A Music Victoria study finds Melbourne hosts 62,000 live concerts annually, making it one of the live music capitals of the world. [1] Victoria is host to more than three times the live performance national average, making it the live music capital of the country. Melbourne is host to more music venues per capita than Austin, Texas. [2]
The Esplanade Hotel, built in 1878, one of the earliest, largest and most prominent 19th century resort hotels in Victoria, has served as a venue for various styles through the 20th century. Between 1920 and 1925, the "Eastern Tent Ballroom" constructed to the rear of the site became an important jazz venue and dance venue in St Kilda, one of the main entertainment districts in Melbourne at the time. In the 1970s, the hotel's Gershwin Room, a grand dining room, was turned into a disco, complete with flashing Saturday Night Fever-style dance floor. Since the 1970s, it has hosted primarily rock-related acts and is currently the longest continuously running live music venue in Australia. [3]
The Keep The Vineyard Live body, supported by Australian music giants like Mental As Anything's Greedy Smith, Molly Meldrum, Triple M radio's Mieke Buchan and Underbelly actor Damian Walshe-Howling, who together with SLAM , packed the St Kilda Town Hall chamber for an emotional council meeting on the matter. The rally attracted the attention of the state government whom, on 28 June 2010 at the 11th hour, sent an express letter to councillors indicating its support for the continuation of the St Kilda live music venue, and thus swayed the council's decision to retain The Vineyard Bar as a live music venue. [4]
Melbourne's popular, commercial music scene has fostered many internationally renowned artists and musicians. The 1960s gave rise to many performers including Olivia Newton-John, John Farnham, Graeme Bell, and folk group The Seekers. The 1970s and 1980s saw many acts getting their first big breaks on Melbourne's Countdown, including the Little River Band, Mondo Rock, Australian Crawl, The Uncanny X-Men and Crowded House who later wrote a song about the city of Melbourne called Four Seasons In One Day. Successful Melbourne artists include Hunters & Collectors, Nick Cave, Flea (of the Red Hot Chili Peppers), Gotye and Something for Kate. Melbourne is also the home of music journalist and commentator Ian "Molly" Meldrum.
More recent notable Melbourne acts include Jet, Rogue Traders, Taxiride, Missy Higgins, Madison Avenue, Anthony Callea, The Living End and The Temper Trap. Melbourne-based television shows Young Talent Time and Neighbours gave many singers a launching pad to international success. Local talents to come from these shows include Kylie Minogue, Dannii Minogue, Tina Arena, Jamie Redfern and Jason Donovan. Another Music TV show that began in Melbourne was Turn It Up!. It was first shown on Melbourne's Channel 31 and then relayed via satellite and rebroadcast terrestrially to major TV networks in over 22 countries. The show had the second largest viewing audience around the world, beaten only by the audience of American Bandstand. In one episode, the show presented Melbourne's annual festival Moomba to a world audience.
Melbourne has one of the most extensive and successful alternative, DIY, avant-garde, experimental, independent music scenes in the world. A variety of factors including a relative abundance of venues, independent record labels, music street press, and strong support from local community radio (such as PBS, 3RRR, 3CR, 3SYN), have enabled the city to enjoy a depth, diversity and longevity of independent music not seen in other Australian cities. Melbourne's independent music industry has been the subject of two documentary films, Sticky Carpet in 2006 and the DIY film Super8 Diaries Project in 2008. Some of the most important and influential alternative artists emerged from Melbourne in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Post-punk band The Birthday Party are one of "the darkest and most challenging post-punk groups to emerge in the early '80s." One act from Melbourne, Dead Can Dance, a duo, mixed Dark Wave with classical music, thus founding the genre Neoclassical Dark Wave . Other notable independent artists from Melbourne include: Cut Copy, The Drones, TISM, Eddy Current Suppression Ring, Rowland S. Howard, Dirty Three, The Avalanches and The Great Elevator. [5]
The Little Band scene is the name given to an experimental post-punk scene which flourished in Melbourne's inner suburbs from 1978 until early 1981. [6] Led by Primitive Calculators and Whirlywirld, the scene involved many short-lived bands which often changed names and lineups, sometimes on a weekly basis. Approximately 50 people were in playing little bands during the scene's creative peak, including members of Dead Can Dance, Hunters & Collectors and Boom Crash Opera. The scene served as the backdrop of the 1986 cult film Dogs in Space .
The term "dolewave" was coined in the early 2010s to describe a Melbourne indie scene featuring Dick Diver, Twerps, Scott & Charlene's Wedding, and other groups. Courtney Barnett later became associated with the scene.
Many musical acts have written music with their origins, suburbs or Melbourne in general as their subject matter. Singer Paul Kelly wrote several well-known songs about aspects of the city close to the heart of many Melburnians, notably "Leaps and Bounds" and "From St Kilda to King's Cross", while bands like Australian Crawl and Skyhooks wrote some more tongue-in-cheek songs about Melbourne; "Balwyn Calling", "Carlton (Lygon Street Limbo)" and "Toorak Cowboy" are examples. The Living End wrote a song entitled "West End Riot" about differences between eastern and western suburbs in Melbourne's inner city.
The American state of New Jersey is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic region.
St Kilda is an inner seaside suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 6 km south-east of the Melbourne central business district, located within the City of Port Phillip local government area. St Kilda recorded a population of 19,490 at the 2021 census.
Australian indie rock is part of the overall flow of Australian rock history but has a distinct history somewhat separate from mainstream rock in Australia, largely from the end of the punk rock era onwards.
Rock music in Australia, also known as Oz rock, Australian rock and Aussie rock, is rock music from Australia. The nation has a rich history of rock music and an appreciation of the roots of various rock genres, usually originating in the United States or Britain, but also continental Europe, and more recently the musical styles of Africa. Australian rock has also contributed to the development of some of these genres, as well as having its own unique Australiana sound with pub rock and its indigenous music.
The Little Band scene was an experimental post-punk scene which flourished in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia from late 1978 until early 1981. Instigated by groups Primitive Calculators and Whirlywhirld, this scene was concentrated in the inner suburbs of Fitzroy and St Kilda, and involved large numbers of short-lived bands, more concerned with artistic expression than commercial success. Frequently changing names, swapping members and sharing equipment, the bands played in small inner-city venues, often pubs, and their music was recorded live and broadcast by radio announcer Alan Bamford on community station 3RRR. In the scene, the distinctions between performers and audience were blurred; many audience members were either in little bands or ended up forming such.
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. The books follows two decades of music, from punk, rock, alternative sound to garage-rock and grunge and integrates various first-person accounts from Walker's perspective as well as drawing upon interviews with artists during that time to illustrate the cultural history of Australian sound.
The Primitive Calculators are an Australian post-punk band, formed in Melbourne, Victoria in 1978. Described by British critic Everett True as sounding like "a very aggressive Suicide", the band is known for its mix of harsh guitar noise, fast and repetitive drum machine beats, and abrasive synthesizers. Along with fellow Melbourne act Whirlywirld, the Primitive Calculators played a leading role in founding the experimental Little Band Scene in the late 1970s, wherein both bands and numerous other acts formed large numbers of short-lived bands by frequently swapping members and inviting non-musicians to join in at live shows.
The Zorros were an Australian rock band, formed in 1979, comprising Nic Chancellor on lead vocals, Darren Smith on lead guitar, Alex Zammit on bass guitar and Greg Pedley on drums.
The Esplanade Hotel, commonly known locally as "The Espy", is a hotel and music venue in the inner bayside suburb of St Kilda, in the city of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Built in 1878, it overlooks Port Phillip from the Upper Esplanade. It is famed for its long history of live music, and served as the filming location for the live music trivia program Rockwiz.
Perth, the major city in Western Australia, has given rise to a number of notable performers in popular music. Some of the more famous performers include Kevin Parker, Troye Sivan, Rolf Harris, David Helfgott, Luke Steele and Tim Minchin. Notable artists in genres including rock, classical, and electronic music have lived in Perth.
The music of Cardiff has been dominated mainly by rock music since the early 1990s with later trends developing towards more extreme styles of the genre such as heavy metal and metalcore music. It, along with the nearby music scene in Newport, has brought a number of musicians to perform or begin their careers in South Wales.
Australian musicians played and recorded some of the earliest punk rock, led by The Saints who released their first single in 1976 and subgenres or offshoots of punk music, such as local hardcore acts, still have a strong cult following throughout Australia today.
Australian heavy metal music has its roots in both the Australian hard rock and pub rock tradition of the 1970s and the American and British heavy metal scenes. Since the mid-1980s, Australian heavy metal has been particularly influenced by foreign bands, particularly Swedish death metal, American thrash metal and black metal from Norway. Within Australia heavy metal has always remained part of the underground but since the mid-1990s many Australian metal acts have found widespread acceptance in overseas markets, particularly in Europe.
The Deakins were an Australian rock group which formed in 1963. This was the era of the local version of beat music; which included 1960s garage rock, proto-punk and pop. Their initial line-up included Jeff W Donoghue on bass guitar, Ian Kinkead on drums, and Bob Millar and Gary Schober on guitars. The later Deakins 'trio' released two singles in 1966, "Tonight You're Gonna Fall in Love with Me" and "Take Me for a Little While", via GO!!. The band regularly appeared on the related TV pop music weekly series, The Go!! Show, and on daily weekday show, Kommotion, both broadcast by ATV-0. The Deakins disbanded in 1973.
The culture of Melbourne, the capital of the Australian state of Victoria, encompasses the city's artistic, culinary, literary, musical, political and social elements. Since its founding as a British settlement in 1835, Melbourne has been culturally influenced by European culture, particularly that of the British Isles. During the 1850s Victorian gold rush and in the decades the immediately followed, immigrants from many other parts of the world, notably China and the Americas, helped shape Melbourne's culture. Over time, Melbourne has become the birthplace of a number of unique cultural traits and institutions, and today it is one of the world's most multicultural cities.
The Australian ska scene has existed since the mid-1980s, when it started enjoying the same sort of interest as it did in the United Kingdom, following the success of UK 2 Tone bands such as The Specials, The Beat and Madness.
Fitzroy Street is the major thoroughfare of the beachside Melbourne suburb of St Kilda. Its fortunes have risen and fallen along with that of St Kilda itself, from wealthy residential district to a popular working and middle class beachside entertainment district, to cheap and seedy, and popular again in the late 20th century. In recent years Fitzroy Street itself has gone from a popular restaurant strip to the situation in 2017 where only a few restaurants remain amongst kebab shops and convenience stores catering the backpackers and many empty shopfronts. It is named after Charles Augustus FitzRoy, Governor of New South Wales in 1842 when St Kilda was first subdivided.
The Crystal Ballroom was a music venue located within the Seaview Hotel on Fitzroy Street in St Kilda, an inner suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It has often been referred to as the centerpiece of Melbourne's post-punk movement, showcasing groups such as The Birthday Party, Dead Can Dance and Crime and the City Solution, as well as being a mainstay of the Little Band scene.
Bruce Milne is a prominent figure in the Australian music industry, a long-standing member of the grass-roots Melbourne music community who, after getting his start publishing a punk fanzine in the late 1970s, has done practically everything since – been a writer, radio presenter, DJ, run record shops, book shops and record labels, run bars and venues, and worked in A&R and as a tour promoter.
Dolores San Miguel was a music promoter and author from Melbourne, Australia.