Australian Music Industry Research Articles

Australia

In this contribution, we provide a brief overview of the development of Hip Hop culture in Australia, looking specifically at rap and breaking (breakdancing). We show how Australian rap has for a long time been dominated by white Australian artists attempting to solidify an Aussie Hip Hop identity distinct from the United States. Because rap from Indigenous and Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CaLD) communities did not fit the tropes of dominant (white) Australian culture, and were instead disregarded as simple mimicry of African American rap, the gatekeepers of Aussie Hip Hop for a long time locked out these minority artists. This created a divide in the rap scene that reflected broader Australian racial politics. In contrast, the breaking community has historically been more inclusive and reflective of a multicultural Australia, and has been more connected with the breakers of North America, Europe and Asia. In this contribution, we demonstrate how Australian Hip Hop has evolved over the past two decades to be more culturally inclusive, supported by key Australian artists, community radio, social media and finally validated by the Australian music industry as a distinct musical genre worth celebrating.

Experiences and perceptions of gender in the Australian music industry

This article reports results from an online survey (n=207) about experiences and perceptions of gender from those working in the Australian music industry. Taking a feminist approach, theory on gender and hegemonic masculinity is used to discuss power in a gendered context in this industry. Literature shows women and girls experience a range of difficulties in the music industry worldwide, such as negative assumptions about their skill levels. The small body of research on gender and the Australian music industry has discussed topics such as the forgetting of women in Australian popular music history. Results reported in this article show that women’s worst experiences most often related to sexual violence or unwanted sexual advances; and men’s most often related to money. Findings contribute to the field by providing gendered analysis of self-reported data in an under-researched industry.

The Australian music industry’s mental health crisis: media narratives during the coronavirus pandemic

How has the Australian music industry’s mental health crisis played out in the media during the coronavirus pandemic? This commentary article considers a snapshot of media reports about this issue. We survey print and online media, press releases, official websites, online seminars and social media from March to June 2020. During this time, the industry has faced financial loss, job insecurity and anxiety for the future of Australian music, thus placing unprecedented strain on an industry already characterised by poor mental health. We identify four key narratives communicated by the media, which we call (1) acknowledging grief and loss, (2) supporting creativity and well-being, (3) adapting to the new normal and (4) envisaging a post-pandemic future. These narratives illustrate overarching concern for music industry workers’ mental health and also the provision of helpful strategies for managing these issues.

#metoo 2.0 to #meNOmore: Analysing Western Reporting About Sexual Violence in the Music Industry

ABSTRACTIn October 2017, #metoo 2.0 reinforces the gendered sexual violence in the creative sector [Marghitu, 2018. “It’s Just art: Auteur Apologism in the Post-Weinstein era”, Feminist Media Studies, 18(93): 491–494] Building on this movement, on 11 November that year, 2912 women “testified about the situation in the Swedish music industry”, signing an open letter condemning sexual violence [Nyheter, 2017. “2192 Women in the Swedish Music Industry Behind Appeal Against Sexism.” Dagens Nyheter, November 17. https://www.dn.se/kultur-noje/2192-women-in-the-swedish-music-industry-behind-appeal-against-sexism/]. After the Swedish initiative, on 12 December 2017, the #meNOmore hashtag was established by 1000 women who signed an open letter to the Australian music industry speaking out against similar behaviour [Whyte, 2017a. “Artists Speak Out Against Sexual Harassment in the Music Industry.” AM – ABC Radio, December 13. https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/am/sexual-harassment-in-the-music-industry/9253956]. Using a content analysis framework, this study examines the media framing of 26 stories about #meNOmore by the Western press from 22 November 2017 (height of the Swedish campaign) to 21 December 2017 (a week after the hashtag surfaced in Australia). Research from journalism studies and musicology highlights that sexual violence is historically engrained in the media and music industries. However, findings from our study of the first month’s coverage of the #meNOmore content analysis in 2017 reveal that media reports about women and sexual violence were framed around addressing gender inequality and systemic structural issues in the music industry. This raises the question, has the media has turned a corner when covering sexual violence in the post #metoo era?

Building on #MeToo and #MeNoMore: Devising a framework to examine sexual violence in Australian music journalism

Allegations against film producer Harvey Weinstein, co-owner of US entertainment company Miramax Films, which led to the revitalized #MeToo movement of October 2017, gave global recognition to the sexual violence (sexism, misogyny, sexual harassment, assault and rape) that women experience in the creative industries. As a spin-off, the #MeNoMore campaign in December 2017 resulted in more than 400 women working in the Australian music industry speaking out against similar behavior. Despite having a reputation for sexual violence, the local music press played a minor role in this hashtag development, claiming that its practices are tied to radical, liberal and progressive values. In the post-Weinstein, #MeToo and #MeNoMore era, this contradiction signifies that the Australian music press is fertile ground for a feminist investigation. However, to date minimal local research has examined the link between sexual violence and music journalism. As a literature review to a larger empirical case study, this article draws on a critical discourse analysis from the post-feminist wave of media research into rockism, poptimism, punk, rap, hip hop, dubstep and electronic dance music genres, mainly conducted in the United States and United Kingdom. Derived from this analysis, the article argues that there are four framing techniques associated with music journalism practice in Australia: gendered music press, a masculine attitude towards music reporting, gendered musical tastes and gendered sexual harassment.

Aesthetic cosmopolitan, national and local popular music heritage in Melbourne’s music laneways

There are currently few examples of popular music being officially celebrated as heritage in Australia. Interest in this area is growing, however, and this paper examines how Melbourne, the capital of the state of Victoria, has recently named three laneways after rock artists, namely, AC/DC Lane, Amphlett Lane and Rowland S. Howard Lane. Using interview and observational data collected at the laneways, we demonstrate that these spaces respectively reflect aesthetic cosmopolitan heritage (AC/DC Lane), national heritage (Amphlett Lane), and sub-national heritage (Rowland S. Howard Lane). The number of visitors to these laneways varies greatly across the sites, and reflects the national and international success of the artist commemorated. The laneways’ success as commemorative sites is also related to intersections of globally circulating ideas about what constitutes ‘rock’, what urban spaces should look or feel like, and how heritage is expected to be enacted (especially for tourists). Within this field, there are specifics relating to the Australian music industry that appear to find clear reflection in the sites chosen and their level of success as memorial spaces.

Gender, Popular Music and Australian Identity

This introduction gives an overview of the limited literature that is available on the subject of gender and popular music in the Australian context. Despite demonstrable ongoing gender disparity in the Australian music industry, very little academic attention has been paid to this issue. This special edition aims to at least partly address this gap. This opening article introduces the texts for the special issue, and places them into a framework that will demonstrate the relevance and importance of the special issue in terms of finding space for the debates on gender in this field.

Access, Place and Australian Live Music

The role of place in cultivating artistic practice, communities and audiences is well established and the economic, social and cultural benefits that flow from this are becoming better understood. By contrast, the factors impacting and influencing access to these places is poorly theorised. This paper identifies and examines these factors as they apply to live music in Australia, through a qualitative survey of live music patrons and venues. We compare the themes identified from our data with existing theories of access in the arts, with a particular focus on the ways in which place-based music scenes may encourage or exclude participation. We address the question of how access affects participation within these scenes, as well as how access might be improved.

It Ain't Necessarily So

If Australian music industry studies were to be considered as those produced locally within the academic domain, then we could count them on the fingers of one hand. This short review of literature in the field of Australian music and record industry studies highlights the paucity of local! y published material and seeks to establish directions in which a music industry study can proceed.

Keeping It Real? Authenticity, Commercialisation and Family in Australian Country Music

Keeping It Real? Authenticity, Commercialisation and Family in Australian Country Music

Youth, radio and Australian popular music policy

Following its extensive Australian Music on Radio Inquiry conducted between 1982 and 1988, the Australian broadcasting regulator concluded that commercial radio had a responsibility to support the development of Australian music but its own systems for ensuring they fulfilled that responsibility were insufficient. While, as an objective of broadcasting policy the support for Australian music intersected with the federal government’s interest in aiding the development of the local music industry, the government’s concurrent interest in deregulating the broadcasting sector impeded the ability of regulator to address its regulatory deficiencies. In this article I explore how the objective to encourage radio to support the development of the Australian music industry generated a key rationale for the development of non-commercial youth radio services that translated into establishment of the ABC Triple J youth radio network in the 1990s and a set of independent youth community radio stations in the early 2000s.

Breaching the Profession: The Musicians' Union of Australia, Immigrant Musicians and the Post-World War II Australian Music Industry

For four decades of the twentieth century, the Musicians' Union of Australia sought to prevent any foreign musicians from working in Australia. In the years immediately following the Second World War, the Union found itself at odds with the government-sponsored mass immigration program that, for the first time, brought large numbers of non-British European immigrants to the country. This article documents the Union's efforts to secure government endorsement of restrictions on musician immigration and to impose nationality quotas on the Australian Broadcasting Commission's symphony orchestras. Local support for immigrant musicians and the eventual dismantling of forty-year discriminatory Union procedures is charted.

Lobby Loyde: The G.O.D. father of Australian rock

This article contends that the influence of Australian rock musician Lobby Loyde has been overlooked by Australia’s popular music scholarship. The research examines Loyde’s significance and influence through the neglected sphere of his work (1966–1980) with The Coloured Balls, The Purple Hearts, The Wild Cherries, The Aztecs, Southern Electric, Sudden Electric and Rose Tattoo, and his role as producer in the late-1970s until his death. First, it explores how he has been discussed by his musical peers and respected Australian rock historians. Second, it details Loyde’s musical origins and work with early bands during the period in which he was first referred to as Australia’s first guitar hero. Third, it investigates the career and influence of The Coloured Balls, their relationship with the 1970s youth subculture known as the ‘sharpies’, and the media-fuelled moral panic which surrounded both the band and the sharpies. Fourth, it assesses Loyde’s work as a producer in the 1980s, and late-in-life recognition by the Australian music industry. In doing so, the article shows the nature and importance of Loyde’s contribution to Australia’s popular music industry and discusses why he is only known to a strong but small fraction of the Australian public.

Becoming Yesterday: Changes in Music, the Music Industry and Musicians' Careers in 1960s Melbourne

The 1960s was a time of considerable musical change that largely established the shape of the Australian popular music industry until the beginning of the digital era. This article explores seismic shifts in Melbourne's music scene that resulted equally from changes in the local industry and musical developments occurring overseas, and the extent to which careers could be built beyond the brief cycle of commercial success, with extensive interviews documenting the varying fortunes of Melbourne and Melbourne-based musicians of the period. Performers' ability to cross over between commercial genres and fringe styles including country, jazz and folk, and the shifting commercial fortunes of these movements towards the end of the decade, are also discussed.

Technology, Copyright Law and the Future: The Contemporary Australian Music Industry

Technology, Copyright Law and the Future: The Contemporary Australian Music Industry

Classic Hits in a Digital Era: Music Radio and the Australian Music Industry

Often the ‘forgotten’ form in media and cultural studies, contemporary music radio remains a significant presence in the daily pleasures of Australians. This paper briefly explores the current regulatory, technological and cultural challenges confronting the local music radio industry. The music format is taken as the key source of engagement between station, advertiser and audience, at the intersection of relationships with the music industry. As the music radio industry is forced to question its traditional modes of delivery and reception, it is argued that a re-examination of the role of contemporary music formats within wider local music infrastructure is needed, particularly in the development and presentation of new artists and music genres, and radio's role in the maintenance of ‘heritage’/canonical artists and genres.

Off World Sounds: Building a Collaborative Soundscape

There are many ways to construct, shape and frame a history of popular music. From a focus on performers to a stress on cities, from theories of modernity to reveling in ‘the post,’ innovative music has been matched by evocative writing about it. One arc of analysis in popular music studies focuses on the record label. Much has been written about Sun, Motown, Factory and Apple, but there are many labels that have not reached this level of notoriety and fame but offer much to our contemporary understanding of music, identity and capitalism. The aim of this article is to capture an underwritten history of 21st century music, capturing and tracking moments of collaboration, movement and contact. Through investigating a specific record label, we explore the interconnectiveness of electronica and city-based creative industries’ initiatives. While urban dance culture is still pathologised through drug scares and law and order concerns, clubbing studies and emerging theories of sonic media and auditory cultures offer a significant trigger and frame for this current research. The focus on Off World Sounds (OWS) traces a meta-independent label that summons, critiques, reinscribes and provokes the conventional narratives of capitalism in music. We show how OWS has remade and remixed the collaborations of punk to forge innovative ways of thinking about creativity, policy and popular culture. While commencing with a review of the origin, ideology and intent of OWS, the final part of the paper shows where the experiment went wrong and what can be learnt from this sonic label laboratory.

New Feminist Approaches to Social Science Methodologies: An Introduction

New Feminist Approaches to Social Science Methodologies: An Introduction

Rock Dogs: Politics and the Australian Music Industry

Rock Dogs: Politics and the Australian Music Industry

Calling The Tune

This article follows-up a previous study - in the Spring 1995 issue of Convergence1 - which analysed the early development of music CD-ROMs with particular regard to Australian music industry initiatives. The 1995 study signalled the emergence of the Internet as a threat to the further development and exploitation of music CD-ROMs and noted that 'predictions as to when the Internet will effectively render music CD- ROMs redundant tend to opt for a five to 15-year period'.2 It also suggested that 'the two forms will be able to co-exist and complement each other (at least during a transitional stage).3 This article analyses these characterisations and conclusions with reference to the production and consumption of music CD-ROMs in Australia in the period 1995- 96. While the case studies offered here are specifically national, the analyses and prognoses are more generally applicable to the international music/media industry.