonies of The Waifs
. A number of "blues and roots" festivals have sprung up and are attracting large audiences.
As well as these uniquely "Aussie Bands", 2005 in particular sparked many brand new Australian "indie rock" bands such as End Of Fashion
who won ARIA awards for their debut self-titled album and hit song "Oh Yeah" (as well as performing at the Homebake
festival and appearing on talk show Rove Live several times). There is also Kisschasy
who appeared in concert on 2 October 2005 with teen favourite Simple Plan
. Another band to appear on the scene at this time were John Smith Quintet wielding their new brand of funk
onto the Australian charts and music scene.
The Do-It-Yourself (DIY) ethic is strong with local distributors and small record labels active in most capital cities. Unlike the United States relatively few bands are straight edge or influenced by particular political views or religious convictions.
The strong sense of DIY ethics supported by independent street press and community radio stations mostly in Brisbane, Melbourne and Perth forms a breeding ground for creative artists who wish to explore the audio spectrum, as seen in Sticky Carpet
rockumentary of Melbourne music scene.
In recent years, Australian hardcore bands have been growing in fanbase and success, the most notable being Byron Bay's Parkway Drive signing to American punk/hardcore record label Epitaph Records
.
The first popular Australian rock song to resemble contemporary dance music was the funky The Real Thing
(1969) by Russell Morris
. The high beats per minute blip of mainstream Electronic music
in Australia appeared in the early 1980s with Severed Heads
' Lamborghini. Severed Heads
formed in 1979 and were the first electronic group to play the Big Day Out
. The band achieved long term success, winning an ARIA Award in 2005
for "Best Original Soundtrack" for The Illustrated Family Doctor, where lead singer Tom Ellard
said the band would never fit into mainstream music.
have developed an original sound by combining heavy guitars and electronic influences, and rock-electro groups, most notably Rogue Traders
, have become popular with mainstream audiences. However, Cyclic Defrost
, the only specialist electronic music magazine in Australia, was started in Sydney (in 1998) and is still based there. Radio
still lags somewhat behind the success of the genre—producer and artist manager Andrew Penhallow told Australian Music Online
that "the local music media have often overlooked the fact that this genre has been flying the flag for Australian music overseas".
In the late 2000s indie-electronic, indietronica
and synthpop
music rose in popularity, with Cut Copy
being a notable Australian export and touring internationally.
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. Australia has a rich history of rock music and an appreciation of the roots of various rock genres, usually originating in the United States but also Britain, Ireland, Continental Europe and more recently the musical styles of Africa. Internationally, AC/DC has come to be the most well-known Australian rock band, with more than 63 million sales in the US alone.
1950s to early 1960s: the "First Wave" of Australian rock
In the mid 1950s American rockabillyRockabilly
Rockabilly is one of the earliest styles of rock and roll music, dating to the early 1950s.The term rockabilly is a portmanteau of rock and hillbilly, the latter a reference to the country music that contributed strongly to the style's development...
and rock and roll
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
music was taken up by local musicians and it soon caught on with Australian teens, through movies, records and from 1956, television. EMI had dominated the Australasian record market since the end of WWII, and they made British music a powerful force in the late Fifties and Sixties with signings like Cliff Richard
Cliff Richard
Sir Cliff Richard, OBE is a British pop singer, musician, performer, actor, and philanthropist who has sold over an estimated 250 million records worldwide....
& The Shadows
The Shadows
The Shadows are a British pop group with a total of 69 UK hit-charted singles: 35 as 'The Shadows' and 34 as 'Cliff Richard and the Shadows', from the 1950s to the 2000s. Cliff Richard in casual conversation with the British rock press frequently refers to the Shadows by their nickname: 'The Shads'...
, The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
, The Hollies
The Hollies
The Hollies are an English pop and rock group, formed in Manchester in the early 1960s, though most of the band members are from throughout East Lancashire. Known for their distinctive vocal harmony style, they became one of the leading British groups of the 1960s and 1970s...
and Cilla Black
Cilla Black
Cilla Black OBE is an English singer, actress, entertainer and media personality, who has been consistently popular as a light entertainment figure since 1963. She is most famous for her singles Anyone Who Had A Heart, You're My World, and Alfie...
. EMI (Australia) also locally distributed Decca
Decca Records
Decca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
(The Rolling Stones' label) as well as the American Capitol
Capitol Records
Capitol Records is a major United States based record label, formerly located in Los Angeles, but operating in New York City as part of Capitol Music Group. Its former headquarters building, the Capitol Tower, is a major landmark near the corner of Hollywood and Vine...
label (The Beach Boys
The Beach Boys
The Beach Boys are an American rock band, formed in 1961 in Hawthorne, California. The group was initially composed of brothers Brian, Dennis and Carl Wilson, their cousin Mike Love, and friend Al Jardine. Managed by the Wilsons' father Murry, The Beach Boys signed to Capitol Records in 1962...
). During this period, however, a number of local companies in Australia expanded into the growing Australian music market, which grew considerably after the emergence of the first wave of American rock'n'roll.
In 1951 merchant bank, Mainguard took over a struggling Sydney engineering firm, retooled and relaunched it as Festival Records. Its main local competition was ARC (the Australian Record Company), a former radio production and disc transcription service that established the successful Pacific
Pacific Records
Pacific Records has been the name of at least two record labels:-Pacific Records :Pacific Records, was founded by Brian Witkin in 1999. Formerly known as "Real2Reel Records", in 2004 Pacific was introduced as a division of Wingnut Media Group, Inc, based in Del Mar, California. The company was...
, Rodeo and Coronet
Coronet Records
Coronet Records was a record label in Australia, based in Sydney, NSW. The label that operated from the early 1950s until around 1960 was recognizable by its famous octagonal label....
labels and competed with Festival as a manufacturer/distributor in NSW.
Several major events took place in 1960. In January Festival Records was purchased by rising young media magnate Rupert Murdoch
Rupert Murdoch
Keith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG is an Australian-American business magnate. He is the founder and Chairman and CEO of , the world's second-largest media conglomerate....
, and a few weeks later, in April, ARC was taken over by the American CBS company, who closed the Coronet label and replaced the Australian CBS label.
Although most of the major labels were based in Sydney, Melbourne's vibrant dance and concert scene powered a local boom in rock'n'roll and pop music and it became Australia's pop capital in the 1960s. During the Fifties luthier Bill May expanded his Maton
Maton
Maton is an Australian manufacturer of guitars and other fretted musical instruments.Maton was founded in 1946 as the Maton Musical Instruments Company by Bill May and his brother Reg...
guitar company, becoming one of the first local manufacturers of the new electric guitars and amplifiers. In 1953 precision engineering
Precision engineering
Precision engineering is a subdiscipline of electrical engineering, electronics engineering, mechanical engineering, and optical engineering concerned with designing machines, fixtures, and other structures that have exceptionally low tolerances, are repeatable, and are stable over time...
company White & Gillespie established a custom recording division, which their company history claims was the first in Australia to press records in the new vinyl microgroove format. The new division soon included the W&G
W&G Records
W&G Records was an Australian recording company that operated from the early 1950s to the 1970s. It was a subsidiary of the Melbourne precision engineering company White & Gillespie....
label and studio. In 1960 Melbourne consumer electronics company Astor Electronics created its own record division, Astor Records
Astor Records
Astor Records was an Australian recording company that operated from the 1960s to the early 1980s. Astor was originally a trademark of the consumer electronics industries ltd. Radio Corporation Pty. Ltd., makers of Astor radios and radiograms and a range of electronic companies including gereral...
, which established the Astor label and also became a leading distributor.
All through this period Australia was experiencing the effects of a rising tide of migration, as thousands fled the wreckage of postwar Europe. The majority of migrants were from the UK, and many were "Ten Pound Poms" who were able to take advantage of the Australian government's generous £10 assisted-passage fare. Also, for the first time since the Gold Rush large numbers of "non-Anglo" migrants came to Australia from places like Greece, Italy, Malta, Spain, Portugal and eastern European nations like Yugoslavia, Hungary and Poland. These immigrants exerted a powerful influence on all aspects of Australian society and notably in popular music—many major Australia pop performers of the Sixties were the children of migrants from Europe and the UK.
The arrival of American entrepreneur Lee Gordon
Lee Gordon
For the rock and roll promoter see Lee Gordon Lee "Stubby" Gordon was a jazz musician and the Cleveland bandsman who conducted the Rhythm Masters orchestra and wrote the music for songs such as "Tell Me Dreamy Eyes" , "Worryin' Blues" , and "Rippin' It Off." He was the first to broadcast...
in 1953 marked a major expansion in Australian entertainment. He established himself with a record-breaking tour by American singer Johnnie Ray
Johnnie Ray
Johnnie Ray was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Popular for most of the 1950s, Ray has been cited by critics as a major precursor of what would become rock and roll, for his jazz and blues-influenced music and his animated stage personality.-Early life:John Alvin Ray was born in...
and Gordon's now-legendary "Big Show" promotions brought to Australia—in many cases for the first or only time—dozens of the biggest American jazz, rock and popular stars of the era, including Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong , nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter and singer from New Orleans, Louisiana....
, Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Fitzgerald
Ella Jane Fitzgerald , also known as the "First Lady of Song" and "Lady Ella," was an American jazz and song vocalist...
, Artie Shaw
Artie Shaw
Arthur Jacob Arshawsky , better known as Artie Shaw, was an American jazz clarinetist, composer, and bandleader. He was also the author of both fiction and non-fiction writings....
, Nat King Cole
Nat King Cole
Nathaniel Adams Coles , known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an American musician who first came to prominence as a leading jazz pianist. Although an accomplished pianist, he owes most of his popular musical fame to his soft baritone voice, which he used to perform in big band and jazz genres...
, Johnnie Ray
Johnnie Ray
Johnnie Ray was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Popular for most of the 1950s, Ray has been cited by critics as a major precursor of what would become rock and roll, for his jazz and blues-influenced music and his animated stage personality.-Early life:John Alvin Ray was born in...
, Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
, Bill Haley & The Comets, Little Richard
Little Richard
Richard Wayne Penniman , known by the stage name Little Richard, is an American singer, songwriter, musician, recording artist, and actor, considered key in the transition from rhythm and blues to rock and roll in the 1950s. He was also the first artist to put the funk in the rock and roll beat and...
, Buddy Holly & The Crickets, Jerry Lee Lewis
Jerry Lee Lewis
Jerry Lee Lewis is an American rock and roll and country music singer-songwriter and pianist. An early pioneer of rock and roll music, Lewis's career faltered after he married his young cousin, and he afterwards made a career extension to country and western music. He is known by the nickname 'The...
, Chuck Berry
Chuck Berry
Charles Edward Anderson "Chuck" Berry is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter, and one of the pioneers of rock and roll music. With songs such as "Maybellene" , "Roll Over Beethoven" , "Rock and Roll Music" and "Johnny B...
and many others. He also promoted local talent by using Australian acts as supports on his concerts.
In the mid-1950s Festival Records grabbed an early lead in rock'n'roll by releasing Bill Haley
Bill Haley
Bill Haley was one of the first American rock and roll musicians. He is credited by many with first popularizing this form of music in the early 1950s with his group Bill Haley & His Comets and their hit song "Rock Around the Clock".-Early life and career:...
's "Rock Around The Clock" in Australia in 1956 after the single had been turned down EMI/Decca. It became the biggest-selling hit ever released in Australia up to that time, and its success set Festival on its way to becoming the dominant Australian local record company for the next fifteen years.
Soon after, inspired by Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley
Elvis Aaron Presley was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King"....
and Little Richard
Little Richard
Richard Wayne Penniman , known by the stage name Little Richard, is an American singer, songwriter, musician, recording artist, and actor, considered key in the transition from rhythm and blues to rock and roll in the 1950s. He was also the first artist to put the funk in the rock and roll beat and...
, Johnny O'Keefe
Johnny O'Keefe
John Michael O'Keefe, known as Johnny O'Keefe was an Australian rock and roll singer whose career began in the 1950s. Some of his hits include "Wild One" , "Shout!" and "She's My Baby"...
achieved local stardom after his breakthrough appearances on Lee Gordon's Bill Haley tour. O'Keefe carved out a singular career and became a legend of Australian rock music. He hosted one of Australia's first TV pop shows, Six O'Clock Rock, became a partner in Lee Gordon's record company, Leedon, and was the first Australian rock'n'roll performer to attempt to break into the USA. Iggy Pop
Iggy Pop
Iggy Pop is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. Though considered an innovator of punk rock, Pop's music has encompassed a number of styles over the years, including pop, metal, jazz and blues...
acknowledged O'Keefe's importance when he recorded a version of O'Keefe's hit "Real Wild Child" in the 1980s, which he recently re-recorded with successful Australian band Jet
Jet (band)
Jet are an Australian rock band formed in 2001 while attending St Bede's College Mentone in Melbourne, . The band consists of lead guitarist Cameron Muncey, bassist Mark Wilson, and brothers Nic and Chris Cester on vocals/rhythm guitar and drums respectively...
. For a few years, O'Keefe and other local rockers like Lonnie Lee & The Leemen, Dig Richards & The R'Jays, Col Joye & The Joy Boys, Alan Dale & The Houserockers, Ray Hoff & The Offbeats, Digger Revell & The Denvermen and New Zealand's Johnny Devlin & The Devils whipped up excitement on a par with their American inspirations.
The success of these 'First Wave' rock'n'roll acts was brief, and by the early '60s the first boom had begun to fade. Between O'Keefe's last major hit in 1961 and Billy Thorpe
Billy Thorpe
William Richard "Billy" Thorpe, AM was a renowned English-born Australian pop / rock singer-songwriter and musician...
's first hit in 1964, the local pop scene became noticeably blander and more conservative. The charts were dominated by clean-cut acts, like the members of the so-called "Bandstand family", most of whom were signed to Festival and were regular guests on Australia's leading TV pop show, 'Bandstand', which explicitly aimed to appeal to anyone "from eight to eighty".
An alternative to mainstream pop was instrumental 'surf' groups, for instance The Atlantics
The Atlantics
This article refers to the Australian Surf rock band. See paragraph at the end of this page for information on other bands called The Atlantics....
and The Denvermen in Sydney, and Melbourne's, The Thunderbirds. Many of the players in these dance bands had come from the jazz scene, and were also strongly influenced by the R&B and "jump" music of performers like Louis Jordan. Others were inspired by figures like American surf guitar players Dick Dale
Dick Dale
Dick Dale is an American surf rock guitarist, known as The King of the Surf Guitar. He experimented with reverberation and made use of custom made Fender amplifiers, including the first-ever 100-watt guitar amplifier.-Early life:Dale was born in South Boston, Massachusetts and lived in nearby...
and Duane Eddy
Duane Eddy
Duane Eddy is a Grammy Award-winning American guitarist. In the late 1950s and early 1960s he had a string of hit records, produced by Lee Hazlewood, which were noted for their characteristically "twangy" sound, including "Rebel Rouser", "Peter Gunn", and "Because They're Young"...
, and particularly by the popularity of The Shadows
The Shadows
The Shadows are a British pop group with a total of 69 UK hit-charted singles: 35 as 'The Shadows' and 34 as 'Cliff Richard and the Shadows', from the 1950s to the 2000s. Cliff Richard in casual conversation with the British rock press frequently refers to the Shadows by their nickname: 'The Shads'...
and American band the Ventures
The Ventures
The Ventures is an American instrumental rock band formed in 1958 in Tacoma, Washington. Founded by Don Wilson and Bob Bogle, the group in its various incarnations has had an enduring impact on the development of music worldwide. With over 100 million records sold, the group is the best-selling...
. The Shadows' influence on Australasian pop and rock music of the Sixties and Seventies is still much underrated, and their lead guitarist Hank Marvin
Hank Marvin
Hank Brian Marvin is an English guitarist, best known as the lead guitarist for The Shadows. The group, which primarily performed instrumentals, was formed as a backing band for vocalist Cliff Richard...
.
These instrumental bands cut their teeth playing at the dance venues in Australia's major cities and regional towns. Like Australian jazz
Australian jazz
Jazz music has a long history in Australia. Over the years jazz has held a high profile at local clubs, festivals and other music venues and a vast number of recordings have been produced by Australian jazz musicians, many of whom have gone on to gain a high profile in the international jazz...
bands of the period, these rock'n'roll musicians became extremely accomplished players. Because dance patrons in those days actually danced as couples to traditional rhythms, dance bands in Australia and New Zealand tended to play a wide variety of musical styles.
Johnny O'Keefe's attempt to launch an American career failed, but British-born singer Frank Ifield
Frank Ifield
Francis Edward Ifield is an early Australian-English easy listening and country music singer. He achieved considerable success in the early 1960s, especially in the UK Singles Chart, where he had four Number 1 hits between 1962 and 1963....
was one of the first Australian postwar performers to gain widespread international recognition. He was hugely successful in the UK in the early Sixties, becoming the first performer to have three consecutive #1 hits there, and his biggest hit, "I Remember You" was #1 in the UK and a Top 5 hit in the U.S.A.. Entertainer Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris, CBE, AM is an Australian musician, singer-songwriter, composer, painter and television personality.Born in Perth, Western Australia, Harris was a champion swimmer before studying art. He moved to England in 1952, where he started to appear on television programmes on which he drew the...
also had several novelty hits during this period and became a fixture on British television with his variety show.
The Beat boom
The Beatles and other British InvasionBritish Invasion
The British Invasion is a term used to describe the large number of rock and roll, beat, rock, and pop performers from the United Kingdom who became popular in the United States during the time period from 1964 through 1966.- Background :...
groups had a massive impact on the Australasian music scene. These bands toured Australia and New Zealand to wild receptions in the mid-Sixties. When The Beatles' 1964 Australian tour arrived in Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...
, an estimated 300,000 people — about one-third of the city's population at that time — turned out to see them as their motorcade made its way from the airport to the city.
The tours and recordings by 'Beat' groups revitalised the pop genre and inspired scores of new and established groups, who quickly developed a vibrant and distinctive local inflection of the 60s 'beat music' craze. The Easybeats
The Easybeats
The Easybeats were an Australian rock and roll band. They formed in Sydney in late 1964 and broke up at the end of 1969. They are regarded as the greatest Australian pop band of the 1960s, and were the first Australian rock and roll act to score an international pop hit with their 1966 single...
and The Bee Gees are probably the best-known acts from this era to gain success outside Australia, but by the mid-Sixties there were hundreds of bands working in Australia and New Zealand.
1964–1969: "Second Wave"
1964–1969 is often classified as the 'Second Wave' of Australian rock. The leading acts of this period include Little PattieLittle Pattie
Little Pattie is the stage name of Australian singer, Patricia Thelma Amphlett OAM later Patricia Thompson, who performed as a 1960s surf pop singer and then in adult contemporary music...
, Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs
Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs
Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs were an Australian pop and rock group dating from the mid-sixties. The group enjoyed huge success in the mid-1960s, but split in 1967. They re-emerged in the early seventies to become one of the most popular Australian hard-rock bands of the period...
, beat duo Bobby & Laurie
Bobby & Laurie
Bobby & Laurie were a popular Australian singing duo of the 1960s, featuring Laurie Allen and Bobby Bright . Their regular backing band were The Rondells...
(Australia's first "long-haired" performers), the Easybeats
The Easybeats
The Easybeats were an Australian rock and roll band. They formed in Sydney in late 1964 and broke up at the end of 1969. They are regarded as the greatest Australian pop band of the 1960s, and were the first Australian rock and roll act to score an international pop hit with their 1966 single...
, Ray Brown & The Whispers
Ray Brown & The Whispers
. For other uses of Whispers, see Whispers page.Ray Brown & The Whispers were a highly successful Australian rock band from 1964 to 1967...
, Tony Worsley & The Fabulous Blue Jays, the Twilights, the Loved Ones
The Loved Ones
The Loved Ones were an Australian rock band formed in 1965 in Melbourne following the British Invasion. The line-up of Gavin Anderson on drums, Ian Clyne on organ and piano, Gerry Humphrys on vocals and harmonica, Rob Lovett on guitar, and Kim Lynch on bass guitar recorded their early hits...
, the Masters Apprentices
The Masters Apprentices
The Masters Apprentices were an Australian rock band fronted by mainstay Jim Keays on lead vocals, which formed in 1965 in Adelaide, South Australia, relocated to Melbourne in February 1967 and attempted to break into the United Kingdom market from 1970, before disbanding in 1972...
, MPD Ltd, Mike Furber & The Bowery Boys, Ray Columbus & The Invaders
Ray Columbus & the Invaders
Ray Columbus & the Invaders were a rock group from New Zealand active from 1964 to 1966.The group was influenced by the early 1960s work of Cliff Richard and The Beatles. They scored a #1 hit in Australia and New Zealand with "She's a Mod" in 1964, a cover version of a song by The Senators. They...
, Max Merritt
Max Merritt
Max Merritt is a New Zealand-born singer-songwriter and guitarist who is renowned as an interpreter of soul music and R&B...
, Dinah Lee
Dinah Lee
Dinah Lee is the stage name of New Zealand-born singer, Diane Marie Jacobs , who performed 1960s pop and then adult contemporary music. Her debut single from early 1964, "Don't You Know Yockomo?", achieved No. 1 chart success in New Zealand and, across the Tasman Sea, in Brisbane and Melbourne...
, Australia's most popular male singer Normie Rowe
Normie Rowe
Norman John "Normie" Rowe AM was a major male solo performer of Australian pop music in the 1960s. Known for his bright and edgy tenor voice and dynamic stage presence, many of Rowe's most successful recordings were produced by Pat Aulton, house producer for the Sunshine Records, Spin Records and...
, The Groop
The Groop
The Groop were an Australian folk, R&B and rock band formed in 1964 in Melbourne, Australia and had their greatest chart success with their second line-up of Max Ross on bass, Richard Wright on drums and vocals, Don Mudie on lead guitar, Brian Cadd on keyboards and vocals, and Ronnie Charles on...
, the Groove
The Groove (band)
Formed in mid 1967, The Groove are considered to be Australia's first "supergroup" in that all members had considerable experience behind them in a number of successful bands...
, Lynne Randell
Lynne Randell
Lynne Randell was an Australian pop singer. For three years in the mid-1960s she was Australia's most popular female performer and had hits with "Heart" and "Goin' Out of My Head" in 1966, and "Ciao Baby" in 1967. In 1967, Randell toured the United States with The Monkees and performed on-stage...
(who toured America with the Monkees
The Monkees
The Monkees are an American pop rock group. Assembled in Los Angeles in 1966 by Robert "Bob" Rafelson and Bert Schneider for the American television series The Monkees, which aired from 1966 to 1968, the musical acting quartet was composed of Americans Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork,...
and Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
), Johnny Young
Johnny Young
Johnny Young is an Australian singer, composer, record producer, disc jockey, television producer and host. Originally from Netherlands, his family settled in Perth, Western Australia in the early 1950s...
, John Farnham
John Farnham
John Peter Farnham, AO, formerly billed as Johnny Farnham , is an English-born Australian pop singer. He was a teen pop idol from 1964 to 1979, and has since forged a career as an adult contemporary singer. His career has mostly been as a solo artist although he briefly replaced Glenn Shorrock as...
, Doug Parkinson, Russell Morris
Russell Morris
Russell Norman Morris is an Australian singer-songwriter who had five Australian Top 10 singles during the late 1960s and early 1970s...
and Ronnie Burns. Also of note were cult acts such as the Missing Links, the Purple Hearts
Purple Hearts (Australian band)
The Purple Hearts were an Australian rock group, formed in Brisbane in 1964. The band consisted of lead vocalist Mick Hadley, lead guitarist Barry Lyde , rhythm guitarist Fred Pickard, bassist Bob Dames, and drummers Adrian 'Red' Redmond and Tony Cahill .It is notable that Brisbane, traditionally...
, The Wild Cherries, The Creatures and the Throb, who had only limited success at the time but whose 'heavier' sound would exert a significant influence on later bands like The Saints
The Saints (band)
The Saints are an Australian rock band, which formed in Brisbane in 1974 as punk rockers. Founders were Chris Bailey , Ivor Hay , and Ed Kuepper . Alongside mainstay Bailey, the group has had numerous line-ups...
.
It was during the '60s that New Zealand performers began to move to Australia in search of wider opportunities. Although their origins are often overlooked (in much the same way that Canadian performers like Neil Young
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
and Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
are routinely classified as "American") these trans-Tasman performers — people like Max Merritt
Max Merritt
Max Merritt is a New Zealand-born singer-songwriter and guitarist who is renowned as an interpreter of soul music and R&B...
, Mike Rudd
Mike Rudd
Mike Rudd is a New Zealand born musician and composer who has been based in Australia since the late 1960s, and who is best known as the leader of respected Australian progressive rock bands Spectrum and Ariel in the 1970s....
, Dinah Lee
Dinah Lee
Dinah Lee is the stage name of New Zealand-born singer, Diane Marie Jacobs , who performed 1960s pop and then adult contemporary music. Her debut single from early 1964, "Don't You Know Yockomo?", achieved No. 1 chart success in New Zealand and, across the Tasman Sea, in Brisbane and Melbourne...
, Ray Columbus
Ray Columbus
Ray Columbus is a New Zealand solo singer and entertainer who has had a career spanning six decades. He was lead singer of Ray Columbus & the Invaders who had a hit with She's A Mod in the 1960s. Since then he has been a solo singer and television host.-Links:* *...
, Bruno Lawrence
Bruno Lawrence
Bruno Lawrence was a New Zealand musician and actor.Initially notable as founder of 1970s musical and theatrical "Blerta", he had well-regarded roles in several major films, and starred on the 1990s Australian satirical TV series Frontline.-Biography:Born David Charles Lawrence in Worthing, West...
, Dragon
Dragon (band)
Dragon is a popular New Zealand rock band, they were formed in Auckland, New Zealand in January 1972 and relocated to Sydney, Australia in May 1975. They were previously led by singer Marc Hunter and are currently led by his brother bass player Todd Hunter...
and Split Enz
Split Enz
Split Enz were a New Zealand band of the 1970s and early 1980s featuring Phil Judd and brothers Tim Finn and Neil Finn. They achieved chart success in New Zealand, Australia, and Canada during the early 1980s ‒ most notably with the single "I Got You", and built a cult following elsewhere...
— have exerted a tremendous influence on Australian popular music.
Another significant Australian from this period, and one whose importance is only now beginning to be widely recognised, was the critic and journalist Lillian Roxon
Lillian Roxon
Lillian Roxon was a noted Australian journalist and author, best known for Lillian Roxon's Rock Encyclopedia . Her niece Nicola Roxon, the Australian politician, is currently the federal Minister for Health....
(1932–1973), who grew up in Brisbane but who was based in New York from 1959 until her premature death from asthma
Asthma
Asthma is the common chronic inflammatory disease of the airways characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and bronchospasm. Symptoms include wheezing, coughing, chest tightness, and shortness of breath...
. She was a close friend of feminist writer Germaine Greer
Germaine Greer
Germaine Greer is an Australian writer, academic, journalist and scholar of early modern English literature, widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the later 20th century....
, photographer Linda McCartney
Linda McCartney
Linda Louise McCartney, Lady McCartney was an American photographer, musician and animal rights activist. Her father and mother were Lee Eastman and Louise Sara Lindner Eastman....
, poet Delmore Schwartz
Delmore Schwartz
Delmore Schwartz was an American poet and short story writer from Brooklyn, New York.-Biography:Schwartz was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. His parents, Harry and Rose, both Romanian Jews, separated when Schwartz was nine, and their divorce had a profound effect on him. Later, in 1930,...
, artist Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
and many musicians including Lou Reed
Lou Reed
Lewis Allan "Lou" Reed is an American rock musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is best known as guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter of The Velvet Underground, and for his successful solo career, which has spanned several decades...
. Roxon wrote the world's first Rock Encyclopedia, published in 1969, and her writings about pop music and musicians were central to the development of serious rock criticism and rock journalism in the late 1960s and 1970s.
By far the most influential and popular music-related publication of this period was the weekly magazine Go-Set
Go-Set
Go-Set was the first Australian pop music newspaper, published weekly from 2 February 1966 to 24 August 1974, and was founded in Melbourne by Phillip Frazer, Peter Raphael and Tony Schauble...
, which was published from 1966 to 1974. Founded in Melbourne in 1966 by a group of former Monash University
Monash University
Monash University is a public university based in Melbourne, Victoria. It was founded in 1958 and is the second oldest university in the state. Monash is a member of Australia's Group of Eight and the ASAIHL....
students including Philip Frazer, Tony Schauble and Doug Panther, Go-Set chronicled all of the major events, trends, fads and performers in Australian popular music, as well as featuring regular columns by renowned Melbourne radio DJ Stan Rofe
Stan Rofe
Stan 'The Man' Rofe was Melbourne's first and most influential rock'n'roll disc jockey. He is remembered as playing the first rock and roll music on Melbourne radio 3KZ in 1956 and as a champion of Australian music, a pioneer who played songs other DJs were too scared to play.-Career:Stan Rofe...
and Aussie fashion designer Prue Acton
Prue Acton
Prue Acton, OBE is an Australian fashion designer, and is often referred to as Australia's "golden girl" of fashion' during the 60's.-Early life:...
.
Go-Set also published the first national Australian pop charts in October 1966 (all charts prior to this were state-based) and it gave extensive coverage to overseas musical developments—it was one of the first international music papers to report on the emergence of Jimi Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...
and two staff members—writer Lily Brett
Lily Brett
Lily Brett is an award-winning Australian novelist, essayist and poet who now lives in New York City. Much of her writing deals with her Jewish family semi-biographically and with her feelings about the Holocaust....
and photographer Colin Beard
Colin Beard
Colin Beard is a former Australian rules football player who played in the VFL between 1969 and 1971 for the Richmond Football Club.Originally from South Fremantle in the WAFL, where he won the club's Best & Fairest award in 1966, he returned there after his three seasons at Richmond and was coach...
– travelled to the USA and the UK in mid-1967, reporting on the famous Monterey International Pop Festival and the burgeoning music scene in London, as well as chronicling the exploits of Australian musicians overseas including Normie Rowe
Normie Rowe
Norman John "Normie" Rowe AM was a major male solo performer of Australian pop music in the 1960s. Known for his bright and edgy tenor voice and dynamic stage presence, many of Rowe's most successful recordings were produced by Pat Aulton, house producer for the Sunshine Records, Spin Records and...
and Lynne Randell
Lynne Randell
Lynne Randell was an Australian pop singer. For three years in the mid-1960s she was Australia's most popular female performer and had hits with "Heart" and "Goin' Out of My Head" in 1966, and "Ciao Baby" in 1967. In 1967, Randell toured the United States with The Monkees and performed on-stage...
. Another aspect of Go-Set's activities was its exclusive reporting and promotion of Australia's prestigious annual rock band competition, Hoadley's Battle of the Sounds
Hoadley's Battle of the Sounds
Hoadley's Battle of the Sounds was an annual national rock/pop band competition held in Australia from 1966 to 1972.-History:Australia's Battle of the Sounds was originally established by Australian tabloid magazine Everybody’s in 1965 as a talent quest for new unsigned bands in Sydney, Melbourne...
, which ran from 1966 to 1972. Go-Set conducted a pop poll of performers which led to the King of Pop Awards starting with Normie Rowe in 1967.
Although it was explicitly established as a 'teens and twenties' magazine, in its later years, inspired by newer publications like Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone Australia
Rolling Stone Australia is an Australian-based magazine devoted to music, politics, and popular culture that is published monthly, it is the Australian edition of the United States' Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone was initially released in Melbourne in May 1970 as a supplement in Revolution, an...
magazine, Go-Set took on a more mature presentation, with numerous rock performers including Jim Keays
Jim Keays
James "Jim" Keays is an Australian musician who fronted rock band The Masters Apprentices as singer-songwriter, guitarist and harmonica-player during 1965–1972, and subsequently had a solo career including leading Jim Keays' Southern Cross...
and Wendy Saddington
Wendy Saddington
Wendy June Saddington is an Australian blues / soul / jazz singer and was in the bands Chain, Copperwine and the Wendy Saddington Band. She wrote for teen pop newspaper Go-Set from September 1969 – September 1970 as an agony aunt in her weekly "Takes Care of Business" column and as a...
writing for the magazine. In 1970 former columnist Ian Meldrum
Ian Meldrum
Ian Alexander "Molly" Meldrum AM is an Australian popular music critic, journalist, record producer , and musical entrepreneur...
scored a world exclusive for Go-Set when he interviewed John Lennon
John Lennon
John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...
in London, during which Lennon made his first public announcement that The Beatles were breaking up.
As in other countries, independent record labels proliferated during this period. The local branch of the British-owned EMI
EMI
The EMI Group, also known as EMI Music or simply EMI, is a multinational music company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the fourth-largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry and one of the "big four" record companies. EMI Group also has a major...
company had dominated the Australian record market since the 1920s, but in this period it faced increasing challenges from its rivals, including the Australian arm of the American CBS Records
CBS Records
CBS Records is a record label founded by CBS Corporation in 2006 to take advantage of music from its entertainment properties owned by CBS Television Studios. The initial label roster consisted of only three artists; rock band Señor Happy and singer/songwriters Will Dailey and P.J...
and particularly from the Sydney-based Festival Records, a division of Rupert Murdoch
Rupert Murdoch
Keith Rupert Murdoch, AC, KSG is an Australian-American business magnate. He is the founder and Chairman and CEO of , the world's second-largest media conglomerate....
's News Limited
News Limited
News Limited is one of Australia's largest diversified media companies. The publicly listed company's interests span newspaper and magazine publishing, Internet, Pay TV, National Rugby League, market research, DVD and film distribution, and film and television production trading assets.News Limited...
.
Festival had its own successful house label, and it also signed valuable distribution deals with some of the most important and successful independent labels of Sixties, notably Leedon Records
Leedon Records
Leedon Records was an Australian record label active from 1958 to 1969. It was founded by American entrepreneur Lee Gordon in early 1958.-Establishment and early releases:...
(which released the earliest recordings by The Bee Gees), Spin Records
Spin Records
Spin Records was an Australian popular music label of the late 1960s and early 1970s. It was established in late 1966 by Clyde Packer and a group of partners including entrepreneur Harry M. Miller. The label's first A&R manager was Nat Kipner who produced several early Spin releases...
and the Perth
Perth, Western Australia
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....
-based Clarion Records. The many hits released on these independent labels comprised a significant part of Festival's total turnover.
Other important independent pop labels of this period included the Melbourne-based W&G Records
W&G Records
W&G Records was an Australian recording company that operated from the early 1950s to the 1970s. It was a subsidiary of the Melbourne precision engineering company White & Gillespie....
, Astor Records
Astor Records
Astor Records was an Australian recording company that operated from the 1960s to the early 1980s. Astor was originally a trademark of the consumer electronics industries ltd. Radio Corporation Pty. Ltd., makers of Astor radios and radiograms and a range of electronic companies including gereral...
– also a major distributor—and the short-lived Go!! Records label, which was set up in conjunction with the popular pop TV series The Go!! Show
The Go!! Show
The Go!! Show was a top rating Australian popular music television series which aired on ATV-0 Melbourne from 1964 to 1967, and was produced by DYT Productions at the Channel 0 studios in Nunawading, Victoria....
.
Independent studios and production companies began to play an increasingly important role in the local record industry. Arguably the most productive and influential pop studio in Australia at that time was Armstrong's Studios
Armstrong's Studios
-- also known as Bill Armstrong's Studio and later renamed AAV is an important Australian commercial recording studio located in Melbourne, Victoria....
in Melbourne. Studio owner and engineer date=June 2011
Bill Armstrong
William Harold Armstrong is a retired Canadian professional ice hockey player. He played in one NHL game for the Philadelphia Flyers during the 1990–91 NHL season and spent the rest of his professional career in the AHL and IHL. Armstrong played collegiately at Western Michigan University from...
was an industry veteran who had worked for major record labels, radio stations and advertising clients; and his new studio, which opened in 1965, soon became the most sought-after in the country and probably produced more Australian pop hits than any other in this era. It was also one of the first studios in the country to install 8-track and 16-track recorders in the late 1960s and early '30s, and was an important training ground for some of Australia's best engineers and producers including Roger Savage
Roger Savage
Roger Savage is an Australian sound engineer. He was nominated for an Academy Award in the category Best Sound for the film Moulin Rouge! He has worked on over 80 films since 1971.-External links:...
, John L. Sayers, Ern Rose, John French
John French
John French may refer to:* John French , English doctor and chemist* John French , Canadian ice hockey player* John French , American drummer and musician...
and many others.
One of the first and most important independent production companies was Albert Productions
Albert Productions
Albert Productions, a division of music publishing and recording company Albert Music, is one of Australia's longest established independent Australian record label to specialise in rock and roll music. The label was founded in 1964 by Ted Albert, whose family owned and operated the Australian...
, which signed both Billy Thorpe & The Aztecs
Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs
Billy Thorpe and the Aztecs were an Australian pop and rock group dating from the mid-sixties. The group enjoyed huge success in the mid-1960s, but split in 1967. They re-emerged in the early seventies to become one of the most popular Australian hard-rock bands of the period...
and The Easybeats
The Easybeats
The Easybeats were an Australian rock and roll band. They formed in Sydney in late 1964 and broke up at the end of 1969. They are regarded as the greatest Australian pop band of the 1960s, and were the first Australian rock and roll act to score an international pop hit with their 1966 single...
. It was established in 1969 by young music executive Ted Albert
Ted Albert
Edward 'Ted' Albert was an early pioneer in Australian independent record production and founder of Albert Productions...
, whose family that owned Australia's leading music publishing house J. Albert & Son and the Macquarie Radio Network
Macquarie Radio Network
Macquarie Radio Network is the name of the company that owns and operates 2GB and 2CH in Sydney and MTR 1377 in Melbourne. It is a publicly listed company, majority owned by John Singleton. The Chief Executive is Angela Clarke....
, which then included leading Sydney AM pop station 2UW.
Albert Productions scored many major Australian hits (released locally on EMI's Parlophone
Parlophone
Parlophone is a record label that was founded in Germany in 1896 by the Carl Lindström Company as Parlophon. The British branch was formed in 1923 as "Parlophone" which developed a reputation in the 1920s as a leading jazz label. It was acquired in 1927 by the Columbia Graphophone Company which...
label) with both their flagship acts in the mid-Sixties, and the Albert Productions record label, esatblished in the early 1970s, became one of the most successful Australian labels of that decade. Other significant 'indie' production houses of ther period included Leopold Productions (Max Merritt
Max Merritt
Max Merritt is a New Zealand-born singer-songwriter and guitarist who is renowned as an interpreter of soul music and R&B...
, The Allusions), set up Festival's original house producer Robert Iredale, and June Productions, led by former W&G/Astor staff producer Ron Tudor, who went on to found Fable Records in 1923.
1970–1975: "Third Wave"
After a period of flux in the late 60s, during which almost all of the dominant 60s acts dissolved or faded from view, Australian rock moved into the so-called "The Third Wave" (1970–1975), a fertile period in which newer performers and veterans of the 60s Beat Boom coalesced into new formations and developed a more mature, progressive and distinctively Australian rock style. Some of these acts were successful within Australia, but few managed to achieve any lasting local or overseas success, due to the combination of poor management, lack of record company support and lack of radio exposure.Early "Third Wave"
Until the late 1970s, many Australian performers found it hard to become established and to maintain their profile, because of the difficulty in getting airplay on radio. Until 1975, Australian pop radio was dominated by a clique of commercial broadcasters who virtually had the field to themselves and their influence over government was such that, incredibly, no new radio licences had been issued in any Australian capital city since the prevailing industry structure had been consolidated in the early 1930s. All commercial pop radio was broadcast on the AM band, in mono, and the commercial sector strenuously resisted calls to grant new licences, introduce community broadcasting and open up the FM band (then only used for TV broadcasts in Australia) even though FM rock radio was already well-established in the United States.Many of the more progressively-oriented artists found themselves locked out of Australian commercial radio, which concentrated on high-rotation 3-minute pop single programming. This was a result of the widespread adoption of the American-inspired "More Music" format, which had been pioneered in Los Angeles with great success by the Drake-Chenault programming consultancy.
There was a great deal of innovative and exciting music produced; although few Australians got to hear more than a fraction of it at the time, this music is undergoing a major resurgence both locally and internationally, since Australia is one of the last untapped resources of 20th-century popular music.
Landmark acts of this period include Spectrum
Spectrum (band)
Spectrum is an Australian progressive rock band that formed in Melbourne in 1969 and, in its original period, remained in existence until 1973. Its members also performed under the alter-ego Indelible Murtceps...
and its successor Ariel
Ariel (band)
Ariel was an Australian progressive rock band based around the duo Mike Rudd and Bill Putt, who formed the band in 1973 after the breakup of their previous group Spectrum . The original Ariel line-up was Rudd , Putt , Tim Gaze , Nigel Macara and John Mills...
, Daddy Cool
Daddy Cool (band)
Daddy Cool is an Australian rock band formed in Melbourne in 1970 with the original line-up of Wayne Duncan , Ross Hannaford , Ross Wilson and Gary Young . Their debut single "Eagle Rock" was released in May 1971 and stayed at number 1 on the Australian singles chart for ten weeks...
, Blackfeather
Blackfeather
Blackfeather was an Australian rock group in the 1970s. The group had many members and went through two major incarnations - the earlier heavy rock version of the group, which recorded the album At The Mountains of Madness and the hit single "Seasons of Change", and the later piano-based lineup...
, The Flying Circus
The Flying Circus (band)
The Flying Circus was a pioneering Australian country rock band who had a number of pop hits in Australia from 1968 to 1971 and then re-located to Canada from 1971 to 1974 where they also achieved a degree of success.-Beginnings:...
, Tully (band)
Tully (band)
Tully was an Australian progressive rock group of the late 1960s and early 1970s which had a close association with the Sydney-based film/lightshow collective Ubu.-Formation:...
, Tamam Shud
Tamam Shud
Tamam Shud were an Australian psychedelic and progressive rock band, formed in Sydney in 1967, which released two albums, Evolution and Goolutionites and the Real People before disbanding in 1972...
, Russell Morris
Russell Morris
Russell Norman Morris is an Australian singer-songwriter who had five Australian Top 10 singles during the late 1960s and early 1970s...
, Jeff St John & Copperwine, Chain
Chain (band)
Chain are an Australian blues band formed in Melbourne as The Chain in late 1968 with a lineup including guitarist, vocalist Phil Manning; they are sometimes known as Matt Taylor's Chain after lead singer-songwriter and harmonica player, Matt Taylor...
, Billy Thorpe
Billy Thorpe
William Richard "Billy" Thorpe, AM was a renowned English-born Australian pop / rock singer-songwriter and musician...
& The (new) Aztecs, Headband, Company Caine
Company Caine
Company Caine, also known as Co. Caine and Company Kane, is an Australian progressive rock band of the 1970s. The band was formed in Melbourne in 1970 with member as follows:* Gulliver Smith * Russell Smith * Jeremy Noone 1970-71, 1975...
, Kahvas Jute, Country Radio, Max Merritt & The Meteors, The La De Das
The La De Das
The La De Das were a leading New Zealand rock band of the 1960s and early 1970s. Formed in New Zealand in 1963 , they enjoyed considerable success in both New Zealand and Australia until their split in 1975....
, Madder Lake
Madder Lake (band)
Madder Lake is an Australian progressive rock band formed in Melbourne in 1971. They were one of the first band's signed to the Michael Gudinski co-owned Mushroom Records which released their debut single, "Goodbye Lollipop" in February 1973, followed by the album Stillpoint in August. This...
, former Easybeats lead singer Stevie Wright, Wendy Saddington
Wendy Saddington
Wendy June Saddington is an Australian blues / soul / jazz singer and was in the bands Chain, Copperwine and the Wendy Saddington Band. She wrote for teen pop newspaper Go-Set from September 1969 – September 1970 as an agony aunt in her weekly "Takes Care of Business" column and as a...
, The 69'ers
The 69'ers
The 69'ers were a well known Australian rock/pop/jug/country band formed in Sydney in 1969. They released two albums and a number of singles. As well they toured extensively in Australia and appeared at the Sunbury Rock Festival in 1973 and 1974...
, The Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band
The Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band
The Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band was an Australian band, active throughout the 1970s. It was based in Melbourne and centred around singer and multi-instrumentalist Mic Conway and his brother Jim Conway, who is widely regarded as one of Australia's finest exponents of the blues harmonica.Inspired...
and country-rock pioneers The Dingoes
The Dingoes
The Dingoes are an Australian country rock band initially active from 1973 to 1979, formed in Melbourne they relocated to the United States from 1976. Most stable line-up was John Bois on bass guitar, John Lee on drums, Broderick Smith on vocals and harmonica, Chris Stockley on guitar and Kerryn...
.
Guitarist-songwriter-producer Lobby Loyde
Lobby Loyde
Lobby Loyde , also known as John Barrie Lyde or Barry Lyde, was an Australian rock music guitarist, songwriter and producer....
(ex Wild Cherries, Purple Hearts) was another key figure in this period, most notably with his '70s band Coloured Balls, who gained a considerable following, despite media allegations that their music promoted skinhead violence. Lloyde had also played an important part in the re-emergence of Billy Thorpe and the 'new' hard-rock incarnation of the Aztecs, and his solo and band recordings in this period had a significant impact in Australia and internationally; Henry Rollins
Henry Rollins
Henry Rollins is an American singer-songwriter, spoken word artist, writer, comedian, publisher, actor, and radio DJ....
and Nirvana's Kurt Cobain
Kurt Cobain
Kurt Donald Cobain was an American singer-songwriter, musician and artist, best known as the lead singer and guitarist of the grunge band Nirvana...
are among those who have reportedly cited Lobby as an influence.
Rock musicals were another important development in Australia at this time. The local production of Hair
Hair (musical)
Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical is a rock musical with a book and lyrics by James Rado and Gerome Ragni and music by Galt MacDermot. A product of the hippie counter-culture and sexual revolution of the 1960s, several of its songs became anthems of the anti-Vietnam War peace movement...
brought future "Queen of Pop" Marcia Hines
Marcia Hines
Marcia Elaine Hines, AM is a vocalist, actress and TV personality who achieved success in her adopted homeland of Australia. Hines made her debut, at the age of sixteen, in the Australian version of the stage musical Hair and followed with the role of Mary Magdalene in Jesus Christ Superstar...
to Australia in 1970. In 1972 the hugely successful and much-praised Sydney production of Jesus Christ Superstar
Jesus Christ Superstar
Jesus Christ Superstar is a rock opera by Andrew Lloyd Webber, with lyrics by Tim Rice. The musical started off as a rock opera concept recording before its first staging on Broadway in 1971...
premiered, and this production alone included Marcia Hines, Jon English
Jon English
Jonathan James "Jon" English is an Australian rock singer, musician, actor and writer. English emigrated to Australia with his parents in 1961...
, theatre legend Reg Livermore
Reg Livermore
Reginald Dawson Livermore AO is an Australian actor, singer, theatrical performer and television presenter.-Childhood:From a young age, Livermore demonstrated an interest in the performing arts...
, the two main members of Air Supply
Air Supply
Air Supply is an Australian soft rock duo, consisting of Graham Russell as guitarist and singer-songwriter and Russell Hitchcock as lead vocalist. They had a succession of hits worldwide, including eight Top Ten hits in the United States, in the early 1980s...
, Stevie Wright, John Paul Young
John Paul Young
John Paul Young is an Australian pop singer who had a 1978 worldwide hit with "Love Is in the Air"...
and Rory O'Donoghue. It was directed by Jim Sharman
Jim Sharman
James "Jim" Sharman , the son of boxing tent entrepreneur Jimmy Sharman, is a director and writer for film and stage with over 70 productions to his credit...
, who went on to lasting international success as the director of the both the original stage production and the film version of The Rocky Horror Show
The Rocky Horror Show
The Rocky Horror Show is a long-running British horror comedy stage musical, which opened in London on 19 June 1973. It was written by Richard O'Brien, produced and directed by Jim Sharman. It came eighth in a BBC Radio 2 listener poll of the "Nation's Number One Essential Musicals"...
.
Alongside the more obscure acts was a raft of successful pop-oriented groups and solo artists, including Sherbet
Sherbet (band)
Sherbet was one of the most prominent and successful Australian rock bands of the 1970s. Their biggest singles were "Summer Love" and "Howzat" , both reaching number one in Australia. "Howzat" was also a top 5 hit in the UK. Though the band's success in the U.S...
, Hush
Hush (band)
Hush was a 1970s Australian glam rock pop group and became famous during frequent appearances on the ABC show Countdown for live concerts and teenagers, and they would not have come into existence without the superb John Koutts on drums....
, Ray Burgess, the Ted Mulry Gang (TMG) and John Paul Young
John Paul Young
John Paul Young is an Australian pop singer who had a 1978 worldwide hit with "Love Is in the Air"...
, who became the first Australian performer to have a major hit in multiple international markets with his perennial "Love Is In The Air
Love Is in the Air
"Love Is in the Air" is a 1977 disco song sung by John Paul Young. The song was written by George Young and Harry Vanda. It became his only worldwide hit during 1978, peaking at No. 2 on the Australian charts and No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart. In the United States, the song peaked at No. 7 on the...
" (1978) — a song which was, not coincidentally, written and produced by former Easybeats Harry Vanda
Harry Vanda
Harry Vanda , is a Dutch-born Australian popular music singer, guitarist, songwriter and record producer.-Career:...
and George Young, the masterminds behind many of the biggest Australian hits of the mid-to-late Seventies. The tail-end of the Second Wave gave birth to the record-breaking Skyhooks, who bridged the transition from the Third Wave into the period of the so-called New Wave music
New Wave music
New Wave is a subgenre of :rock music that emerged in the mid to late 1970s alongside punk rock. The term at first generally was synonymous with punk rock before being considered a genre in its own right that incorporated aspects of electronic and experimental music, mod subculture, disco and 1960s...
acts of the late 1970s and early 1980s. In commercial terms, howeverm Sherbet was undoubtedly the most successful of these.
The early 1970s also witnessed the first major rock festival
Rock festival
A rock festival, or a rock fest, is a large-scale rock music concert, featuring multiple acts.The first rock festivals were put on in the late 1960s and were important socio-cultural milestones. In the 1980s a minor resurgence of festivals occurred with charity as the goal.Today, they are often...
s in Australia, which were closely modelled on the fabled Woodstock
Woodstock Festival
Woodstock Music & Art Fair was a music festival, billed as "An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music". It was held at Max Yasgur's 600-acre dairy farm in the Catskills near the hamlet of White Lake in the town of Bethel, New York, from August 15 to August 18, 1969...
festival of 1969. The festival era was exemplified by the annual Sunbury music festival, held outside Melbourne, Victoria each January from 1972 to 1975. Although there were numerous other smaller festivals, most were not successful and failed to have the lasting impact of Sunbury. After the disastrous 1975 Sunbury festival, which sent the promoters broke, large-scale festivals were considered too risky and were only occasionally staged in Australia until the advent of the annual Big Day Out
Big Day Out
The Big Day Out is an annual music festival held in several cities in Australia and New Zealand in late January. It started in Sydney in 1992, spread to Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth by 1993, with the Gold Coast and Auckland joining in 1994...
in the 1990s.
Also paralleling a US trend was the beginning of an Australian Christian music culture. One of the first examples of this ternd was the surprise success of singing nun Sister Janet Mead
Sister Janet Mead
Sister Janet Mead is a Roman Catholic nun and is best known for recording a rock version of The Lord's Prayer. The surprise hit reached #3 on the Australian Singles Chart in 1974 and #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in that same year. The single earned her a Grammy Award nomination and Golden Gospel...
whose 'rock' arrangement of The Lord's Prayer was a major hit in Australia and the USA and earned a gold record award in the USA. Bands like Family in Brisbane, and Kindekrist
Kindekrist
Formed in 1970, Kindekrist was Australia's first Christian rock band. The band brought together musicians from different musical styles - folk, country-rock, classical, pop and rock - and theological traditions...
in Adelaide, started performing. Rod Boucher formed Good God Studios, which recorded a range of alternative Christian artists. Following on these foundations, later artists such as Newsboys had significant popular success.
Two important changes which had a dramatic affect the rock scene were the long-overdue introduction of colour television and FM radio in 1975. This period also saw the decline of the booming local dance and discothèque circuit that had flourished in the 1960s and early 1970s. These rock dances were a continuation of the social dance circuit that had thrived in Australia's cities and suburbs since the 19th century, and they were hugely popular from the late Fifties to the early Seventies, but they gradually faded in the early Seventies as the "Baby Boomer" generation grew into adulthood and changes to licencing laws saw pubs take on an increasingly important role as venues for live music.
From the 1950s to the early 1970s, the main venues for live music were discothèques (usually located in inner city areas), church, municipal and community halls, Police Boys' Clubs and beachside surf clubs. Bigger concerts and international tours were usually staged in the few large-size venues, such as the legendary Sydney Stadium
Sydney Stadium
The Sydney Stadium was a sporting and entertainment venue in Sydney, New South Wales, which formerly stood on the corner of New South Head Road and Neild Avenue, Rushcutters Bay...
(originally built as a boxing arena), the Sydney Trocadero
Sydney Trocadero
The Sydney Trocadero in Sydney, Australia, opened with a full-dress gala on 3 April 1936. It was the main venue of Big Band jazz orchestras, with the resident Trocadero Orchestra under the baton of Frank Coughlan, and the All Girl Trocadero Band....
, and Brisbane and Melbourne Festival Halls. Such venues regularly attracted large numbers of young people because they were supervised, all-ages events — Australia's restrictive liquor licensing laws of the period meant that these venues and dances were almost always alcohol-free.
According to rock historian Glenn A. Baker
Glenn A. Baker
Glenn A. Baker is an Australian journalist, commentator, and broadcaster well known in Australia for his vast knowledge of Rock music. He has written books and magazine articles on rock music and travel, interviewed celebrities, managed bands such as Ol' 55 and promoted tours of international stars...
, in 1965 there were up to 100 dances being held every weekend in and around Melbourne alone. The most popular groups frequently played almost every night of the week, commonly commuting around town, performing short sets at three or more different dances every night. It was a very lucrative circuit for musicians and even moderately popular acts could easily earn considerably more than the average weekly wage at that time.
The decline of the local dance circuit, combined with the fact that the baby boom
Baby boom
A baby boom is any period marked by a greatly increased birth rate. This demographic phenomenon is usually ascribed within certain geographical bounds and when the number of annual births exceeds 2 per 100 women...
teenagers of the Sixties were now ageing into adulthood, led to the rise of a thriving new city and suburban pub music circuit in the mid-70s, which in turn spawned a new generation of bands who cut their teeth in this often tough but formative training ground.
1974: Countdown
Main article: CountdownTeen-oriented pop music still enjoyed strong popularity during the 1970s, although much of it was sourced from overseas, and the proportion of Australian acts in the charts had hit an all-time low by 1973. That trend began to change around 1975, thanks largely to the advent of a new weekly TV pop show, Countdown, in late 1974. It gained a huge audience and soon exerted a strong influence on radio programmers, because it was broadcast nationwide on Australia's government-owned broadcaster, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...
(ABC). Countdown was one of the most popular music programs in Australian TV history, and it had a marked effect on radio because of its loyal national audience — and the amount of Australian content it featured.
The most important feature of Countdown was that it became a critical new interface between the record industry and radio. By the late 1970s, radio programmers ignored Countdown's hit picks at their peril. Host Ian "Molly" Meldrum also frequently used the show to castigate local radio for its lack of support for Australian music. Unlike commercial TV or radio, Countdown was not answerable to advertisers or sponsors, and (in theory) it was far less susceptible to influence from record companies. Like no other ABC program before or since, it openly and actively promoted the products of these private companies. Countdown was crucial to the success of acts like John Paul Young
John Paul Young
John Paul Young is an Australian pop singer who had a 1978 worldwide hit with "Love Is in the Air"...
, Sherbet, Skyhooks, Dragon
Dragon (band)
Dragon is a popular New Zealand rock band, they were formed in Auckland, New Zealand in January 1972 and relocated to Sydney, Australia in May 1975. They were previously led by singer Marc Hunter and are currently led by his brother bass player Todd Hunter...
and Split Enz
Split Enz
Split Enz were a New Zealand band of the 1970s and early 1980s featuring Phil Judd and brothers Tim Finn and Neil Finn. They achieved chart success in New Zealand, Australia, and Canada during the early 1980s ‒ most notably with the single "I Got You", and built a cult following elsewhere...
, and it dominated Australian popular music well into the 1980s stimulating domestic demand for Australian pop and rock, with quality varying in extremes of good and bad.
1975: the establishment of Double Jay
Double-Jay's wide-ranging programming policies were influenced by British '60s pirate radio
Pirate radio
Pirate radio is illegal or unregulated radio transmission. The term is most commonly used to describe illegal broadcasting for entertainment or political purposes, but is also sometimes used for illegal two-way radio operation...
, the early programming of BBC Radio One, and the American album-oriented rock (AOR) format. The new station opened up the airwaves to a vast amount of new local music, introduced listeners to important overseas innovations like reggae
Reggae
Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s. While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Jamaican music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady.Reggae is based...
, dub
Dub music
Dub is a genre of music which grew out of reggae music in the 1960s, and is commonly considered a subgenre, though it has developed to extend beyond the scope of reggae...
, progressive rock
Progressive rock
Progressive rock is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility." John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of...
, punk
Punk rock
Punk rock is a rock music genre that developed between 1974 and 1976 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Rooted in garage rock and other forms of what is now known as protopunk music, punk rock bands eschewed perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock...
and New Wave
New Wave music
New Wave is a subgenre of :rock music that emerged in the mid to late 1970s alongside punk rock. The term at first generally was synonymous with punk rock before being considered a genre in its own right that incorporated aspects of electronic and experimental music, mod subculture, disco and 1960s...
– music that had been largely ignored by commercial radio. Double Jay also featured an unprecedented level of Australian content, and presented regular live concert broadcasts, comedy, controversial documentaries and innovative radiophonic features.
Double-Jay quickly made a significant mark on the ratings in its target age group, Its major commercial competitor was Sydney's 2SM
2SM
2SM is an Australian radio station, licensed to and serving Sydney, New South Wales, broadcasting on 1269 kilohertz on the AM band. It is owned and operated by Broadcast Operations Group...
(then Australia's top rating and most profitable pop station). The radio broadcaster had some synergies with the more pop oriented Countdown television show, also owned by the ABC. Double Jay/Triple-J has influenced Australia's taste in rock music, and it has been a testing ground for many acts that were later played by commercial radio stations after becoming popular with the J's audience.
The late 1970s
The advent Double Jay and Countdown fundamentally changed the political economy of Australian popular music, and the pub circuit gave rise to a newer generation of tough, uncompromising, adult-oriented rock bands.One of the most popular Australian groups to emerge in this period was the classic Australian pub rock band Cold Chisel
Cold Chisel
Cold Chisel is a rock band that originated in Adelaide, Australia. It is one of the most acclaimed Australian rock bands of all time, with a string of hits throughout the 1970s and 1980s and huge sales that continue to this day, although its success and acclaim was almost completely restricted to...
, which formed in Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...
in 1973 and enjoyed tremendous success in Australia in the late 1970s and early 1980s, although they never managed to break into other countries.
Other popular acts from this transitional period include AC/DC
AC/DC
AC/DC are an Australian rock band, formed in 1973 by brothers Malcolm and Angus Young. Commonly classified as hard rock, they are considered pioneers of heavy metal, though they themselves have always classified their music as simply "rock and roll"...
, Skyhooks, Richard Clapton
Richard Clapton
Richard Clapton is an Australian singer-songwriter and guitarist from Sydney, New South Wales. His solo top 20 hits on the Kent Music Report Singles Chart are "Girls on the Avenue" and "I Am an Island"...
, Ol' 55
Ol' 55
Ol' 55 was an Australian band specialising in retro, 1950s-era Rock 'n' Roll. They formed as Fanis in 1972 in Sutherland, Sydney, New South Wales . Drummer Geoff Plummer was working with Glenn A. Baker at the NSW Department of Media and invited Baker to hear his part-time band, including Pat...
, Jon English
Jon English
Jonathan James "Jon" English is an Australian rock singer, musician, actor and writer. English emigrated to Australia with his parents in 1961...
, Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons
Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons
Jo Jo Zep and the Falcons were an Australian blues and rock music band which featured singer, songwriter and saxophonist, Joe Camilleri . The band was active in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and had several Australian chart hits, including "Hit and Run", "Shape I'm In" and "All I Wanna Do"...
, The Angels
The Angels (Australian band)
The Angels are a hard rock band that formed in Adelaide, Australia in 1970. The band later relocated from Adelaide to Sydney and enjoyed huge local success until well into the 1990s. For the purposes of international release, their records were released under the names Angel City and later The...
, The Sports
The Sports
The Sports were a popular Australian rock group that performed and recorded between 1976 and 1981.Based in Melbourne, Victoria, the group released a number of successful singles and albums. Their sound fitted well with both 1970s British pub rock bands and British New Wave...
, The Radiators
The Radiators (AU)
The Radiators are a rock band from Sydney, Australia, formed in 1978. Their best known songs include "Coming Home", "No Tragedy" and "Gimme Head"...
, Australian Crawl
Australian Crawl
Australian Crawl were an Australian rock band founded by James Reyne , Brad Robinson , Paul Williams , Simon Binks and David Reyne in 1978. David Reyne soon left and was replaced by Bill McDonough...
, Dragon
Dragon (band)
Dragon is a popular New Zealand rock band, they were formed in Auckland, New Zealand in January 1972 and relocated to Sydney, Australia in May 1975. They were previously led by singer Marc Hunter and are currently led by his brother bass player Todd Hunter...
, Rose Tattoo
Rose Tattoo
Rose Tattoo is an Australian rock and roll band, now led by Angry Anderson, that was formed in Sydney in 1976. Their sound is hard rock mixed with blues rock influences, with songs including "Bad Boy for Love", "Rock 'n' Roll Outlaw", "Nice Boys", "We Can't Be Beaten" and "Scarred for Life"...
, Ross Wilson's Mondo Rock
Mondo Rock
Mondo Rock is a rock band from Melbourne, Australia, most prominent in the early 1980s. The band was formed in late 1976 by singer-songwriter-guitarist Ross Wilson.-Early years: 1976–1979:...
, acclaimed soul singers Marcia Hines
Marcia Hines
Marcia Elaine Hines, AM is a vocalist, actress and TV personality who achieved success in her adopted homeland of Australia. Hines made her debut, at the age of sixteen, in the Australian version of the stage musical Hair and followed with the role of Mary Magdalene in Jesus Christ Superstar...
and Renée Geyer
Renée Geyer
Renée Rebecca Geyer is an Australian singer who has long been regarded as one of the finest exponents of jazz, soul and R&B idioms. She had commercial success as a solo artist in Australia, with "It's a Man's Man's World", "Heading in the Right Direction" and "Stares and Whispers" in the 1970s and...
and pioneering Australian punk/new wave acts The Saints
The Saints (band)
The Saints are an Australian rock band, which formed in Brisbane in 1974 as punk rockers. Founders were Chris Bailey , Ivor Hay , and Ed Kuepper . Alongside mainstay Bailey, the group has had numerous line-ups...
(Mk I) and Radio Birdman
Radio Birdman
Radio Birdman was one of the first punk bands in Australia along with The Saints. Deniz Tek and Rob Younger formed the group in Sydney, Australia in 1974...
. The band Sebastian Hardie
Sebastian Hardie
Sebastian Hardie were Australia's first symphonic rock band. They formed in Sydney in 1967 as Sebastian Hardie Blues Band but dropped the 'Blues Band' reference when they became pop-oriented. By 1973 they developed a more progressive rock style, and later performed as Windchase, but disbanded in 1977...
became known as the first Australian symphonic rock
Symphonic rock
Symphonic rock is a sub-genre of progressive rock. Since early in progressive rock's history, the term has been used sometimes to distinguish more classically influenced progressive rock from the more psychedelic and experimental forms of progressive rock....
band in the mid-70s, with the release of their debut Four Moments
Four Moments
Four Moments is the debut studio album by the Australian symphonic rock band Sebastian Hardie and was released in August 1975 by Polydor Records. It was their most commercially successful release and peaked at #13 on the Australian album charts. The single from the album was the instrumental...
.
Three "Australian" acts that appeared towards the end of the Second Wave — AC/DC, Little River Band and Split Enz — and lasted into the late 1970s and early 1980s achieved the long sought-after international success that finally took Australasian rock onto the world stage.
The progression of the Australian independent scene from the late seventies until the early nineties is chronicled in Stranded: The Secret History of Australian Independent Music 1977–1991
Stranded: The Secret History of Australian Independent Music 1977-1991
Stranded: The Secret History of Australian Independent Music 1977–1991 is a book about the Australian independent music scene from 1979 until 1991, as written by author and music journalist Clinton Walker...
(Pan Macmillan, 1996) by author and music journalist Clinton Walker
Clinton Walker
Clinton Walker is an Australian writer, best known for his works on popular music but with a broader interest in social and cultural history and theory....
.
Australia's main contribution to the development of punk rock
Punk rock
Punk rock is a rock music genre that developed between 1974 and 1976 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Rooted in garage rock and other forms of what is now known as protopunk music, punk rock bands eschewed perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock...
, (not including sixties garage rock bands), consists of The Saints
The Saints (band)
The Saints are an Australian rock band, which formed in Brisbane in 1974 as punk rockers. Founders were Chris Bailey , Ivor Hay , and Ed Kuepper . Alongside mainstay Bailey, the group has had numerous line-ups...
and Radio Birdman
Radio Birdman
Radio Birdman was one of the first punk bands in Australia along with The Saints. Deniz Tek and Rob Younger formed the group in Sydney, Australia in 1974...
.
AC/DC
AC/DC are perhaps the most well-known rock group from Australia. They have sold millions of albums (some 200 million), toured the world several times over, broken countless attendance records, and influenced hard rock music the world over.From their humble beginnings, Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
brothers Angus
Angus Young
Angus McKinnon Young is a Scottish-born Australian musician, and the lead guitarist, songwriter, and co-founder of the rock and roll band AC/DC. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame along with other members of AC/DC in 2003 and is known for his energetic performances,...
and Malcolm Young
Malcolm Young
Malcolm Young is a Scottish-born Australian guitarist, best known as a founding member, rhythm guitarist, backing vocalist and songwriter for the Australian hard rock band AC/DC. Young was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003, along with the other members of AC/DC...
forged a hard-hitting, ball-breaking pub guitar sound, similar to Alex Harvey
Alex Harvey (musician)
Alex Harvey was a Scottish rock musician. With The Sensational Alex Harvey Band, he built a reputation as an exciting live performer during the 1970s glam rock era.-Biography:...
but tougher. When Bon Scott
Bon Scott
Ronald Belford "Bon" Scott was a Scottish-born Australian rock musician, best known for being the lead singer and lyricist of Australian hard rock band AC/DC from 1974 until his death in 1980...
joined the band to lend his unique vocal talent, the band began their 'long way to the top', shooting to the top of the Australian rock scene in 1974 – 75 and their song "It's A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)
It's A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)
"It's a Long Way to the Top " is a song by Australian hard rock band AC/DC. It is the first track of the group's album T.N.T., released in December 1975, and was written by Angus Young, Malcolm Young and Bon Scott...
". This song is now widely regarded as the Australian rock anthem. The band found a degree of international success, especially with the release of their Highway to Hell
Highway to Hell (album)
Highway to Hell is the sixth studio album by Australian hard rock band AC/DC, released in July 1979. It is also AC/DC's fifth international studio album...
album. This was to be Bon Scott's last album. During the subsequent tour, Scott was discovered in the backseat of a friend's car, having died of alcohol poisoning (choking on vomit).
The band found a new singer in English-born Brian Johnson
Brian Johnson
Brian Johnson is an English singer and lyricist who has been the lead singer for the rock band AC/DC since 1980. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003 along with the other members of the band....
and released their next album, Back In Black, in the early '80s. The U.S. took notice of the band with some of their finest songs, such as the title track and You Shook Me All Night Long
You Shook Me All Night Long
"You Shook Me All Night Long" is one of AC/DC's signature songs from their most successful album, Back in Black. The song also reappeared on their later album Who Made Who. It is one of the band's top 40 singles, reaching number 35 on the Billboard Hot 100 pop singles chart in 1980...
, and the album became one of the best-selling albums by a band ever, selling over 22 million copies in the U.S. and 42 million copies around the world
AC/DC are credited as a seminal influence by scores of leading hard rock and heavy metal music acts, and they are now rated the fifth-biggest selling group in U.S. recording history, with total sales of over 100 million records.
Little River Band
Main article: Little River BandLittle River Band
Little River Band is an Australian rock band, formed in Melbourne in early 1975.The group chose the name after passing a road sign leading to the Victorian township of Little River, near Geelong, on the way to a performance. Little River Band enjoyed sustained commercial success in not only...
Another highly popular and lucrative band of this period is the soft-rock-harmony group Little River Band
Little River Band
Little River Band is an Australian rock band, formed in Melbourne in early 1975.The group chose the name after passing a road sign leading to the Victorian township of Little River, near Geelong, on the way to a performance. Little River Band enjoyed sustained commercial success in not only...
(LRB). Resurrected from the ashes of an earlier band called Mississippi
Mississippi (band)
Mississippi was an Australian band , which featured some big names in Australian rock music, Graeham Goble, Beeb Birtles and Kerryn Tolhurst...
, LRB centred on a trio of seasoned veterans. Lead singer Glenn Shorrock
Glenn Shorrock
Glenn Barrie Shorrock is an English-born Australian singer-songwriter. He was a founding member of pop groups The Twilights, Axiom and Little River Band as well as being a solo performer....
had fronted Australian 60s pop idols The Twilights and singer-guitarists Beeb Birtles
Beeb Birtles
Beeb Birtles , is a Dutch / Australian musician, one of the founding members of the Little River Band....
and Graeham Goble
Graeham Goble
Graeham George Goble is a musician, singer/songwriter and record producer, best known as a founding member of rock performers Little River Band ....
had been the core members of Mississippi; prior to that, Birtles had played bass in chart-topping Australian '60s pop group Zoot
Zoot (band)
Zoot are a pop/rock band formed in Adelaide, South Australia in 1965 as Down the Line. They changed their name to Zoot in 1967 and by 1968 had relocated to Melbourne...
whose former lead guitarist Rick Springfield
Rick Springfield
Rick Springfield is an Australian-born singer-songwriter, musician, and actor. He was a member of pop rock group Zoot from 1969 to 1971 and then started his solo career with his début single "Speak to the Sky" reaching the top 10 in Australia. In mid-1972, he relocated to the United States...
also became a solo star in the USA.
Under the guidance of manager Glenn Wheatley
Glenn Wheatley
Glenn Dawson Wheatley is an Australian artist manager and entertainment industry executive.Wheatley began his career as a musician in Brisbane in the mid-1960s and in the late 1960s became nationally famous as a member of leading pop-rock band The Masters Apprentices...
(former bassist in The Masters Apprentices
The Masters Apprentices
The Masters Apprentices were an Australian rock band fronted by mainstay Jim Keays on lead vocals, which formed in 1965 in Adelaide, South Australia, relocated to Melbourne in February 1967 and attempted to break into the United Kingdom market from 1970, before disbanding in 1972...
, one of the top Australian bands of the Sixties) LRB became the first Australian band to achieve major ongoing chart and sales success in the United States. They achieved huge success in the late 70s and early 80s and their single "Reminiscing" now ranks as one of the most frequently-played singles in American radio history.
Seventies and Eighties: Indie, punk, post-punk and early Australian electronica
Other developments starting from the mid 70s were the appearance of early electronicaElectronica
Electronica includes a wide range of contemporary electronic music designed for a wide range of uses, including foreground listening, some forms of dancing, and background music for other activities; however, unlike electronic dance music, it is not specifically made for dancing...
, as opposed to electronic music
Electronic music
Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound...
, as Percy Grainger
Percy Grainger
George Percy Aldridge Grainger , known as Percy Grainger, was an Australian-born composer, arranger and pianist. In the course of a long and innovative career he played a prominent role in the revival of interest in British folk music in the early years of the 20th century. He also made many...
had invented some obscure electronic instruments earlier, and Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris
Rolf Harris, CBE, AM is an Australian musician, singer-songwriter, composer, painter and television personality.Born in Perth, Western Australia, Harris was a champion swimmer before studying art. He moved to England in 1952, where he started to appear on television programmes on which he drew the...
was famously associated with the Stylophone. The most notable of early electronica were Cybotron, Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
's Severed Heads
Severed Heads
Severed Heads is an Australian electronic music group based and founded in Sydney in 1979 as Mr. and Mrs. No Smoking Sign. The original members were Richard Fielding and Andrew Wright, and were soon joined by Tom Ellard. Fielding and Wright eventually left the group, leaving Ellard as a singular...
and Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
's Laughing Hands and Essendon Airport
Essendon Airport (band)
Essendon Airport was an Australian post-punk group from 1978-83 who explored experimental minimalist, electronic and funk music. They reformed in the original duo lineup for occasional performances in 2003 following the re issue of Sonic Investigations of the Trivial...
who began to experiment with tape loops and synthesisers, but did not rise to prominence until the 1980s. Electronica had existed in the Australian classical music scene with David Ahern
David Ahern
David Anthony Ahern was an Australian composer and music critic, who became a prominent artist in the avant-garde genre after his best-known work, Ned Kelly Music was released and performed at the Sydney Proms music series.Born and raised in Sydney, Ahern decided to become a composer in his...
in the late 1960s. By the late 1990s Severed Heads were signed to the influential label Nettwerk
Nettwerk
The Nettwerk Music Group is the umbrella company for Nettwerk Management, Nettwerk Records, Nettwerk One Publishing, Nutone Records, and Artwerk. With over 150 employees, the Vancouver-based company has offices in New York, Los Angeles, London, Boston, Nashville, and Hamburg...
records. Single Gun Theory
Single Gun Theory
Single Gun Theory is an Australian band made up of Jacqui Hunt , Pete Rivett-Carnac and Kath Power , recording on the Canadian label Nettwerk. Their music combines elements of downtempo electronic dance music with introspective, ethereal vocals and samples of dialogue...
had been with Nettwerk since 1987. The pop band Mi-Sex
Mi-Sex
Mi-Sex was a New Zealand new wave rock band active from 1978 to 1984. Led by Steve Gilpin as vocalist, they were best known for their singles "Computer Games" in 1979 and "People" in 1980.-History:...
scored a major hit with the single "Computer Games" in 1980, which was one of the first Australian pop recordings to employ sequenced synthesiser backings. In 1980 producer Mark Moffatt pioneered dance technology
Dance technology
The terms dance technology and Dance and Technology refer to application of modern information technology in activities related to dance: in dance education, choreography, performance, and research.-Dance education:...
by becoming the first in the world to use a Roland 808 rhythm composer and MC 4 digital sequencer on record with his studio project the Monitors.
Following the punk movement several influential bands of this post-punk
Post-punk
Post-punk is a rock music movement with its roots in the late 1970s, following on the heels of the initial punk rock explosion of the mid-1970s. The genre retains its roots in the punk movement but is more introverted, complex and experimental...
era were The Birthday Party
The Birthday Party (band)
The Birthday Party were an Australian rock band, active from 1973 to 1983.Despite being championed by John Peel, The Birthday Party found little commercial success during their career...
, led by Nick Cave
Nick Cave
Nicholas Edward "Nick" Cave is an Australian musician, songwriter, author, screenwriter, and occasional film actor.He is best known for his work as a frontman of the critically acclaimed rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, established in 1984, a group known for its eclectic influences and...
, Foetus
Foetus (band)
Foetus is the primary musical outlet of industrial music pioneer J. G. Thirlwell. Until 1995 the band underwent various name changes, all including the word foetus. Monikers adopted at different times include Foetus Under Glass, You've Got Foetus On Your Breath and Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel...
, The Go-Betweens
The Go-Betweens
The Go-Betweens were an indie rock band formed in Brisbane, Australia in 1977 by singer-songwriters and guitarists, Robert Forster and Grant McLennan. They were later joined by Lindy Morrison on drums, Robert Vickers on bass guitar and Amanda Brown on violin, oboe, guitar, and backing vocals,...
, SPK
SPK (band)
SPK, formed in 1978 in Sydney, Australia, was a 1980s and early 1990s industrial music and noise music group. One member, Graeme Revell, would later go on to become a successful Hollywood movie composer.-History:...
, Dead Can Dance
Dead Can Dance
Dead Can Dance are an ethereal neoclassical duo formed in Melbourne, Australia, in August 1981, by Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry. The band relocated to London in May 1982 and disbanded in 1998. Their 1996 album Spiritchaser reached No. 1 on the Billboard Top World Music Albums Chart...
, These Immortal Souls
These Immortal Souls
These Immortal Souls was an Australian post-punk band based in Europe and active through the late 1980s and early 1990s.The band consisted of Rowland S. Howard , Genevieve McGuckin , Epic Soundtracks and Harry Howard...
, Crime and the City Solution
Crime and the City Solution
Crime and the City Solution was a rock music band formed by Australian singer and songwriter Simon Bonney.They had four distinct line-ups: Sydney in 1977–78, Melbourne in 1979, and two groupings in Berlin from 1985–1990. The only common member in all four line-ups was Bonney.Other members included:...
, No
No (band)
No were an Australian band, active during the late 1980s. They blended electronic music with nihilistic punk rock, in a similar fashion to New York's Suicide. The band included Ollie Olsen, Marie Hoy, Michael Sheridan, and others...
, Louis Tillett
Louis Tillett
Louis Tillett is an Australian singer-songwriter, keyboard player and saxophonist. He was the frontman in Australian bands The Wet Taxis, Paris Green and The Aspersion Caste...
, Laughing Clowns, Kim Salmon and the Surrealists
Kim Salmon and the Surrealists
Kim Salmon and the Surrealists were an Australian indie rock band formed by Kim Salmon in 1987 when he was living in Perth between the final two tours by The Scientists...
, Beasts of Bourbon
Beasts of Bourbon
Beasts of Bourbon was an Australian alternative rock band formed in 1983, with a line-up that has changed as the band splintered and reformed several times - Beginnings :...
.
1980s
While many Australasian bands from the 1980s remained cult acts outside of Australia, some, including Little River BandLittle River Band
Little River Band is an Australian rock band, formed in Melbourne in early 1975.The group chose the name after passing a road sign leading to the Victorian township of Little River, near Geelong, on the way to a performance. Little River Band enjoyed sustained commercial success in not only...
, Men at Work
Men at Work
Men at Work are an Australian rock band who achieved international success in the 1980s. They are the only Australian artists to have a simultaneous #1 album and #1 single in the United States . They achieved the same distinction of a simultaneous #1 album and #1 single in the United Kingdom...
, AC/DC
AC/DC
AC/DC are an Australian rock band, formed in 1973 by brothers Malcolm and Angus Young. Commonly classified as hard rock, they are considered pioneers of heavy metal, though they themselves have always classified their music as simply "rock and roll"...
, INXS
INXS
INXS are an Australian rock band, formed as The Farriss Brothers in 1977 in Sydney, New South Wales. Mainstays are Garry Gary Beers on bass guitar, Andrew Farriss on guitar/keyboards, Jon Farriss on drums, Tim Farriss on lead guitar and Kirk Pengilly on guitar/sax...
, Midnight Oil
Midnight Oil
Midnight Oil , were an Australian rock band from Sydney originally performing as Farm from 1972 with drummer Rob Hirst, bass guitarist Andrew James and keyboard player/lead guitarist Jim Moginie...
, and later Crowded House
Crowded House
Crowded House are a rock band, formed in Melbourne, Australia and led by New Zealand singer-songwriter Neil Finn. Finn is the primary songwriter and creative director of the band, having led it through several incarnations, drawing members from New Zealand , Australia and the United States...
, found wide success throughout the decade. Groups with international hit singles included Real Life
Real Life (band)
Real Life are a Melbourne-based Australian New Wave/Synthpop band that had hits with their debut single, "Send Me an Angel" and with "Catch Me I'm Falling" , both of which were featured on the band's debut album Heartland .-Biography:...
with "Catch Me I'm Falling", "Send Me an Angel", Divinyls
Divinyls
Divinyls were an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1980 and featuring vocalist Christina Amphlett and guitarist Mark McEntee. As the focal point, Amphlett performed on stage wearing a school uniform and fishnet stockings, often using an illuminated neon tube as a prop and displaying...
with "Pleasure and Pain", Big Pig
Big Pig
Big Pig were a seven-piece Australian pop/rock band that existed from 1985 to 1991.-Biography:In 1983 Australian drummer Oleh Witer, frustrated over playing in a string of unsuccessful groups, travelled from Australia to London....
with "Breakaway" and Rick Springfield with "Jessie's Girl
Jessie's Girl
"Jessie's Girl" is a rock song written and performed by pop singer Rick Springfield. It was released on the album Working Class Dog. The song is about unrequited love, and centers on a young man in love with his best friend's girlfriend....
". Moving Pictures
Moving Pictures (band)
Moving Pictures was a rock music band formed in Sydney, Australia in 1980. They are best known for their hit single, "What About Me" and multi-platinum album Days of Innocence, both of which topped the charts in Australia.-Biography:...
had a hit album with Days of Innocence
Days of Innocence
Days of Innocence is the debut album released by Australian band Moving Pictures in 1981. It spent 7 weeks at the top of the Australian Album charts in 1982...
. Jimmy Barnes
Jimmy Barnes
James Dixon Swan , better known as Jimmy Barnes, is a Scottish-born Australian rock singer-songwriter. His father Jim Swan was a prizefighter and his older brother John Swan is also a rock singer. It was actually John who had encouraged and taught Jim how to sing as he wasn't really interested at...
and Michael Hutchence
Michael Hutchence
Michael Kelland John Hutchence was an Australian musician and actor. He was the founding lead singer-songwriter of rock band :INXS from 1977 to his death in 1997, a period of twenty years. Hutchence was a member of short-lived pop rock group Max Q and recorded solo material which was released...
performed "Good Times" a song by the Australian songwriting duo Vanda & Young
Vanda & Young
Vanda & Young are Harry Vanda , and George Young...
and it was included on The Lost Boys soundtrack
The Lost Boys (soundtrack)
The Lost Boys is the soundtrack from the 1987 film The Lost Boys released by Atlantic Records.-Track listing:#"Good Times" by INXS and Jimmy Barnes – 3:49#"Lost in the Shadows " by Lou Gramm – 6:17...
. Expatriate Mike Chapman continued his career as a prominent record producer and co-wrote "Mickey
Mickey (song)
"Mickey" is a 1982 U.S. new wave song recorded by singer and choreographer Toni Basil. Written by Mike Chapman and Nicky Chinn as "Kitty", it was first recorded by UK popular music group Racey during 1979...
" which became a major hit when Toni Basil
Toni Basil
Antonia Christina Basilotta , better known by her stage name Toni Basil, is an American singer-songwriter, actress, filmmaker, film director, choreographer, and dancer, best known for her multi-million-selling worldwide #1 hit "Mickey" from 1982.-Early life:Basil was born Antonia Christina...
performed it.
Baby Boomer acts
The 1980s was a boom period for veteran Baby BoomerBaby boomer
A baby boomer is a person who was born during the demographic Post-World War II baby boom and who grew up during the period between 1946 and 1964. The term "baby boomer" is sometimes used in a cultural context. Therefore, it is impossible to achieve broad consensus of a precise definition, even...
acts, this includes occasionally critically praised, popular acts such as The Party Boys
The Party Boys
The Party Boys was an Australian rock band with floating membership that existed from 1982 until 1992. Initially established by Mondo Rock bass player Paul Christie as a part-time venture for professional musicians with downtime from other projects, the group has boasted members from acts such as...
, James Reyne
James Reyne
James Reyne is an Australian rock musician and singer/songwriter both as a member of the iconic 1980s band Australian Crawl and solo work.. He is a successful singer/ songwriter and prolific artist...
, Models
Models (band)
Models were an alternative rock group formed in Melbourne, Australia, in August 1978 and went into hiatus in 1988. They are often incorrectly referred to as The Models. They re-formed in 2000, 2006 and 2008 to perform reunion concerts. "Out of Mind, Out of Sight", their only No. 1 hit,...
, Sunnyboys, Hunters & Collectors
Hunters & Collectors
Hunters & Collectors were an Australian rock music band formed in Melbourne in 1981, fronted by singer-songwriter and guitarist Mark Seymour, they developed a blend of pub rock and art-funk...
, Machinations
Machinations (band)
Machinations was a popular Sydney-based outfit working the mid-1980s independent Australian music scene. Notable national hits included "Pressure Sway", "My Heart's On Fire" and "No Say In It". They also achieved indie prominence with the two versions of their first single, "Average Inadequacy"...
, Johnny Diesel
Johnny Diesel
Johnny Diesel is an Australian musician, who has released material as leader of Johnny Diesel & the Injectors, under his birth name, or by the epithet Diesel...
, Matt Finish
Matt Finish
Matt Finish are an Australian rock band formed by singer-songwriter/guitarist Matt Moffitt and drummer/composer/producer John Prior in mid 1979....
, Ward 13, Hands Off, Hoodoo Gurus
Hoodoo Gurus
Hoodoo Gurus are an Australian rock band, formed in Sydney in 1981, by the mainstay Dave Faulkner and later joined by Richard Grossman , Mark Kingsmill , and Brad Shepherd...
, Chantoozies
Chantoozies
Chantoozies were an Australian pop group active from 1986 to 1991. The band featured four female singers: Eve von Bibra, Angie La Bozzetta, Ally Fowler and Tottie Goldsmith; and four male musicians: Brett Goldsmith , Scott Griffiths , Frank McKoy and David Reyne...
, The Dugites
The Dugites
The Dugites were a Perth band who formed in the late '70s. The name refers to the brown venomous snake, the dugite, common in the area.-History:...
, The Numbers, The Swingers
The Swingers
The Swingers were a New Zealand rock band. Formed out of the remnants of The Suburban Reptiles, the founding members were Phil Judd , Wayne Stevens , and Mark Hough . Formed in 1979, the band released the single "One Good Reason" which was a top 20 hit in New Zealand...
, Spy Vs Spy
Spy Vs Spy
Spy vs Spy, also known as v. Spy v. Spy, The Drug Grannies and The Spies, are an Australian ska/pub rock band from Sydney formed in 1981. They became known for tackling political issues through their music, including racism, homelessness and contemporary drug culture. They were named after a comic...
, Eurogliders
Eurogliders
Eurogliders were an Indie pop band formed in 1981 in Perth, Western Australia, which included mainstays Grace Knight on vocals and Bernie Lynch on guitar and vocals. The band was originally formed by Bernie Lynch and Amanda Vincent under the name Living Single. After almost a year, Grace Knight...
, Mental As Anything
Mental As Anything
Mental As Anything are an Australian New Wave–rock music band formed at an art school in Sydney in 1976. Their most popular line-up was Martin Plaza on vocals and guitar; Reg Mombassa on lead guitar and vocals; his brother Peter "Yoga Dog" O'Doherty on bass guitar and vocals; Wayne "Bird"...
, Boom Crash Opera
Boom Crash Opera
Boom Crash Opera are a pop-rock band formed in Melbourne, Australia in 1985. Initially based around the songwriting partnership of Richard Pleasance and Peter Farnan Boom Crash Opera also includes Dale Ryder , Peter 'Maz' Maslen , Greg O'Connor and Ian Tilley Boom Crash Opera are a pop-rock band...
, I'm Talking
I'm Talking
I'm Talking was a 1980s Australian funk-pop rock band, which featured vocalists Kate Ceberano and Zan Abeyratne. They formed in 1983 in Melbourne and provided top ten hit singles "Trust Me", "Do You Wanna Be?" and "Holy Word" and a top fifteen album, Bear Witness, before disbanding in...
, Private Lives (later known as The Private), Do Ré Mi
Do-Re-Mi (band)
Do-Re-Mi aka Do-Ré-Mi were an Australian Rock/Pop band formed in Sydney in 1981 when Deborah Conway and Dorland Bray joined Helen Carter and later recruited Stephen Philip...
, Rockmelons
Rockmelons
Rockmelons, often referred to as the Rockies, are an Australian Pop/Dance/R&B group formed in 1983 in Sydney. They are based around Bryon Jones, his brother Jonathon Jones and Raymond Medhurst. They had two Top Five hit singles in the early 1990s with "Ain't No Sunshine" and "That Word ", both sung...
, Stephen Cummings, The Reels
The Reels
The Reels is an Australian rock/indie pop group which formed in Dubbo, New South Wales in 1976 and initially disbanded in 1991, they eventually reformed in 2007. Their 1981 song, "Quasimodo's Dream", was voted one of the Top 10 Australian songs of all time by a 100-member panel from Australasian...
, The Stems
The Stems
The Stems were an alternative rock band formed in Perth, Western Australia in 1983 and were heavily influenced by 1960s garage rock and 1970s power pop. They broke up in 1987, reformed in 2003 and released a new album in 2007.-Formation:...
, Paul Kelly
Paul Kelly (musician)
Paul Maurice Kelly is an Australian rock music singer-songwriter, guitarist, and harmonica player. He has performed solo, and has led numerous groups, including the Dots, the Coloured Girls, and the Messengers. He has worked with other artists and groups, including associated projects Professor...
, Nick Barker
Nick Barker
Nicholas "Nick" Paul Barker is an Australian singer-songwriter and guitarist who formed a Melbourne-based rock, power pop band Nick Barker & the Reptiles in March 1988. Their cover version of Cockney Rebel's "Make Me Smile " reached the top 30 on the Australian Recording Industry Association ...
, Paul Norton, Jenny Morris, The Triffids
The Triffids
The Triffids were a seminal Australian alternative rock and pop band formed in Perth, Western Australia, in May 1978 with charismatic, David McComb as singer-songwriter, guitarist, bass guitarist and keyboardist. They achieved negligible success in Australia, but greater success in the U.K...
, The Choirboys
The Choirboys (band)
The Choirboys are an Australian hard rock band from Sydney formed in 1979 with mainstays Mark Gable on lead vocals and Ian Hulme on bass guitar and were later joined by drummer Paul Wheeler. Their hit "Run to Paradise" reached No. 3 on the Kent Music Report Singles Chart in late 1987. The...
, Icehouse
Icehouse (band)
Icehouse is an Australian rock band, formed as Flowers in 1977 in Sydney. Initially known in Australia for their pub rock style, they later achieved mainstream success playing new wave and synthpop style music and attained Top Ten singles chart success in both Europe and the U.S...
, Redgum
Redgum
Redgum were an Australian folk and political music group formed in Adelaide in 1975 by singer-songwriter John Schumann, Michael Atkinson on guitars/vocals and Verity Truman on flute/vocals; they were soon joined by Chris Timms on violin. All four had been students at Flinders University and...
, Goanna
Goanna
Goanna is the name used to refer to any number of Australian monitor lizards of the genus Varanus, as well as to certain species from Southeast Asia.There are around 30 species of goanna, 25 of which are found in Australia...
, 1927
1927 (band)
1927 are an Australian pop/rock band formed in Melbourne in 1987 with James Barton on drums, Bill Frost on bass guitar, his brother Garry Frost on guitar and keyboards, and Erik Weideman on vocals, guitar and keyboards...
, Max Q, Noiseworks
Noiseworks
Noiseworks is an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1986 with bass guitarist Steve Balbi, guitarist Stuart Fraser, drummer Kevin Nicol, keyboardist Justin Stanley and lead vocalist Jon Stevens...
, GANGgajang
GANGgajang
Gang Gajang are an Australian rock band who formed in 1984. The three principal figures in the original lineup were former Riptides frontman Mark "Cal" Callaghan and two former members of popular Australian hard rock band The Angels, bassist Chris Bailey and drummer Graham "Buzz"...
, The Black Sorrows
The Black Sorrows
The Black Sorrows are an Australian band founded by Joe Camilleri, the group's only constant member. Founded in 1983, The Black Sorrows are still active today, and are best remembered for their top 40 Australian hits of the late 1980s and early 1990s, including "Hold On To Me", "Chained To The...
and The Zorros
The Zorros
-Biography:The Zorros played their first gig at the Champion Hotel, Fitzroy in January 1980.Nic Chancellor was previously a roadie for 1970s punk band, The News and a doorman at 'Bernhardt's Nite Club'...
.
The mainstream taste was to tap into the "classic" Fifties rock look, with a contemporary touch, while alternative rockers were often identifiable for sixties and seventies retro. At this time Goth fashion was very unusual and heavily applied black mascara was the sign of a deeply troubled person.
Many of these acts often topped the Australian charts but never gained international success. Mainstream Australian rock of the eighties was generally uncontroversial with the exception of Kylie Minogue for her limited vocal range, Chrissy Amphlett and Ecco Homo, who were deemed by some to be too sexually provocative and Yothu Yindi's "Treaty", which was commonly objected to by some because Paul Kelly co-wrote it. Nick Cave was not famous in Australia until Triple J Radio became a nationwide, prominent broadcaster. Audiences who went to The Angels' gig were famous for their good humoured response "No way, get fucked, fuck off!" to the lead singer's lyric "Am I ever going to see your face again?".
Mainstream acts
Mainstream acts such as singer John FarnhamJohn Farnham
John Peter Farnham, AO, formerly billed as Johnny Farnham , is an English-born Australian pop singer. He was a teen pop idol from 1964 to 1979, and has since forged a career as an adult contemporary singer. His career has mostly been as a solo artist although he briefly replaced Glenn Shorrock as...
, Darryl Braithwaite and Jimmy Barnes
Jimmy Barnes
James Dixon Swan , better known as Jimmy Barnes, is a Scottish-born Australian rock singer-songwriter. His father Jim Swan was a prizefighter and his older brother John Swan is also a rock singer. It was actually John who had encouraged and taught Jim how to sing as he wasn't really interested at...
were very successful for many years within Australia, but remain largely unknown outside the country.
Farnham's commercial comeback was one the biggest success stories in Australian music in that decade, the former "King of Pop" spent years out of favour with the public and the industry, often reduced to working in suburban clubs, but he returned in 1986 with the album Whispering Jack, which became the biggest-selling album of that year and remains one of the biggest selling Australian records. His manager was Glenn Wheatley
Glenn Wheatley
Glenn Dawson Wheatley is an Australian artist manager and entertainment industry executive.Wheatley began his career as a musician in Brisbane in the mid-1960s and in the late 1960s became nationally famous as a member of leading pop-rock band The Masters Apprentices...
, former manager of Little River Band.
Renowned artists such as singer-songwriter Paul Kelly
Paul Kelly (musician)
Paul Maurice Kelly is an Australian rock music singer-songwriter, guitarist, and harmonica player. He has performed solo, and has led numerous groups, including the Dots, the Coloured Girls, and the Messengers. He has worked with other artists and groups, including associated projects Professor...
and his band The Coloured Girls (renamed The Messengers for America), ambient
Ambient music
Ambient music is a musical genre that focuses largely on the timbral characteristics of sounds, often organized or performed to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual" or "unobtrusive" quality.- History :...
-rock
Rock and roll
Rock and roll is a genre of popular music that originated and evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily from a combination of African American blues, country, jazz, and gospel music...
-crossover act Not Drowning, Waving
Not Drowning, Waving
Not Drowning, Waving were a musical group formed in Melbourne, Australia in 1983 by David Bridie and John Phillips...
and Aboriginal-band Yothu Yindi
Yothu Yindi
Yothu Yindi are an Australian band with Aboriginal and balanda members formed in 1986. Aboriginal members come from Yolngu homelands near Yirrkala on the Gove Peninsula in Northern Territory's Arnhem Land...
drew inspiration from distinctly Australian concerns, particularly from the land, and they were critically well received within Australia, and also found international listeners.
One noteworthy group in this decade was the pioneering Aboriginal group Warumpi Band
Warumpi Band
The Warumpi Band is an Australian band from the bush, coming from Papunya, Northern Territory, Australia.The band was formed in 1980 by Neil Murray, a Victorian "whitefella" working in the region as a schoolteacher and labourer, George Burarrwanga, from Elcho Island, and local boys Gordon and...
from the Northern Territory
Northern Territory
The Northern Territory is a federal territory of Australia, occupying much of the centre of the mainland continent, as well as the central northern regions...
, whose landmark single "Jailanguru Pakarnu (Out from Jail)" was the first rock single ever recorded in an Aboriginal language. Triple J was the cutting edge radio station of the time and was instrumental in bringing this band to public attention, as were Midnight Oil
Midnight Oil
Midnight Oil , were an Australian rock band from Sydney originally performing as Farm from 1972 with drummer Rob Hirst, bass guitarist Andrew James and keyboard player/lead guitarist Jim Moginie...
, who took the group on national tours with them. Their classic 1987 single "My Island Home" was successfully covered by Christine Anu
Christine Anu
-Early life:Anu was born in Cairns, Queensland to a Torres Strait Islander mother from Saibai and Mabuiag Islands.-Career:Anu began performing as a dancer and later went on to sing back-up vocals for The Rainmakers, which included Neil Murray of the Warumpi Band. Her first recording was in 1993...
in the 1990s. Another memorable song of the Aboriginal rock scene is "Black Boy" by Coloured Stone
Coloured Stone
Coloured Stone is a band from the Koonibba Mission, west of Ceduna, South Australia. Their sound has been described as having a unique feel and Aboriginal qualities...
.
Darkwave
Critically acclaimed acts like The ChurchThe Church (band)
The Church is an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1980. Initially associated with new wave and the neo-psychedelic sound of the mid 1980s, their music later became more reminiscent of progressive rock, featuring long instrumental jams and complex guitar interplay...
, Cosmic Psychos
Cosmic Psychos
The Cosmic Psychos are a punk rock band based in Melbourne and rural Victoria in Australia. An underground band that has only ever achieved limited recognition.-Description:...
, the darkwave
Darkwave
Dark Wave or darkwave is a music genre that began in the late 1970s, coinciding with the popularity of New Wave and post-punk. Building on those basic principles, dark wave added dark, introspective lyrics and an undertone of sorrow for some bands...
-world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...
group Dead Can Dance
Dead Can Dance
Dead Can Dance are an ethereal neoclassical duo formed in Melbourne, Australia, in August 1981, by Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry. The band relocated to London in May 1982 and disbanded in 1998. Their 1996 album Spiritchaser reached No. 1 on the Billboard Top World Music Albums Chart...
, Hunters & Collectors
Hunters & Collectors
Hunters & Collectors were an Australian rock music band formed in Melbourne in 1981, fronted by singer-songwriter and guitarist Mark Seymour, they developed a blend of pub rock and art-funk...
, Hoodoo Gurus
Hoodoo Gurus
Hoodoo Gurus are an Australian rock band, formed in Sydney in 1981, by the mainstay Dave Faulkner and later joined by Richard Grossman , Mark Kingsmill , and Brad Shepherd...
, Scribble, The Moodists
The Moodists
The Moodists were an Australian post-punk band that formed in 1980, when Dave Graney, Clare Moore and Steve Miller of punk group The Sputniks moved from Adelaide to Melbourne. They added bass player Chris Walsh and later added guitarist Mick Turner....
, The Deadly Hume, The Wreckery, the second incarnation of The Saints
The Saints (band)
The Saints are an Australian rock band, which formed in Brisbane in 1974 as punk rockers. Founders were Chris Bailey , Ivor Hay , and Ed Kuepper . Alongside mainstay Bailey, the group has had numerous line-ups...
, Laughing Clowns, The Go-Betweens
The Go-Betweens
The Go-Betweens were an indie rock band formed in Brisbane, Australia in 1977 by singer-songwriters and guitarists, Robert Forster and Grant McLennan. They were later joined by Lindy Morrison on drums, Robert Vickers on bass guitar and Amanda Brown on violin, oboe, guitar, and backing vocals,...
and a new band formed by Nick Cave and Mick Harvey
Mick Harvey
Michael John Harvey , is an Australian rock musician, composer, arranger and record producer. He is best known for his long-time collaboration with the singer and songwriter Nick Cave...
, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian alternative rock band, formed in Melbourne in 1983. The band is fronted by Nick Cave and has featured international personnel throughout their career.-Formation and early releases :...
, developed consistent followings in Europe and other regions. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian alternative rock band, formed in Melbourne in 1983. The band is fronted by Nick Cave and has featured international personnel throughout their career.-Formation and early releases :...
and the side project Honeymoon in Red
Honeymoon In Red
Honeymoon In Red is a concept album released in 1987 as a Lydia Lunch album. Honeymoon In Red is sometimes referred to as a band or alternately as a collaboration between Lydia Lunch and The Birthday Party.-Music:...
were heavy on the pop cultural references to cult favourites like Johnny Cash
Johnny Cash
John R. "Johnny" Cash was an American singer-songwriter, actor, and author, who has been called one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century...
and Saul Bass
Saul Bass
Saul Bass was a Jewish-American graphic designer and filmmaker, best known for his design of motion picture title sequences....
and lurid pulp fiction. Their pop art influenced style anticipated the Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Tarantino
Quentin Jerome Tarantino is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, cinematographer and actor. In the early 1990s, he began his career as an independent filmmaker with films employing nonlinear storylines and the aestheticization of violence...
craze of the following decade. From the late seventies to the late eighties there was also a lively Australian post-punk scene which was made up of bands that showed obvious influences of bands such as Tangerine Dream
Tangerine Dream
Tangerine Dream is a German electronic music group founded in 1967 by Edgar Froese. The band has undergone many personnel changes over the years, with Froese being the only continuous member...
, Wire
Wire
A wire is a single, usually cylindrical, flexible strand or rod of metal. Wires are used to bear mechanical loads and to carry electricity and telecommunications signals. Wire is commonly formed by drawing the metal through a hole in a die or draw plate. Standard sizes are determined by various...
, The Cure
The Cure
The Cure are an English rock band formed in Crawley, West Sussex in 1976. The band has experienced several line-up changes, with frontman, vocalist, guitarist and principal songwriter Robert Smith being the only constant member...
, Siouxsie and the Banshees and Suicide
Suicide (band)
Suicide is an American electronic protopunk musical duo, intermittently active since 1970 and composed of vocalist Alan Vega and Martin Rev on synthesizers and drum machines. They are an early synthesizer/vocal musical duo....
. New Zealand's Fetus Productions briefly lived and worked in Australia. Of the early Australian electronica scene just a few truly memorable recordings emerged, for example "Lamborghini" by Severed Heads, "Pony Club" by The Limp "The Pilot Reads Crosswords" by Scattered Order
Scattered Order
-History:Scattered Order was a post punk band based in Sydney, Australia. They were formed in 1979, and initially comprised Mitch Jones , Michael Tee, and Simon Vidale. The lineup would change often throughout the eighties and nineties...
and the electronica of Hugo Klang. Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast
Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast
The Makers Of The Dead Travel Fast were an Australian band active throughout the early 1980s.The band consisted of;*Peter Richardson *Greg Addison *Steve Couri*Tim Schultz *Shane Fahey...
and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian alternative rock band, formed in Melbourne in 1983. The band is fronted by Nick Cave and has featured international personnel throughout their career.-Formation and early releases :...
were precursors of postrock. SPK
SPK (band)
SPK, formed in 1978 in Sydney, Australia, was a 1980s and early 1990s industrial music and noise music group. One member, Graeme Revell, would later go on to become a successful Hollywood movie composer.-History:...
was a sinister industrial band in the early 80s and they surprised many of their fans by reinventing themselves as a fashion friendly synthpop group in the mid 80s. SPK's sound was unlike the chilly asexual minimalism of many little known experimental bands of the time. Australian Crawl
Australian Crawl
Australian Crawl were an Australian rock band founded by James Reyne , Brad Robinson , Paul Williams , Simon Binks and David Reyne in 1978. David Reyne soon left and was replaced by Bill McDonough...
, a chart topping rock group, dabbled in minimalist composition with "Reckless", using a very simple bassline and voice, without alienating their established audience.
Use of Violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
was unusual in Australian rock bands and two bands who did were Box the Jesuit and Crime and the City Solution
Crime and the City Solution
Crime and the City Solution was a rock music band formed by Australian singer and songwriter Simon Bonney.They had four distinct line-ups: Sydney in 1977–78, Melbourne in 1979, and two groupings in Berlin from 1985–1990. The only common member in all four line-ups was Bonney.Other members included:...
.
Garage rock
Detroit rock influenced bands such as the Celibate Rifles, The ScientistsThe Scientists
The Scientists are an influential post-punk band from Perth, Australia, led by Kim Salmon, initially known as Exterminators and then Invaders. The band had two primary incarnations: the Perth-based punk band of the late 1970s and the Sydney/London-based swamp rock band of the 1980s...
, Lime Spiders
Lime Spiders
Lime Spiders are an Australian punk rock band, currently consisting of Mick Blood, Tom Corben, Gerard Corben, David Sparks and Tony Bambach.-Early Days :...
and The Hitmen
The Hitmen
Hitmen are an Australian Hard rock band. The group went through a large number of lineup changes in its short late 1970s and early 1980s run, then regrouped under a new name, Hitmen DTK, between 1989 and 1992. They reformed in 2007 and continue to play....
would serve as a link between the garage rock
Garage rock
Garage rock is a raw form of rock and roll that was first popular in the United States and Canada from about 1963 to 1967. During the 1960s, it was not recognized as a separate music genre and had no specific name...
revival of the 1980s and the grunge
Grunge
Grunge is a subgenre of alternative rock that emerged during the mid-1980s in the American state of Washington, particularly in the Seattle area. Inspired by hardcore punk, heavy metal, and indie rock, grunge is generally characterized by heavily distorted electric guitars, contrasting song...
scene to follow. From the bassy "I Don't Wanna Go Out" by X
X (Australian band)
X is an Australian punk rock band, formed in Sydney in 1977 and led by the late Ian Rilen. The band has split and reformed several times.Although X has had several members, its sound has been defined by two distinctive elements: Rilen's basslines and Steve Lucas's guitar...
in 1979 and throughout the eighties the Australian indie rock scene produced catchy melodic songs with heavy guitar and bass backing. Examples are Johnny Teen and The Broken Hearts "I Like It Both Ways", "I Lied" by The Pony, Too Much Acid by Pineapples from the Dawn of Time, Chewin by Space Juniors, These Immortal Souls
These Immortal Souls
These Immortal Souls was an Australian post-punk band based in Europe and active through the late 1980s and early 1990s.The band consisted of Rowland S. Howard , Genevieve McGuckin , Epic Soundtracks and Harry Howard...
' "Blood and Sand, She Said" and The Scientists
The Scientists
The Scientists are an influential post-punk band from Perth, Australia, led by Kim Salmon, initially known as Exterminators and then Invaders. The band had two primary incarnations: the Perth-based punk band of the late 1970s and the Sydney/London-based swamp rock band of the 1980s...
' "Swampland". Some bands had a foot in both the mainstream and alternative scenes, for example, The Johnnys, Hunters & Collectors, Hoodoo Gurus, TISM
TISM
TISM was a seven piece anonymous alternative rock band from Melbourne, Australia. The group was formed in 1982 and enjoyed a large underground/independent following. Their third album Machiavelli and the Four Seasons reached the Australian national top 10 in 1995...
, Painters and Dockers. In 1989 the group No
No (band)
No were an Australian band, active during the late 1980s. They blended electronic music with nihilistic punk rock, in a similar fashion to New York's Suicide. The band included Ollie Olsen, Marie Hoy, Michael Sheridan, and others...
released "Once We Were Scum, Now We Are God", an Ep that was in parts as hard rock as The Cult
The Cult
The Cult are a British rock band that was formed in 1983. They gained a dedicated following in Britain in the mid 1980s as a post-punk band with singles such as "She Sells Sanctuary", before breaking mainstream in the United States in the late 1980s as a hard rock band with singles such as "Love...
, despite No being generally perceived as an "underground" band.
Noise rock
Noise rock
Noise rock describes a style of post-punk rock music that became prominent in the 1980s. Noise rock makes use of the traditional instrumentation and iconography of rock, but incorporates atonality and especially dissonance, and also frequently discards usual songwriting conventions.-Style:Noise...
acts included Lubricated Goat
Lubricated Goat
Lubricated Goat was an Australian noise rock band of the 1980s.They achieved brief notoriety for playing on a television program naked, wearing only their instruments and shoes...
and People With Chairs Up Their Noses. Some of the louche pub rock names of the time were People With Chairs Up Their Noses, Free Beer, Shower Scene From Psycho, Thug, No More Bandicoots and Nyuk Nyuk Nyuck.
The Mark of Cain, one of the better and more faithful hard rock bands of the decade, formed in Adelaide between 1984-85.
The decade also saw perhaps the most concerted examination of the routine and everyday aspects of suburban and inner-city life since perhaps The Executives 1960's classic "Summer Hill Road." This approach was explored not only by Paul Kelly
Paul Kelly (musician)
Paul Maurice Kelly is an Australian rock music singer-songwriter, guitarist, and harmonica player. He has performed solo, and has led numerous groups, including the Dots, the Coloured Girls, and the Messengers. He has worked with other artists and groups, including associated projects Professor...
and the Coloured Girls (in songs like "From St. Kilda To Kings Cross" and "Leaps and Bounds") but also by The Little Heroes
Little Heroes
Little Heroes were a popular Australian rock band in the 1980s. They are best known for their hit single "One Perfect Day", which was released in 1982.-Biography:Little Heroes were formed from the remnants of The Secret Police...
(e.g. "Melbourne is Not New York"), John Kennedy's Love Gone Wrong
John Kennedy's Love Gone Wrong
John Kennedy is an Australian musician, a singer-songwriter with a penchant for strong melodies and "heart on your sleeve" pop songs often with country and western influences.-Early life:...
e.g. "King Street" and The Mexican Spitfires
The Mexican Spitfires
The Mexican Spitfires were a Sydney, Australia-based indie rock–indie pop band formed in suburban Strathfield in the Strathfield Municipality in the mid 1980s...
e.g. "Sydney Town" and "Town Hall Steps."
Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
's Leslie Cheung
Leslie Cheung
Leslie Cheung Kwok-Wing , nicknamed elder brother , was a film actor and musician from Hong Kong. Cheung was considered as "one of the founding fathers of Cantopop", and "combining a hugely successful film and music career".In 2000, Cheung was named Asian Biggest Superstar by China Central...
covered Big Pig
Big Pig
Big Pig were a seven-piece Australian pop/rock band that existed from 1985 to 1991.-Biography:In 1983 Australian drummer Oleh Witer, frustrated over playing in a string of unsuccessful groups, travelled from Australia to London....
's "Breakaway" in 1989, in this decade, one of the rare instances of a popular overseas artist covering a song by a popular Australian band (other than AC/DC).
Iconic music festivals of the decade included the Narara Music Festival
Narara Music Festival
The Narara Music Festival was an outdoor music festival held on the Central Coast of New South Wales, Australia in 1983 and 1984. Despite the name, it was actually held at Somersby, a short distance from Narara.- 1983 :...
, Australian Made
Australian Made
Australian Made was a festival concert series held during 1986–1987 in the six state capitals of Australia and featured local rock acts Mental as Anything, I'm Talking, The Triffids, The Saints, Divinyls, Models, Jimmy Barnes and INXS. The series started in Hobart on 26 December 1986 and...
and Turn Back the Tide at Bondi
Bondi Beach, New South Wales
Bondi Beach is a popular beach and the name of the surrounding suburb in Sydney, Australia. Bondi Beach is located 7 kilometres east of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of Waverley Council, in the Eastern Suburbs...
.
1990s – ravers and alternative rockers
In 1990, Boxcar
Boxcar (band)
Boxcar is an Australian Sydney-based synth pop and techno band. Formed in the mid-1980s in Brisbane by main songwriter guitarist and vocalist David Smith, he was soon joined by keyboardists Brett Mitchell and Carol Rohde and somewhat later by drummer-percussionist Crispin Trist. They initially...
released their first album, Vertigo
Vertigo (Boxcar album)
Vertigo was a 1990 album by Australian electronic-synthpop group Boxcar released by Volition Records in Australia and by Arista Records in the United States....
. Central Station Records in Sydney was one of the leading retailers of dance music. The Sydney street press
Street press
Street press is a term used to describe a certain type of publishing, between zines and magazines/newspapers in terms of distribution, content and audience. They are particularly prolific in Australia, although there are also some examples from Europe and North America...
became half and half dance music and rock.
Highlights in rock from people of ATSI background were Archie Roach
Archie Roach
Archie Roach is an Australian musician. A singer, songwriter and guitarist, he survived a turbulent upbringing to develop into a powerful voice for Indigenous Australians, a storyteller in the tradition of his ancestors, and a nationally popular and respected artist.- Biography :In his own words,...
's Took the Children Away, Christine Anu
Christine Anu
-Early life:Anu was born in Cairns, Queensland to a Torres Strait Islander mother from Saibai and Mabuiag Islands.-Career:Anu began performing as a dancer and later went on to sing back-up vocals for The Rainmakers, which included Neil Murray of the Warumpi Band. Her first recording was in 1993...
's Party and her version of My Island Home
My Island Home
"My Island Home" is popularly believed to be a song about Australia. However, it was written by Neil Murray and originally performed by his Warumpi Band in reference to their lead singer's home up at Elcho Island off the coast of Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory as said by...
and Yothu Yindi
Yothu Yindi
Yothu Yindi are an Australian band with Aboriginal and balanda members formed in 1986. Aboriginal members come from Yolngu homelands near Yirrkala on the Gove Peninsula in Northern Territory's Arnhem Land...
's World Turning.
Fans of early punk band The Saints
The Saints (band)
The Saints are an Australian rock band, which formed in Brisbane in 1974 as punk rockers. Founders were Chris Bailey , Ivor Hay , and Ed Kuepper . Alongside mainstay Bailey, the group has had numerous line-ups...
were excited when Ed Kuepper
Ed Kuepper
Ed Kuepper is an Australian guitarist, vocalist and songwriter. He co-founded the seminal punk band The Saints, the experimental post-punk group Laughing Clowns and later the grunge-like The Aints...
reunited with members of The Saints and played and recorded as The Aints
The Aints
For the nickname of the professional football team, see the New Orleans Saints.The Aints is a band name used by Ed Kuepper during his prolific early 1990s period for loud, feedback-drenched three-piece performance and recordings....
. Kuepper was at the time receiving praise from the critics for his album Today Wonder, that featured simply Kuepper singing and on guitar and Mark Dawson on drums.
In 1991, the band Necrotomy played live on the Peter Couchman talk show special Couchman on Heavy Metal during a period of media controversy about Heavy Metal music
Heavy metal music
Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the Midlands of the United Kingdom and the United States...
.
Another acoustic act of the late nineties was Machine Translations
Machine Translations
Machine Translations is the recording and touring name of J Walker, an Australian singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. J Walker started out recording all instruments himself in a home studio, but has now branched out to include a band in his recent works...
.
The nineties was famous for not only grunge but also eclecticism with Machine Gun Fellatio
Machine Gun Fellatio
Machine Gun Fellatio was an Australian alternative rock band, formed in 1997. They were well-known for their provocative on-stage antics and humorous lyrics, as well as the musical merit of their songs. Their outrage-provoking name gives some idea of the attitude that pervades the band's work...
and Def FX being popular cross-genre acts.
Cranky was well known for the song "Australia, Don't Become America".
Gerling
Gerling
Gerling were an alternative guitar and electronic act from Australia. They formed in 1993, and are based in Sydney.-History:The band formed in 1993 with the line-up of Darren Cross , Presser and Brad Herdson...
, an alternative rock and electronica band, formed in 1993, as was the pop–punk band Noise Addict
Noise Addict
Noise Addict was an Australian alternative rock band, formed in Bondi Beach in 1992, originally consisting of Ben Lee, Doron Kalinko, Daniel Kohn, Joel Wasserman, Daniel Mapp and Saul Smith....
featuring Ben Lee
Ben Lee
Benjamin Michael "Ben" Lee is an ARIA Award winning musician and actor. Lee began his career as a musician at the age of 14 with the Sydney band Noise Addict, but focused on his solo career when the band broke up in 1995. He appeared as the protagonist in the Australian film The Rage in Placid Lake...
, who went on to be a prominent singer and songwriter into the following decade.
Peril
Peril (band)
Peril were a Japanese/Australian industrial band operating throughout the early 1990s.Peril was founded by drummer Tony Buck and were active from 1992 to 1996...
was an attempt to make the self-styled avant garde music of the Tzadik Records
Tzadik Records
Tzadik Records is a record label based in New York City specialising in avant-garde and experimental music. The label was established by the eclectic composer and saxophonist John Zorn in 1995; Zorn is the executive producer of all Tzadik releases...
label.
Musicians and music fans of the nineties tended to be less nostalgic for pre-punk rock compared to those of previous decade. The Cruel Sea
The Cruel Sea (band)
The Cruel Sea are an Australian indie rock band from Sydney formed in late 1987. Originally an instrumental-only band, they became more popular when fronted by vocalist Tex Perkins in addition to Jim Elliott on drums, Ken Gormly on bass guitar, Dan Rumour on guitar and James Cruickshank on guitar...
and Divinyls
Divinyls
Divinyls were an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1980 and featuring vocalist Christina Amphlett and guitarist Mark McEntee. As the focal point, Amphlett performed on stage wearing a school uniform and fishnet stockings, often using an illuminated neon tube as a prop and displaying...
were exceptions, showing the influence of the music of the sixties. Dave Graney
Dave Graney
David John "Dave" Graney is an Australian rock musician and singer-songwriter from Mount Gambier, South Australia. Since 1979, Graney is generally accompanied by drummer, Clare Moore...
and TISM
TISM
TISM was a seven piece anonymous alternative rock band from Melbourne, Australia. The group was formed in 1982 and enjoyed a large underground/independent following. Their third album Machiavelli and the Four Seasons reached the Australian national top 10 in 1995...
continued to be popular with their irreverent commentary on contemporary culture.
Baby Animals
Baby Animals
Baby Animals are a 1990s hard rock band from Australia.-Early history:The Baby Animals were formed in Sydney in 1989 by singer Suze DeMarchi, drummer Frank Celenza, guitarist Dave Leslie, and bassist Eddie Parise...
, a noisy band with a feisty female singer, released their eponymous debut album in 1991. They were briefly successful, however Australian music lovers preferred their feisty women foreign, for instance interest in Americans Courtney Love
Courtney Love
Courtney Michelle Love is an American rock musician. Love is the lead vocalist, lyricist, and rhythm guitarist for alternative rock band Hole, which she formed in 1989, and is an actress who has moved from bit parts in Alex Cox films to significant and acclaimed roles in The People vs...
and L7
L7 (band)
L7 was an American rock band from Los Angeles, that was active from 1985 to 2000. Due to their sound and image, they are often associated with the grunge movement of the late 1980s and early 1990s.-History:...
. Commercial rock radio stations and, in spite of their SNAG image, Triple J
Triple J
triple j is a nationally networked Australian radio station intended to appeal to listeners between the ages of 18 and 30. The government-funded station is a division of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation...
have fostered a music scene that allows female singers to mainly be mawkish, bland and demure. Examples are Frente!
Frente!
Frente! are an Australian alternative rock group, formed in 1991. The original lineup featured singer Angie Hart, founder and guitarist Simon Austin, bassist Tim O'Connor , and drummer Mark Picton...
and The Waifs
The Waifs
The Waifs are an Australian folk rock band formed in 1992 by Josh Cunningham , and sisters Vikki Thorn and Donna Simpson...
. At the time, groups like Frente! and The Waifs were a welcome relief from the dourness of grunge and the many alternative acts espousing angst, choofers (stoners), the Slacker
Slacker
The term "slacker" is used to refer to a person who habitually avoids work. Slackers may be regarded as belonging to an antimaterialistic counterculture, though in some cases their behavior may be due to other causes ....
work ethic, fashionable cynicism and sarcasm, heroin chic
Heroin chic
Heroin chic was a look popularized in mid-1990s fashion and characterized by pale skin, dark circles underneath the eyes, and jutting bones.The look, which promoted emaciated features and androgyny, was an alternative that stood in direct contradiction to the "healthy" and vibrant look of models...
and the idealised suffering artist.
The Screaming Jets was a popular hard rock act from Newcastle. Having a down to earth image, they and Divinyls
Divinyls
Divinyls were an Australian rock band formed in Sydney in 1980 and featuring vocalist Christina Amphlett and guitarist Mark McEntee. As the focal point, Amphlett performed on stage wearing a school uniform and fishnet stockings, often using an illuminated neon tube as a prop and displaying...
were examples of bands that survived the backlash against so called Hair Rock of the Eighties (i.e. Warrant, Poison
Poison (band)
Poison is an American glam metal band that achieved great success in the mid-1980s to mid-1990s. To date, Poison has sold over 30 million records worldwide and have sold 15 million records in the United States alone. The band has also charted ten singles to the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100,...
, Europe
Europe (band)
Europe is a Swedish rock band formed in Upplands Väsby in 1979 under the name Force by vocalist Joey Tempest, guitarist John Norum and drummer Tony Reno. Although widely associated with glam metal, the band's sound incorporates heavy metal and hard rock elements...
, Cinderella
Cinderella (band)
Cinderella is an American heavy metal band from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. They emerged in the mid-1980s with a series of multi-platinum albums and hit singles whose music videos received heavy MTV rotation. They were famous for being a glam metal band, but then shifted over towards a more hard...
). In 1994, hard rock band The Poor
The Poor
The Poor are an Australian hard rock band that formed in the mid-1980s in Darwin, Northern Territory. They released a debut album titled Who Cares on 15 March 1994 on the Sony label. Who Cares debuted at #4 on the Australian albums chart...
charted at #30 in the Billboard
Billboard (magazine)
Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...
Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks with "More Wine Waiter Please". The Candy Harlots
Candy Harlots
Candy Harlots were an Australian glam metal band from Sydney, active between 1987 and 1995. They also released material as Helter Skelter and The Harlots...
' 1990 Foreplay EP reached 17 in the ARIA national Top 100 chart.
Paul Capsis
Paul Capsis
Paul Capsis is an Australian singer and actor, who is best known for his cabaret theatre roles. Capsis has Greek and Maltese heritage.Capsis has released two CDs called Paul Capsis Live and Everybody Wants To Touch Me...
was one of the few rock acts to work with a theatre director, Barrie Kosky
Barrie Kosky
Barrie KoskyBarrie Kosky's name is sometimes misspelled as Barry Kosky, Barrie Koski, Barrie Koskie. is an Australian theatre and opera director.Kosky also plays the piano, as he did in his production of Monteverdi's Poppea...
.
Killing Heidi
Killing Heidi
Killing Heidi were an Australian rock band from Violet Town, Victoria. The band, which has been on hiatus since 2006, are best known for their multi-platinum album Reflector, released in 2000.-Early years :...
had a hit song with "Mascara
Mascara (song)
"Mascara" is the second single by Australian band Killing Heidi from their debut album Reflector. It was released in November 1999 while their debut single "Weir" was still active on the charts. The re-release of the "Mascara" single was released with "Leave Me Alone" as its B-side.-Music Video:The...
" in 1999.
Raja Ram was one half of Shpongle
Shpongle
Shpongle is an English psychedelic downtempo/psybient music project formed in 1996. The group includes Simon Posford and Raja Ram . Their musical style combines eastern ethnic instruments and vocals with contemporary western synthesizer-based psychedelic music...
and their debut album in 1999 was Are You Shpongled?
Are You Shpongled?
Are You Shpongled? is the first of four albums released by Shpongle. This album set the standard for psychedelic downtempo music worldwide, and created a revolution between psychedelic trance and ambient soundscapes.-Track listing:...
.
Roots music continued to have a strong appeal, with acts such as Blues band Bondi Cigars and Zydeco
Zydeco
Zydeco is a form of uniquely American roots or folk music. It evolved in southwest Louisiana in the early 19th century from forms of "la la" Creole music...
band Psycho Zydeco.
The comedy quiz show Good News Week
Good News Week
Good News Week is an Australian satirical panel game show hosted by Paul McDermott that initially aired from 19 April 1996 to 27 May 2000, and resumed on 11 February 2008 to 9 May 2011. The show aired first on ABC TV before it was bought by Network Ten in 1999...
was regularly signed off with Paul McDermott
Paul McDermott (comedian)
Paul McDermott is an Australian comedian, actor, writer, director, singer, artist and television host. He currently hosts the satirical news-based 'Good News World' a follow up to quiz show Good News Week which airs in Australia on Network Ten...
singing his rendition of Hunters & Collectors
Hunters & Collectors
Hunters & Collectors were an Australian rock music band formed in Melbourne in 1981, fronted by singer-songwriter and guitarist Mark Seymour, they developed a blend of pub rock and art-funk...
' stodgy classic "Throw Your Arms Around Me
Throw Your Arms Around Me
-Personnel:Hunters & Collectors members*John Archer — bass guitar*Geoffrey Crosby — keyboards*Douglas Falconer — drums*John 'Jack' Howard — trumpet*Mark Seymour — vocals, lead guitar*Michael Waters — trombone...
".
Alternative rock
Throughout the developed world, alternative rockAlternative rock
Alternative rock is a genre of rock music and a term used to describe a diverse musical movement that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1980s and became widely popular by the 1990s...
of various kinds became more popular during the 1990s, especially grunge
Grunge
Grunge is a subgenre of alternative rock that emerged during the mid-1980s in the American state of Washington, particularly in the Seattle area. Inspired by hardcore punk, heavy metal, and indie rock, grunge is generally characterized by heavily distorted electric guitars, contrasting song...
.
As in other countries, independent music festival
Music festival
A music festival is a festival oriented towards music that is sometimes presented with a theme such as musical genre, nationality or locality of musicians, or holiday. They are commonly held outdoors, and are often inclusive of other attractions such as food and merchandise vending machines,...
s also saw a resurgence in popularity, notably the Big Day Out
Big Day Out
The Big Day Out is an annual music festival held in several cities in Australia and New Zealand in late January. It started in Sydney in 1992, spread to Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth by 1993, with the Gold Coast and Auckland joining in 1994...
(which began in Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
in 1992) attracted and helped build the careers of many Australian acts as well as showcasing international artists to a local audience, and the Woodford Folk Festival
Woodford Folk Festival
The Woodford Folk Festival is an annual music festival held near the small country town of Woodford, 72 km north of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. It is one of the biggest annual cultural events of its type in Australia....
, attracting large crowds in South Eastern Queensland.
Notable Australian independent acts of the time included the Falling Joys
Falling Joys
Falling Joys is an Australian alternative rock band formed in Canberra in 1985. They were composed of lead singer Suzie Higgie, guitarist Stuart G. Robertson, bass guitarist and vocalist Pat Hayes, and drummer Pete Velzen. They frequently played at the ANU's refectory bar, and supported...
from Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
; Diana Anaid
Diana Anaid
Diana Anaid is an Australian singer-songwriter.-Early life and career:Born Diana Gosper in New South Wales, Anaid released her self-titled debut album at the age of 19...
from Nimbin; Magic Dirt
Magic Dirt
Magic Dirt are an Australian rock band, which formed in 1991 in Geelong, Victoria, with Daniel Herring on guitar, Adam Robertson on drums, Adalita Srsen on vocals and guitar, and Dean Turner on bass guitar. Initially known as Deer Bubbles and then The Jim Jims, they were renamed as Magic Dirt in...
from Geelong, Tumbleweed
Tumbleweed (band)
Tumbleweed are a Wollongong-based rock group in Australia, popular during the grunge years of the 1990s. As an opening band for Nirvana on their 1992 tour of Australia, Tumbleweed reached out into the mainstream with their crunchy-psychedelica...
from Wollongong
Wollongong, New South Wales
Wollongong is a seaside city located in the Illawarra region of New South Wales, Australia. It lies on the narrow coastal strip between the Illawarra Escarpment and the Pacific Ocean, 82 kilometres south of Sydney...
; The Superjesus
The Superjesus
The Superjesus were an ARIA award–winning rock band from Adelaide, Australia. They are best known for their singles "Shut My Eyes", "Down Again" and "Gravity".-History:...
from Adelaide; Regurgitator
Regurgitator
Regurgitator are an Australian rock band from Brisbane, currently consisting of Quan Yeomans , Ben Ely and Peter Kostic . The band formed in 1994, its original line-up consisting of Yeomans, Ely and drummer Martin Lee...
, Powderfinger
Powderfinger
Powderfinger was an Australian rock band that formed in Brisbane in 1989. From 1992 until their breakup the band lineup consisted of vocalist Bernard Fanning, guitarists Darren Middleton and Ian Haug, bassist John Collins, and drummer Jon Coghill....
, Screamfeeder
Screamfeeder
Screamfeeder are a rock band from Brisbane, Australia.-Members and history:Screamfeeder began performing under that name in Brisbane, Australia in 1991. They formed out of the remains of Tim Steward and Tony Blade's band, The Madmen....
, The Sallyanne Hate Squad and Custard
Custard (band)
-Overview:The band were originally known as Custard Gun and featured David McCormack on vocals and guitar, Paul Medew on bass, James Straker on guitar and Shane Brunn on drums. After a few shows and line up changes Custard Gun morphed into Custard...
from Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
; Something for Kate
Something for Kate
Something for Kate are a rock band from Melbourne, Australia. Members include songwriter, vocalist and guitarist Paul Dempsey, drummer Clint Hyndman and bassist Stephanie Ashworth...
, The Living End
The Living End
The Living End are an Australian rock band from Melbourne, Victoria, formed in 1994. The current lineup consists of Chris Cheney , Scott Owen and Andy Strachan...
, Dirty Three
Dirty Three
Dirty Three are an instrumental trio consisting of Warren Ellis , Mick Turner and Jim White , originating from Melbourne, Australia. Since the Dirty Three formed in 1992, they have spent a lot of time overseas...
, Rebecca's Empire
Rebecca's Empire
Rebecca's Empire were an indie pop-rock band from Melbourne, Australia. They released two full-length albums and two EPs in a six-year career lasting from 1994 to 2000.-History:...
, Bodyjar
Bodyjar
Bodyjar were an Australian punk rock/pop punk band based in Melbourne. They began performing under the name Bodyjar in 1994; their previous names included Damnation and Helium.-History:...
and The Meanies
The Meanies
The Meanies are an indie Australian punk rock band, formed in 1989. The current band members include Link Meanie , Ringo Meanie and Wally Meanie . The Meanies had a hiatus in the mid-late 1990s, but began performing again in 1998...
from Melbourne; Jebediah
Jebediah
Jebediah is an Australian alternative rock band formed in 1994 in Perth, Western Australia. The group consists of vocalist and guitarist Kevin Mitchell, guitarist Chris Daymond, bassist Vanessa Thornton, and Kevin's brother Brett Mitchell on drums...
, The Blackeyed Susans
The Blackeyed Susans
The Blackeyed Susans are an Australian rock band, formed in Perth in 1989, based in Melbourne since 1992.-Perth 1989-1990:The original line-up consisted of David McComb on vocals and guitar, Alsy MacDonald on drums , Phil Kakulas on bass guitar , Rob Snarski on vocals and guitar, and...
from Perth, RatCat
Ratcat
Ratcat were an Australian indie rock band of the late 1980s and early 1990s fronted by vocalist Simon Day. Their combination of indie pop songwriting and energetic punk-style guitar won them fans from both the indie and skate-punk communities.-Waterfront:...
, The Clouds, You Am I
You Am I
You Am I are an Australian alternative rock band, fronted by vocalist/guitarist and main songwriter Tim Rogers. They were the first Australian band to have three albums successively debut at #1 on the ARIA Charts, and are renowned for their live performances.-History:Tim Rogers formed the first...
, Vicious Hairy Mary, Caligula
Caligula (band)
Caligula were a band from Sydney, Australia, who produced techno-grunge music in the early 1990s and achieved some national success.Caligula was composed of five members: vocalist Ashley Rothschild, guitarist James McKinnon, drummer Dave Macken, Jamie Fonti , and bass guitarist Sean Fonti...
, The Whitlams
The Whitlams
The discography of The Whitlams consists of six studio albums, two live albums, one compilation album, and eighteen singles.-Studio albums:-Live albums:-Compilation albums:-Singles:-Videos:-Music videos:-Awards:...
, The Crystal Set
The Crystal Set
The Crystal Set was a Sydney-based Australian indie rock band formed in the early 1980s featuring Russell Kilbey , Phillip Maher , Davey Ray Moor and Tim Seckhold ....
, The Cruel Sea
The Cruel Sea (band)
The Cruel Sea are an Australian indie rock band from Sydney formed in late 1987. Originally an instrumental-only band, they became more popular when fronted by vocalist Tex Perkins in addition to Jim Elliott on drums, Ken Gormly on bass guitar, Dan Rumour on guitar and James Cruickshank on guitar...
, Crow
Crow
Crows form the genus Corvus in the family Corvidae. Ranging in size from the relatively small pigeon-size jackdaws to the Common Raven of the Holarctic region and Thick-billed Raven of the highlands of Ethiopia, the 40 or so members of this genus occur on all temperate continents and several...
, Nitocris
Nitocris (Band)
Nitocris was a band from Sydney, Australia playing a combination of speedy punk and heavy metal. The band was notable as being perhaps the country's first significant all-female touring band.-Band history:...
, Skulker
Skulker
Skulker was an ARIA Award-nominated rock band from Sydney, Australia that originally formed in 1994. After two albums, the group parted ways in 2005-History:...
, Frenzal Rhomb
Frenzal Rhomb
Frenzal Rhomb are an Australian punk rock band which formed in 1992 with mainstay Jason Whalley on lead vocals and rhythm guitar. In 1996, Lindsay McDougall joined the line-up on lead guitar and backing vocals. Two of the group's albums have peaked into the top 20 on the ARIA Albums Chart, A...
, Pollyanna
Pollyanna
Pollyanna is a best-selling 1913 novel by Eleanor H. Porter that is now considered a classic of children's literature, with the title character's name becoming a popular term for someone with the same optimistic outlook. The book was such a success, that Porter soon produced a sequel, Pollyanna...
from Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
; Spiderbait
Spiderbait
Spiderbait are an Australian alternative rock band formed in Finley in 1989 by bass guitarist Janet English, singer-drummer Mark Maher , and guitarist Damian Whitty. In 2004 the group's cover version of the 1930s Lead Belly song "Black Betty" reached number one on the ARIA Singles Chart...
from Finley, New South Wales
Finley, New South Wales
Finley is a town in the Riverina region of New South Wales, Australia. It is the largest town in the Berrigan Shire Local Government Area. At the 2006 census, Finley had a population of 2,054 people....
and Silverchair
Silverchair
Silverchair were an Australian rock band, which formed in 1992 as Innocent Criminals in Merewether, Newcastle with the line-up of Ben Gillies on drums, Chris Joannou on bass guitar and Daniel Johns on vocals and guitars. The group got their big break in mid-1994 when they won a national demo...
, who began as a teenage combo in Newcastle
Newcastle, New South Wales
The Newcastle metropolitan area is the second most populated area in the Australian state of New South Wales and includes most of the Newcastle and Lake Macquarie Local Government Areas...
, were discovered by Triple-J and have since become one of the most successful Australian bands of all time. The changes brought about in this period and the aforementioned bands are discussed in the book The Sell-In
The Sell-In
The Sell-in: How the Music Business Seduced Alternative Rock is a book by Australian music journalist Craig Mathieson. It documents the rise of the Australia's alternative music scene and how that success attracted the interest of the music industry's major labels.- References :*...
by music journalist Craig Mathieson
Craig Mathieson
Craig Mathieson is an Australian music journalist and writer. His books include, Hi Fi Days and The Sell-In .-Biography:...
.
Frank Bennett covered many of the fashionable alternative rock bands in big band mode. His version of Radiohead
Radiohead
Radiohead are an English rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke , Jonny Greenwood , Ed O'Brien , Colin Greenwood and Phil Selway .Radiohead released their debut single "Creep" in 1992...
's Creep was his most well known recording. His music was less danceable than overseas Retro swing acts Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
Big Bad Voodoo Daddy is a contemporary swing revival band from southern California. Their notable singles include "Go Daddy-O", "You & Me & the Bottle Makes 3 Tonight ", and "Mr. Pinstripe Suit". The band played the Super Bowl XXXIII half-time show in 1999.The band was originally formed in Ventura,...
and Brian Setzer Orchestra. Frank Bennett was deeply ironic and only had moderate success with audiences who were attracted to the romanticised Harry Connick, Jr.
Harry Connick, Jr.
Joseph Harry Fowler Connick, Jr. is an American singer, big-band leader/conductor, pianist, actor, and composer. He has sold over 25 million albums worldwide. Connick is ranked among the top 60 best-selling male artists in the United States by the Recording Industry Association of America, with...
. Music in the style of Frank Sinatra
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became an unprecedentedly successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, after being signed to Columbia Records in 1943. Being the idol of the...
and Tony Bennett
Tony Bennett
Tony Bennett is an American singer of popular music, standards, show tunes, and jazz....
was unfashionable in the Alternative rock scene, stigmatised by the derisive term Lounge Lizard
Lounge music
Lounge music is a retrospective description of music popular in the 1950s and 1960s. It is a type of mood music meant to evoke in the listeners the feeling of being in a place — a jungle, an island paradise, outer space, et cetera — other than where they are listening to it...
. Singers Dave Graney
Dave Graney
David John "Dave" Graney is an Australian rock musician and singer-songwriter from Mount Gambier, South Australia. Since 1979, Graney is generally accompanied by drummer, Clare Moore...
, Tex Perkins
Tex Perkins
Tex Perkins is an Australian singer-songwriter, who is widely known for fronting the popular Australian rock-band The Cruel Sea, but has also performed with the Beasts of Bourbon, Thug, James Baker Experience, The Butcher Shop, Salamander Jim, and Tex, Don and Charlie. He has also released many...
and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian alternative rock band, formed in Melbourne in 1983. The band is fronted by Nick Cave and has featured international personnel throughout their career.-Formation and early releases :...
(particularly for their album The Good Son
The Good Son (album)
The Good Son is the sixth album by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, released in 1990 . It was preceded by the release of "The Ship Song/The Train Song" single. "The Weeping Song/Cock's 'n' Asses" was later also released as a single. After an album as dark and intense as Tender Prey, some fans were...
), also drew on the styles. By the end of the decade there was renewed interest in Lounge music
Lounge music
Lounge music is a retrospective description of music popular in the 1950s and 1960s. It is a type of mood music meant to evoke in the listeners the feeling of being in a place — a jungle, an island paradise, outer space, et cetera — other than where they are listening to it...
from elements of the club scene, the interest being in both the composition and the campness.
The nationalisation of Triple J
Triple J
triple j is a nationally networked Australian radio station intended to appeal to listeners between the ages of 18 and 30. The government-funded station is a division of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation...
was well received across the country where there was little in the way of Australian radio content that was not crassly commercial, stale or blatantly sexist, racist or homophobic. Triple J also embraced political incorrectness, playing songs such as "Backdoor Man" by Pauline Pantsdown
Pauline Pantsdown
Simon Hunt, sometimes known as Pauline Pantsdown, is an Australian satirist and Australian Senate candidate who parodied Pauline Hanson, a controversial former member of federal parliament, in 1997. His birth name was Simon Hunt, but he changed his name by deed poll so that he would appear on the...
, "(He'll Never Be An) Ol' Man River
(He'll Never Be An) Ol' Man River
Ol' Man River was the first single to be released off Machiavelli and the Four Seasons by Australian alternative rock band TISM....
" and All Homeboys Are Dickheads
All Homeboys Are Dickheads
"All Homeboys Are Dickheads" is a song by TISM from their 1995 album Machiavelli and the Four Seasons.It was also released as a promo with Machines Against the Rage.-Track list:# "All Homeboys Are Dickheads "...
(New jack swing
New jack swing
New jack swing or swingbeat is a fusion genre spearheaded by Teddy Riley and Bernard Belle which became extremely popular from the late-1980s into the mid-1990s. Its influence, along with hip-hop, seeped into pop culture and was the definitive sound of the inventive Black New York club scene...
style) by TISM
TISM
TISM was a seven piece anonymous alternative rock band from Melbourne, Australia. The group was formed in 1982 and enjoyed a large underground/independent following. Their third album Machiavelli and the Four Seasons reached the Australian national top 10 in 1995...
, "Closer to Hogs" a song about bestiality
Zoophilia
Zoophilia, from the Greek ζῷον and φιλία is the practice of sex between humans and non-human animals , or a preference or fixation on such practice...
by the Nine Inch Richards and unashamed displays of inner-Western Sydney cultural chauvinism.
2000s
The Vines
https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:LandingCheck?landing_page=L11_1121_WMUK_Jimmy_DDOptimised&utm_medium=sitenotice&utm_campaign=C11_1121_WMUK_DDvOneOff&utm_source=B11_1121_WMUK_Jimmy&language=en&country=GB...
, who rose to prominence in the UK before becoming known in Australia, and Jet
Jet (band)
Jet are an Australian rock band formed in 2001 while attending St Bede's College Mentone in Melbourne, . The band consists of lead guitarist Cameron Muncey, bassist Mark Wilson, and brothers Nic and Chris Cester on vocals/rhythm guitar and drums respectively...
. Jet, influenced by seminal 1960s acts such as the Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...
and the Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones
The Rolling Stones are an English rock band, formed in London in April 1962 by Brian Jones , Ian Stewart , Mick Jagger , and Keith Richards . Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early line-up...
, had their single "Are You Gonna Be My Girl
Are You Gonna Be My Girl
"Are You Gonna Be My Girl" is a song by the Australian rock band Jet, featured on their 2003 album Get Born. It was the first single from the album, released in 2003 in Australia and the UK, and in 2004 in the United States. Written by Nic Cester & Cameron Muncey, the song is often cited for ...
" used in an Apple iPod
IPod
iPod is a line of portable media players created and marketed by Apple Inc. The product line-up currently consists of the hard drive-based iPod Classic, the touchscreen iPod Touch, the compact iPod Nano, and the ultra-compact iPod Shuffle...
commercial, and consequently have sold 3 million copies in the US alone. Another band which had great success is Wolfmother
Wolfmother
Wolfmother is an Australian rock band from Erskineville, Sydney. Formed in 2000, the group was originally a trio composed of vocalist and guitarist Andrew Stockdale, bassist and keyboardist Chris Ross and drummer Myles Heskett. Wolfmother released their self-titled debut album in October 2005,...
, a hard rock band, very influenced by 1960s/1970s psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock is a style of rock music that is inspired or influenced by psychedelic culture and attempts to replicate and enhance the mind-altering experiences of psychedelic drugs. It emerged during the mid 1960s among folk rock and blues rock bands in United States and the United Kingdom...
and heavy metal
Heavy metal music
Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the Midlands of the United Kingdom and the United States...
bands, like Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath are an English heavy metal band, formed in Aston, Birmingham in 1969 by Ozzy Osbourne , Tony Iommi , Geezer Butler , and Bill Ward . The band has since experienced multiple line-up changes, with Tony Iommi the only constant presence in the band through the years. A total of 22...
. In 2007, Wolfmother were awarded a Grammy for best hard rock performance for their extremely successful single "Woman".
Apart from those bands which achieved international success, one of the well known Australian rock bands of the first decade of the 21st century was Grinspoon
Grinspoon
Grinspoon are an Australian rock band from Lismore, New South Wales formed in 1995 and fronted by Phil Jamieson on vocals and guitar with Pat Davern on guitar, Joe Hansen on bass guitar and Kristian Hopes on drums. Also in 1995, they won the Triple J-sponsored Unearthed competition for Lismore,...
. They first achieved success in the music industry in 1995 after being Unearthed by Triple J, and have been a mainstay of festivals such as the Big Day Out ever since.
A wave of female fronted, PJ Harvey
PJ Harvey
Polly Jean Harvey is an English musician, singer-songwriter, composer and occasional artist. Primarily known as a vocalist and guitarist, she is also proficient with a wide range of instruments including piano, organ, bass, saxophone, and most recently, the autoharp.Harvey began her career in...
-esque bands emerged in Australia during the early 2000s, most notably Little Birdy
Little Birdy
Little Birdy are an Australian indie rock band formed in Perth, Western Australia in 2002 by singer and guitarist Katy Steele, drummer Matt Chequer, guitarist and keyboardist Simon Leach, and bass guitarist Scott O'Donoghue...
and Love Outside Andromeda
Love Outside Andromeda
Love Outside Andromeda is an indie rock band from Melbourne, Australia. The band was formed in 2000 as Andromeda, and released their debut EP, Umabel, in 2001. The title track from their second EP, Something White and Sigmund, appeared on the Triple J Hottest 100 2003 at #65...
. And with the phenomenial success of Missy Higgins
Missy Higgins
Melissa "Missy" Morrison Higgins is an Australian pop singer-songwriter, musician and actor. Her No. 1 albums in Australia are The Sound of White and On a Clear Night , and her Top Ten singles are "Scar", "The Special Two", "Steer" and "Where I Stood". From a musical family in...
, artists such as Sarah Blasko
Sarah Blasko
Sarah Elizabeth Blaskow , is an Australian singer-songwriter and musician. After fronting Sydney-based band Acquiesce from the mid-1990s, Blasko developed her solo career from 2002. In 2007, she won the 'Best Pop Release' for What the Sea Wants, the Sea Will Have at the ARIA Music Awards, which...
and others have found themselves a strong following.
There has also been an abundance of modern rock bands who have been influenced by the alternative and progressive scenes. Bands like The Butterfly Effect
The Butterfly Effect (band)
The Butterfly Effect are an alternative metal band from Brisbane, Australia, formed in 1999. The band consists of Clint Boge , Ben Hall , Glenn Esmond and Kurt "Puddles" Goedhart . Their debut album received high rotation play on influential radio station Triple J.-The Butterfly Effect EP:The band...
, Karnivool
Karnivool
Karnivool are an Australian progressive rock band formed in Perth in 1997. The group currently consists of Ian Kenny on vocals, Drew Goddard and Mark Hosking on guitar, Jon Stockman on bass guitar, and Steve Judd on drums. Karnivool emerged from a band Kenny and Goddard formed during high school...
, Mammal
Mammal (band)
Mammal were an Australian band that formed in March 2006. Mammal rose up the ranks of the Australian music scene very quickly. Their first self titled EP was recorded soon after the band came together. Their debut live album "Vol:1 The Aural Underground" was recorded just 4 months after the band...
and Cog
Cog (band)
Cog are an Australian progressive rock band that formed in 1998. Their debut album The New Normal was nominated for Triple J's 2005 J Award. The band's music draws influences from Tool, Isis, Nina Simone, Bob Marley, Leftfield, Deftones and Helmet...
have all seen success, with The Butterfly Effect probably gaining the most international attention.
Roots music and indie
Domestically, roots musicTraditional music
Traditional music is the term increasingly used for folk music that is not contemporary folk music. More on this is at the terminology section of the World music article...
, seemingly a catch-all term for somewhat more laid-back acoustic music covering blues, country and folk influences, came to some prominence, including Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu
Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu
Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu is an Indigenous Australian musician, who sings in the Yolngu language.He was born in Galiwin'ku , off the coast of Arnhem Land, Northern Australia about 350 miles from Darwin. He is from the Gumatj clan of the Yolngu and his mother from the Galpu nation...
, The John Butler Trio, and the plaintive harmonies of The Waifs
The Waifs
The Waifs are an Australian folk rock band formed in 1992 by Josh Cunningham , and sisters Vikki Thorn and Donna Simpson...
. A number of "blues and roots" festivals have sprung up and are attracting large audiences.
As well as these uniquely "Aussie Bands", 2005 in particular sparked many brand new Australian "indie rock" bands such as End Of Fashion
End of Fashion
End of Fashion are an Australian power pop band from Perth, Western Australia. The band consists of singer and guitarist Justin Burford, guitarist Rodney Aravena, bassist Simon Fasolo, and drummer Mike Hobbs. The group gained mainstream attention with their 2005 single "O Yeah", which reached...
who won ARIA awards for their debut self-titled album and hit song "Oh Yeah" (as well as performing at the Homebake
Homebake
Homebake is an annual Australian rock festival, featuring an all-Australian lineup . The festival was first held on 4 January 1996 at Belongil Fields in Byron Bay, on the far north coast of New South Wales...
festival and appearing on talk show Rove Live several times). There is also Kisschasy
Kisschasy
Kisschasy are an Australian rock band formed in Victoria, Australia, in 2002. Since forming, their line-up has consisted of lead vocalist Darren Cordeux, bassist Joel Vanderuit, guitarist Sean Thomas and drummer Karl Ammitzboll....
who appeared in concert on 2 October 2005 with teen favourite Simple Plan
Simple Plan
Simple Plan is a Canadian pop punk band from Montréal, Québec. The band has had no line up changes since its inception in 1999. Members are Pierre Bouvier , Jeff Stinco , Sébastien Lefebvre , David Desrosiers and Chuck Comeau...
. Another band to appear on the scene at this time were John Smith Quintet wielding their new brand of funk
Funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...
onto the Australian charts and music scene.
Hardcore punk
Australian hardcore punk is an active rock music subgenre with a dedicated following. Many bands never tour outside their home state but enjoy a relatively large local fanbase. Recorded material of their work may be hard to acquire as live shows are the mainstay of the scene.The Do-It-Yourself (DIY) ethic is strong with local distributors and small record labels active in most capital cities. Unlike the United States relatively few bands are straight edge or influenced by particular political views or religious convictions.
The strong sense of DIY ethics supported by independent street press and community radio stations mostly in Brisbane, Melbourne and Perth forms a breeding ground for creative artists who wish to explore the audio spectrum, as seen in Sticky Carpet
Sticky Carpet
Sticky Carpet: Melbourne's Underground Rockumentary is a 2006 documentary film by Mark Butcher, Glenn Waterworth and Pip Stafford.Bio : The long overdue cultural recognition to Melbourne’s much-loved independent music scene...
rockumentary of Melbourne music scene.
In recent years, Australian hardcore bands have been growing in fanbase and success, the most notable being Byron Bay's Parkway Drive signing to American punk/hardcore record label Epitaph Records
Epitaph Records
Epitaph Records is a Hollywood, California based independent record label owned by Bad Religion guitarist Brett Gurewitz. The label was originally "just a logo and a P.O. box" created in the 1980s for the purpose of selling Bad Religion records, but has evolved into a large independent record...
.
The Real Thing (Russell Morris song)
"The Real Thing" is a song originally recorded by Australian singer Russell Morris in 1969. His version, which was produced by Ian "Molly" Meldrum and written by Johnny Young, was a huge hit in Australia and has become an Australian rock classic...
(1969) by Russell Morris
Russell Morris
Russell Norman Morris is an Australian singer-songwriter who had five Australian Top 10 singles during the late 1960s and early 1970s...
. The high beats per minute blip of mainstream Electronic music
Electronic music
Electronic music is music that employs electronic musical instruments and electronic music technology in its production. In general a distinction can be made between sound produced using electromechanical means and that produced using electronic technology. Examples of electromechanical sound...
in Australia appeared in the early 1980s with Severed Heads
Severed Heads
Severed Heads is an Australian electronic music group based and founded in Sydney in 1979 as Mr. and Mrs. No Smoking Sign. The original members were Richard Fielding and Andrew Wright, and were soon joined by Tom Ellard. Fielding and Wright eventually left the group, leaving Ellard as a singular...
' Lamborghini. Severed Heads
Severed Heads
Severed Heads is an Australian electronic music group based and founded in Sydney in 1979 as Mr. and Mrs. No Smoking Sign. The original members were Richard Fielding and Andrew Wright, and were soon joined by Tom Ellard. Fielding and Wright eventually left the group, leaving Ellard as a singular...
formed in 1979 and were the first electronic group to play the Big Day Out
Big Day Out
The Big Day Out is an annual music festival held in several cities in Australia and New Zealand in late January. It started in Sydney in 1992, spread to Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth by 1993, with the Gold Coast and Auckland joining in 1994...
. The band achieved long term success, winning an ARIA Award in 2005
ARIA Music Awards of 2005
The 19th Annual Australian Recording Industry Association Music Awards were held on 23 October 2005 at the Sydney Superdome at the Sydney Olympic Park complex, thus continuing the previous year's innovation of televising the awards on Sunday evening...
for "Best Original Soundtrack" for The Illustrated Family Doctor, where lead singer Tom Ellard
Tom Ellard
Thomas Ellard , is an Australian electronic musician best known as the founding member of the electronic and industrial music group Severed Heads.-Early life:...
said the band would never fit into mainstream music.
Electronic rock
Traditional rock bands such as RegurgitatorRegurgitator
Regurgitator are an Australian rock band from Brisbane, currently consisting of Quan Yeomans , Ben Ely and Peter Kostic . The band formed in 1994, its original line-up consisting of Yeomans, Ely and drummer Martin Lee...
have developed an original sound by combining heavy guitars and electronic influences, and rock-electro groups, most notably Rogue Traders
Rogue Traders
Rogue Traders are an Australian electronic pop rock band fronted by Melinda "Mindi" Jackson with James Ash on keyboards, Tim Henwood on guitars and Peter Marin on drums. The group's original members met in London in 1989. Before forming Rogue Traders, Ash and Davis worked together on many...
, have become popular with mainstream audiences. However, Cyclic Defrost
Cyclic Defrost
Cyclic Defrost is Australia's only specialist electronic music magazine. It is edited by Sebastian Chan, Shaun Prescott and Alexandra Savvides, and covers independent electronic music, avant-rock, experimental sound art and left field hip hop....
, the only specialist electronic music magazine in Australia, was started in Sydney (in 1998) and is still based there. Radio
Radio
Radio is the transmission of signals through free space by modulation of electromagnetic waves with frequencies below those of visible light. Electromagnetic radiation travels by means of oscillating electromagnetic fields that pass through the air and the vacuum of space...
still lags somewhat behind the success of the genre—producer and artist manager Andrew Penhallow told Australian Music Online
Australian Music Online
Australian Music Online is a website that indexes information related to Australian music. Launched in March 2003 as an Australian Federal Government initiative, and originally proposed in 1998, the website was actively updated until 31 March 2007, at which point its role transferred to that of an...
that "the local music media have often overlooked the fact that this genre has been flying the flag for Australian music overseas".
In the late 2000s indie-electronic, indietronica
Indietronica
Indietronica is a music genre that combines indie, electronica, rock and pop music. Typical instruments used in indietronica music are electronic keyboard, synthesizer, sampler and drum machine...
and synthpop
Synthpop
Synthpop is a genre of popular music that first became prominent in the 1980s, in which the synthesizer is the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s and early 1970s by the use of synthesizers in progressive rock, electronic art rock, disco and particularly the "Kraut rock" of...
music rose in popularity, with Cut Copy
Cut Copy
Cut Copy are an Australian electronic band formed in 2001 by Dan Whitford on vocals, keyboard and guitar. Other members are Tim Hoey on guitar and sampler, Ben Browning on bass guitar and Mitchell Scott on drums. Their second album, In Ghost Colours peaked at number-one on the ARIA Albums Chart in...
being a notable Australian export and touring internationally.
Further reading
- McFarlane, Ian. (1999). The Encyclopedia of Australian Rock and Pop. St. Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 1864487682.
- Biitch, Awesome. (2005). Pimp Magazine. St. Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin. ISBN 1864487682.
- Edited by Shane Homan and Tony Mitchell (2008). "Sounds of then, sounds of now: Popular music in Australia", ACYS Publishing. ISBN 1875236602.
External links
- Australasian popular music of the 1960s and 1970s
- Listen to an excerpt of 'Jailanguru Pakarnu' and read more about it on australianscreen online
- 'Jailanguru Pakarnu' was added to the National Film and Sound Archive's Sounds of Australia Registry in 2007