I know it’s nowhere near the Dismissal anniversary, but I couldn’t wait to share with LP readers this gem.. I stand to be corrected but I know of no other song that quite captures the mood of November-December 1975 like this one.
The band that played the song, Roaring Jack, were a celtic folk-thrash band that were very popular on Sydney’s inner city pub circuit in the late 1980s. Their frontman Alistair Hulett subsequently recorded a series of solo albums and has since returned to his native Scotland where he continues to be a singer, songwriter and performer of note.
Is it perhaps more than just a curious coincidence that two of the pivotal events in Australian history – the Gallipoli campaign and the Dismissal – have been most eloquently interpreted in song by two Scottish-born songwriters – Eric Bogle (The Band Played Waltzing Matilda) and Alistair Hulett (The Ballad of ’75)?
I was living in NYC at the time.
Late one night a friend in NYC called me and told me that he’d heard on a radio news program that there was rioting in the streets in Australia.
That didn’t sound like the Australia that I knew and left so I went down to the Australian consulate in the Rockefeller Center the three mornings later to see if I could make sense of the whole thing.
A very polite librarian said that I could read the latest newspapers but I’d have to wait because they were being read by someone else.
That other person was Manning Clark who was at that time the holder of the Australian Studies Chair at Harvard University. He’d travelled by train from Boston to read those newspapers.
He later wrote about the incident.
It’s amazing how much communications have sped up in the last 35 years. Now we’d be straight on to the manifold, instant web sources.
Coincidence (of Scottish writers)? Yes.
But some musical traditions prize the “lament”.
Sans Scots, the Oz music industry loses quite a bit actually. No Easybeats, no Cold Chisel, no ACDC for a start.
Don’t forget the Dutch, FDB. (Vanda and Young)
Only Vanda was Dutch though, and he would never have amounted to nothin’ without the scots Young.
Alistair Hewlett has done a cracking version of The Internationale as well.
Just sayin’.
He has indeed, Paul B. It can be found here, along with Billy Bragg’s version.
Amazing song, Paul. Would be great to embed it in the post so you don’t need to click through to YT.
There’s another great Roaring Jack song, also on YouTube, called “The Old Divide and Rule”. Rollicking, furious and brilliant!
And the two events are connected with a third by date — the hanging of Ned Kelly
Great song. I also really like the quisintential Australian nature of our political crises which always include a comedian or two steaing the show.
that would be *steeling* the show, I love Norman.
oh my god, “stealing”. Okay I’m going now.
Thanks Casey! I’ve never seen that before.
Yes, that was the country I knew and left.
Rioting in the streets? Pffft.
Comedy and ridicule win every time.
Oh Katz it gets better. I can’t find it on you tube but when Gough says “Well may we say…etc” you get Norman’s head bobbing up and down behind him. I laugh so much I cry.
And yes, “quintessential”, I am aware. Look, I would like to truly apologise for my appalling spelling smistakes over the past few months. I do need to spellcheck it is true, but the real culprit is some spilt coffee over my keyboard some months ago as a result of somethng that infernal Fyodor said, and since then my laptop swaps vowels (it really likes to swap a’s and e’s) and deletes bits of words and duplicates whole passages. Some letters it doesn’t like at all, so I have to find them from something someone else said and copy and paste them. I was hopeing it would fix itself until I could buy an Apple. As you do. But, rather than torture LP and myself any further, I will kill this sick puppy and I will get a new keyboard. Sorry for the derail. I just needed to explain. I would also like to find out Sideshow’s address to send him the bill , but I would have more chance of curing the keyboard by praying to Mary MacKillop.
Anyway, back on topic, so were Austalians anywhere close to rioting with the Dismissal? or was that just an urban myth???
Casey, put this picture as your desktop wallpaper.
And be sure to tell Kevin if your computer enjoys any improvement.
The viability of the Australian tourist industry depends on favourable results.
Casey, there was angry, but polite demos, but no rioting in the streets. Hawke actually went out of his way to defuse the situation within union ranks, but who’s gonna riot when you’ve got Norman Gunston taking the piss?
Get yourself a Mac as soon as you can afford one, your life will be better.
FDB, you can’t have one of the Vandas and Youngs without the other.
That Norman Gunstone episode was brilliant. For starters, he had to get down to Parl’t House, grab a front pozzie, then ad lib. Fan-bloody-tastic.
The other moment I loved (on a non-Aussie theme): Norman G attends a Paul McCartney press conference. Paul & Linda up on a raised platform. Norman gets the lad’s attention, then looks across at Linda and says to Paul, “SDhe doesn’t LOOK Japanese!”. Mr McCartney, after a brief pause, can’t stop laughing for at least 20 seconds. Comedy gold.
*She*
I now have Mary MacKillop as a screensaver and everyone is looking at me strangely. Yes, Fine. I agree. Apparently Apples have no issues, ever.
She is cross and she has a strap. Run.
Whoops, make that…
Jesus, Katz! That’s enough to give a small child nightmares. She was a grim-looking woman, even for a nun.
“Is it perhaps more than just a curious coincidence that two of the pivotal events in Australian history – the Gallipoli campaign and the Dismissal – have been most eloquently interpreted in song by two Scottish-born songwriters – Eric Bogle (The Band Played Waltzing Matilda) and Alistair Hulett (The Ballad of ‘75)?”
Perhaps more – do you realize that Eric Bogle and Alistair Hulett and Gough Whitlam are never seen together?
“Is it perhaps more than just a curious coincidence that two of the pivotal events in Australian history – have been most eloquently interpreted in song”
yep – I remember Star Hotel, and Love to Have a Joint With Willy.
Can we have a song dedicated to Jim Cairns? Called “Jeez This Is Some Bad Weed! Great! Now Let’s Do The Budget!”.
Norman Gunston is from Wollongong, so “steeling” is appropriate.
I really like this song, I want to say Thanks Casey! I’ve never seen that before.
Ta Paul – that was a beauty
I got a request, probably very obscure – I was knocking around Sydney late 80s, there was this Irish band outfit that got the odd gig in the city – they sang a ‘Ballad to the AE1′ which got a few submariners there at the time, me one of them. Unfortunately, I partook probably a little too much of the grog available to remember any further details
If anyone should have any further details, I’d be much grateful
Love the music (though it is a bit too much like a hard rock interpretation of what could be a very catchy tune), shame about the singing. Starts okay, but he degenerates into more or less bellowing into the microphone.
Can’t make out most of the lyrics, making it a bit difficult to “get” the specifics. The general idea of the song isn’t hard to catch.
“Australia’s voted in a revolution, don’t let the buggers push us out”. That is incitement, not history.
It’s also high time that a folk song was writ in homour of L’il Johhny Howard. Don;t you think? C’arn it needs to be done. I think we need to make it a bit of High Culture considering how stiff the guy’s upper lip is. Let’s pay homage to political philosophy.
.
I know we’ll call it Second Rate and Lucky
.
We also need one for Paul Keating. Punk rock of course.
That is incitement, not history.
.
Or mythology?
Alistair Hulett died last night after a short illness in Glasgow.
That’s very sad news, Chav. That means we’ve lost two great – albeit in different ways – songwriters and performers in Kate McGarrigle and Alistair Hulett within 11 days of each other.
Yes, there will be a lot of sadness on the Left today unfortunately.
I’m treating my shock and sorrow with Whisky and his back-catalogue. Ally had been very unwell and in hospital for the past few weeks, but this came as a quick and very nasty shock.
I guess I’m outta touch but there’s a contemporary thing happening that I’ve started hearing here and there which is ‘”Waltzing Matilda” sung in an Indigenous language. There are two versions around – accomapanied (three people) and unaccompanied with a few in the chorus and one absolutely magical dominant female voice in lead. They both rollick along. Resinging the history of the nation and the landscape in native tongues. Amazing. Perfect. The rest of the country should follow that lead. I’m suspecting that the unforseeable effects of apology and healing may be sprouting here.
Otherwise I’m gonna nominate a local band in Newcastle who played the last night of the Star Hotel. The Heroes. Standing behind a bar on a raised stage in impossibly close quarters these guys rocked the joint with covers. The last night I could go on about and I’ll spare you with only one comment: Newcastle, rightwing labor to its core, would let all kinds of shit go down but close the pub early when we’re several thousand strong and drunk as hell. Of course we rioted. I met the kid’s mother in the course of fund raising for a defence committee legal costs for those charged with rioting. Bloody good cover band, eh?
Oh. And Chain. The loudest driving white boy blues outfit. Used ta’ drive down to some roadside pub around about the Central Coast to hear them. And Wendy Waddington.
Hmmm. On a rollnow: Chrissie Amphlett and the Divinyls. chrissie live at some dive tavern in Newc’s wearing that schoolgirl box pleat dress in front of a whole audience of working class blokes clutching their schooners like they’d never held anything else since they let go of mama’s tit. Man that was wild.
Thanks Chav.
My last sight of Alistair was absurdly romantic, his guitar slung over his back looked like a part of him as he walked, one arm welcomed a companion to his side and the other wielded a bottle. Troubadour Incarnate.
dylwah,
I have a near-identical memory (less the bottle).
Yeah, he certainly looked the part Wombo
AN@39: Slip of the digit no doubt, that’s be Wendy Saddington?
Oz History in Song?
I don’t know if AH did it in his sets, but well he might, and with a gesture to FB@10: Waylon Jennings’ contribution and comment on The Australian Condition, historical antecedents thereof, is on the money: “If anyone does something new, Or does what you would like to do, And if the troopers don’t know who, Blame It On The …
The ALP-Aid song that played a big part in actually changing Australia
n history, you can have as a high quality 16mb download fromhttp://media.aso.gov.au/titles/alpitsti/alpitsti1_pr.mp4
Surpisingly funky it was too, and how could it not work with with the entire cast of Bellbird in shot, or being penned by the genius that convinced us we were Weetbix kids, and TAA really (really) was the friendly, friendly way?
‘Only 19′? ‘Little Things’?
Blame It On the…
Kellys
Danny @43: Saddington indeed. Terrible typo on my part. ‘Only 19′ of course! Great song and one that managed to narrow the gap a little between those who went and those who refused.