features

  • 0

    The ‘queering’ of Hobart’s monuments

    First published in The Guardian, June 2016

    Taped to a wall at Long Gallery in Salamanca Place in Hobart is a 2005 essay by historian Marilyn Lake about Tasmanian monuments. Key sentences are marked in highlighter. “For God and Empire. King and Country.” “There are no statues of women in Tasmania.” ...

  • 0

    ‘The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic’ (review)

    First published in the Australian Book Review, June 2016

    Were I to mimic the style of Chicago-based music critic Jessica Hopper, we’d be off and running by now, or grappling with a question that had bulleted straight to the topic’s heart. When this anthology’s 42 think-pieces, reviews, and ephemera first appeared in Village Voice, Chicago Reader, SPIN and elsewhere, a few words of context may have preceded each of them. Here, we just have bald beginnings such ...

  • 0

    Music You Missed: Jan, Feb, March – 2016

    First published in The Guardian, April 2016

    Victoria’s Golden Plains festival celebrated its 10th anniversary in March. The line-up featured Sleater-Kinney, the Buzzcocks and Violent Femmes but it was Australian acts Royal Headache, No Zu, the Necks and Black Cab that thrust enthusiasm into ecstasy. ...

  • 0

    10 great Australian albums that flew under the radar in 2015

    First published in the The Guardian, December 2015

    If the Australian music tree of life were illuminated where the money flowed, only a twig or two would light up. The root structure, trunk and sturdy branches consist of volunteers. ...

  • 0

    Broken Heel festival: ‘Even Australia’s founding fathers dressed in drag’

    First published in The Guardian, September 2015

    As a kid, Anthony Carthew watched Mad Max 2 car chases from his front door. It was 1981 and the crew was staying in the outback town of Broken Hill and filming on Silverton Road where Carthew lived. “We had a property on the edge of town,” he says. “Out the back door, the red dirt went on forever with the saltbush and sunsets.” Now, ...

  • 0

    Culture and politics merge for Garma Festival

    First published in The Guardian, August 2015

    Held on an escarpment in north-east Arnhem Land, the Garma festival site is called Gulkula in Yolngu language. Traditionally owned by the Gumatj clan, it overlooks a pandanus and stringybark forest that ends at the Arafura sea. It has long been a place for clans to gather and talk. Garma’s three-day key forum honours that spirit of discussion, causing long-timers to claim it is more ...

  • 0

    Lawrence English: our relationship with sound is problematic

    First published in The Guardian, August 2015

    When a rat runs over Lawrence English’s foot, it’s a shock to both of us. For English, because the rat is “the size of a small cat”. For me, because I’m returned to a here and now our conversation has seen me slip from. “I’m interested in the idea of the body as an ear,” English continues. “I want to explore the point at which ...

  • 0

    Barunga comes bittersweet full circle

    First published in Australian Book Review, June 2015

    Opposite the outdoor basketball court, the Karungkarni Arts Centre is selling dot paintings by Gurindji woman Biddy Wavehill. Later at the riverside acoustic stage, Peter Garrett steps unexpectedly from the long grass to sing ‘From Little Things Big Things Grow’ with Paul Kelly – a song about the Wave Hill walk-offs in the 1960s lead by Gurindji man Vincent Lingiari. At the Barunga Festival in ...

  • 0

    Barunga Festival: Gurrumul, Paul Kelly, B2M and Briggs

    First published on ABC Arts, June 2015

    Barunga Festival’s 30th anniversary pulled big crowds, ecstatic performances and a tour lead by Indigenous kids that epitomised the hope captured in the lyrics of Paul Kelly and Kev Carmody’s song ‘From Little Things Big Things Grow’. An hour from Katherine, Barunga Festival is the Northern Territory’s largest and longest-running remote community festival. Held on the Queen’s Birthday Weekend – between the seasons of Banggarrang ...

  • 0

    Music festival stages stacked in favour of men = bad news for all

    First published on The Guardian, March 2015

    Even before Wednesday’s announcement of Sydney’s Vivid Live music lineup featuring all-male headliners it had been a bad year for women at festivals. For the women overlooked and also those in the crowd looking up. When stages are stacked in favour of men, it’s a bad outcome for both. Let’s be clear why. It denies female musicians the mass crowd exposure only a festival can ...