Men at Work are an Australian rock band formed in Melbourne in 1978 and best known for breakthrough hits such as "Who Can It Be Now?" and "Down Under". Its founding member and frontman is Colin Hay, who performs on lead vocals and guitar. After playing as an acoustic duo with Ron Strykert during 1978–79, Hay formed the group with Strykert playing bass guitar and Jerry Speiser on drums. They were soon joined by Greg Ham on flute, saxophone, and keyboards and John Rees on bass guitar, with Strykert then switching to lead guitar. The group was managed by Russell Depeller, a friend of Hay, whom he met at La Trobe University. This line-up achieved national and international success during the early to mid 1980s. In January 1983, they were the first Australian artists to have a simultaneous No. 1 album and No. 1 single on the United States Billboard charts: Business as Usual and "Down Under" (1981), respectively. With the same works, they achieved the distinction of a simultaneous No. 1 album and No. 1 single on the Australian, New Zealand, and United Kingdom charts. Their second album Cargo was also No. 1 in Australia, No. 2 in New Zealand, No. 3 in the US, and No. 8 in the UK. Their third album Two Hearts reached the top 20 in Australia and top 50 in the US.
Colin James Hay is a Scottish-born Australian/American musician who emigrated to Australia in his youth. He is a singer, songwriter, and actor. He came to prominence as the lead vocalist of the band Men at Work and later as a solo artist. Hay's music has been used frequently by actor and director Zach Braff in his work, which helped a career rebirth in the mid-2000s. Hay has also been a member of Ringo Starr's Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band.
Larrikin is an Australian English term meaning "a mischievous young person, an uncultivated, rowdy but good hearted person", or "a person who acts with apparent disregard for social or political conventions".
Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis, better known as C. J. Dennis, was an Australian poet known for his humorous poems, especially "The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke", published in the early 20th century. Though Dennis's work is less well known today, his 1915 publication of The Sentimental Bloke sold 65,000 copies in its first year, and by 1917 he was the most prosperous poet in Australian history.
"Down Under" is a song recorded by Australian rock band Men at Work. It was originally released in 1980 as the B-side to their first local single titled "Keypunch Operator", released before the band signed with Columbia Records. Both early songs were written by the group's co-founders, Colin Hay and Ron Strykert. The early version of "Down Under" has a slightly different tempo and arrangement from the later Columbia release. The most well known version was then released on Columbia in 1981 as the third single from their debut album Business as Usual (1981).
Kenneth Norman Fletcher was an Australian tennis player who won numerous doubles and mixed doubles Grand Slam titles.
Larrikin Love were an English four piece indie rock band from London.
"Six Queens" was Larrikin Love's debut single, released on Young and Lost Club Records in September 2005. Although billed as a double A side with "Little Boy Lost", the greater popularity of the former among both fans and the band, and the fact that it had a music video made for it means that the release is usually simply referred to as just 'Six Queens'.
"Kookaburra" is a popular Australian nursery rhyme and round about the kookaburra. It was written by Marion Sinclair in 1932.
Michael "Micko" Joseph Larkin is an English musician, most notable as the lead guitarist of the indie rock band Larrikin Love and reformed Hole.
Tiny Dancers were an English band formed in Sheffield by vocalist David Kay, guitarist Chris "Ev" Etherington, bassist Dez Wathey, drummer Duncan "Zed" Morrison, and keyboardist David Glover. They formed in 2005 and were later signed to Parlophone.
Gregory Norman Ham was an Australian musician, songwriter, and actor, best known as a member of the 1980s band Men at Work. He played saxophone, flute, organ, piano, and synthesizer.
Robyn Archer, AO, CdOAL is an Australian singer, writer, stage director, artistic director, and public advocate of the arts, in Australia and internationally.
The Rank Strangers were an Australian bluegrass band that won multiple national and international awards during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Random House’s 1991 book Australian Country Music declared the Rank Strangers to be among the major figures of the 1990s Australian music scene, along with Keith Urban and country legend Slim Dusty. Australian Country Music observed that "the Rank Strangers have a musical immediacy that typifies the best of bluegrass and recalls such players as The Stanley Brothers and Bill Monroe."
Warren John Fahey AM is an Australian folklore collector, cultural historian, author, actor, broadcaster, record and concert producer, visual artist, songwriter, and performer of Australian traditional and related historical music. He is the founder of Folkways Music (1973), Larrikin Records (1974) and a folk music ensemble, the Larrikins (1975).
Larrikin Records is a record company founded in 1974 by Warren Fahey. Larrikin started as an independent label and was sold in 1995 to Festival Records.
The Rocks Push was a notorious larrikin gang, which dominated The Rocks area of Sydney from the 1870s to the end of the 1890s. In its day it was referred to as The Push, a title which has since come to be more widely used for cliques in general and the left-wing movement the Sydney Push.
A cabbage tree hat is a hat made from the leaves of the Livistona australis, also known as the cabbage-tree palm. It is known as the first distinctively Australian headwear in use. Seeking protection from the sun, early European settlers started to make hats using fibre from the native palm, which soon became popular throughout the colonies. The process involved boiling, then drying, and finally bleaching the leaves. The Powerhouse Museum describes a cabbage-tree hat thus: "Finely woven natural straw coloured hat; high tapering domed crown, wide flat brim; applied layered hat band of coarser plaiting with zig-zag border edges."
Christine Hutchinson is an Australian children's entertainer and magician. Her album Grand Fairies Ball was nominated for the ARIA Award for Best Children's Album in 1996 but lost to The Wiggles' Wake Up Jeff!, along with the accompanying song being nominated for the APRA Award for Most Performed Children's Work in the same year, but also lost to The Wiggles' accompanying song.
Bilby is a 2018 American computer-animated short film written and directed by Liron Topaz, Pierre Perifel and JP Sans in their directorial debuts, and produced by DreamWorks Animation. The film centers on a bilby trying to protect an albatross chick from the dangers of the Australian Outback.
