Brisbane 1985 – 2010 (Thru Dodgey’s eyes) Part Three

This is part three of my recollection of being involved in the music industry in Brisbane 1985 -2010 – if you missed part two and one READ HERE first.

So in late 1988, against the backdrop of the conclusion of Brisbane hosting the World Expo 88, and in the thick of the Fitzgerald Inquiry (looking into a corrupt Police Service and Government), we had our first meeting in Brisbane’s City Hall to a group of locally based (skeptical) music product retailers.  The Australian Music Trade Association (AMTA) had sent up their President, who was also the Director of Yamaha, Mr Philip Burn.

To a small audience of about 30 – 40  interested parties, Johnny Morris Senior, Philip Burn and myself, spoke about unifying and creating a voice for music retailers to help improve the “music world” for all parties to work together on joint activities and promote the benefits of people to play music – and hence this would help “grow a larger pie” for all concerned.  In hindsight, it was not broadly  inclusive of many other areas of the industry and hence by 1991 this model of “just music retailers” was just too narrow a view.  I am getting ahead of myself, so I will continue on.

In the audience were local retailers, John Masson (Masson’s Music), Stan, Paul and Fred Ellaway (Ellaways Music), Barry Bull (Toombul Music), Mick Privitera, Gary Barr (Musicians Pro Shop/Australian Concert Productions), and a host of  other local store owners, interested wholesale and music related people.  I was still managing the Music Junction and not a store owner at this time,  so I was seen as a junior by the older members standards (I was only 30 years of age and many of my peers were decades older and had been dominating the city for many years).

From this meeting, we met regularly over the next few months to plan and set up the MIAQ inc (Music Industry Association of Q’ld Incorporated).  The Executive Committee was formed, which saw Johnny Morris (President), Mick Privitera (Treasurer), Barry Bull (Secretary) and myself (Workshop Co-ordinater).  Our first major project, we decided, was to run a large public music show at the RNA (Ekka showgrounds) and it was booked and secured for late September 1989.  Not only was I seeing a great opportunity to start my own dream business, but by early 1988 saw Brash’s (who had taken Palings over the year prior) they were losing ground and the local music businesses, by pulling together, wanted to leave this southern owned national company out of any of their plans for growing the industry.  Maybe this was a parochial thing to do – but new management at Brash’s were not interested in the local Queensland market.

I had a dream.  It was about having my own music store.   I was 31 and was married nine years, had two kids, a mortgage, couldn’t seem to get ahead and we had another child on the way.  I had no money to speak of, as most of us know when raising a family, and in 1989, interest rates on home loans had risen to 18+%.  There was negative talk in the media about a thing called a “Recession” – it was at this time in 1989 I chose to never read a newspaper, watch news on TV (or little TV for that matter) and turn off the news on radio.  This has been something I have never regretted to this day, as it enabled for me to focus positive thoughts on how to solve problems and think creatively rather than be bombarded by negative news that really have little to do with me or my family.

So after chatting about the dream of starting a music store with no money with Don Morrison, a local sales rep from a wholesale music company, Electric Factory, he suggested I be introduced to a fellow bass player, store owner, Nigel Line, who had purchased “Smithy’s Secondhand PA and Sound Gear” a few years ago off Neil Smith.  I put a basic plan together of my ideas and had some chats to a few (only five) music distributors.  My simple logic at the time was that I had left Palings in early 1987 to Music Junction.  In a little over the twelve months I had managed the store, we had increased the turnover (sales) significantly (by 80%).  I had discussed with the Music Junction owner, Palmi, about possibly getting some % of profits and he, rightly so, declined.  So – I believed that if  we started a music retail store with only a few distributors then we could at least do $800,000 sales in the first year (sounds a lot – but I will explain breakdowns later).  I met Nigel, we clicked, he loved the idea, as he was not into selling new products, only secondhand and some small hiring of PA’s.  Nigel also agreed with the supplier list (Fender, Yamaha, Electric Factory, Pro Music and Australian Monitor), focusing only on guitars, bass, amplification, PA and sound gear.

So in August 1989, Nigel and I set up Music Worx Pty Ltd and I had my $1000 holiday pay invested (my only savings) and $3500 borrowed reluctantly from my “in-laws”.  (I was sacked on the spot by Palmi – which caused my wife enormous grief with a bay due in several months, as I told her then about my dream to improve our lot in life – so she hung in for the ride).

With our combined capital invested of $9000, we went looking for a store front.   Nigel had his store, Smithy’s, in a backstreet in Gotha Street, Fortitude Valley and a vacant spot was available at the front on Barry Parade.  We kept it very quiet about our idea and I had not mentioned a word to Mick Privitera (Musicians Pro Shop) who was, at that time, playing car pool with me after meetings with the MIAQ.  His business was well established, however, he had done some strange deal with the Electro-Voice sound gear at World Expo in 1988, and he had run up a large debt with Yamaha Music as well.  Yamaha were keen to deal with us and Mick only found out it all when, accidentally, a Yellow Pages advert confirmation letter to Music Worx for 188 Barry Parade had ended up at 222 Barry Parade, Mick’s business address.  Needless to say, Mick had  made some demands to us that we ignored (and laughed about) and within a few months Mick had sold Musicians Pro Shop fully to Gary Barr and Nigel Dwyer (the legendary bass player from The Smokin’ Crawdads).

So, prior to all this going down, we had built a strong connection across the active music businesses in Brisbane and charged them all up about the public music show.  A letter had arrived at a meeting  and was presented by the President of the Queensland Recording Association (QRA), Murry Werne, from a lawyer, John Kenny, who had arrived from Sydney and wanted to know how he could assist the QRA and the new MIAQ.  His specialty was Intellectual Property (IP) and he had a loyal friendship with music industry heavy weight, Sebastion Chase, who had not only previously managed Dragon, Cold Chisel and Rose Tattoo, he had also come out of a nasty bust up with INXS’ Manager, Chris Murphy, over an indie record label in Sydney called – rooArt.

The city was heating up, a new music body, MIAQ, (dominated by music product retailers and aligned with QRA), a huge music show, a new music store (Music Worx) and a lawyer who had southern contacts.  I had mentioned briefly about Robert Brock in part two.  Rob was well on the way with his “rock school” concept with government, connecting the dots with the Dean of Southern Cross University (then the University of New England), Lismore – Professor Clive Pascoe.  Prof. Pascoe had the vision to develop a University to upskill contemporary musicians.  He broke away from the Sydney Conservatorium (Jazz Course) and set up with the help of former players from a well known Sydney band, Crossfire.   Clive also recruited a strong industry support network that included the likes of John Farnham, John Brommell, Glenn Wheatley, Rob Hirst (Midnight Oil), Jimmy Barnes and a host of many of Australia’s icons.

This was a very interesting time in Brisbane’s music history.  In 1987, Molly Meldrum had signed a young Brisbane band, Indecent Obsession, who were very rarely spoken about in local circles, as they were a teen pop band.  John Kenny had represented them and had asked them up to take questions at our new music show.   They had a hit song nationally in the top ten, so they were the only Brisbane act, at this time, we collectively knew who could help lift the lid on the truth about being in the music industry.

It was at this time, whilst still working at the Music Junction, I met for the first time, Ian Haug, who bought a new amp from me, as he was forming a new band, doing Zeppelin and Neil Young covers.  They called the band, Powderfinger, named after a song written and recorded by Neil Young, and they were part of  a new movement of single minded young bands, a new breed, about to change history as we all knew it – a wind of change was coming and no-one on the outside could see it come together until another seven years later.

But we could all feel it….somehow we all knew a serious change was about to come.  It affected each of us differently, but the change we could all smell in the air……………and it had a good new fresh smell.

To be continued in Part FOUR.

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