I bought this book when I was still studying in Brisbane, which was like, some seven years ago, during the Brisbane Writers’ Festival that year. Everyone was talking about it, being one of the few good books out there about the music scene in Australia, especially the music scene in Brisbane. It wasn’t until recently that I decided to pick up the book, the pages already gone brown and spotty, and give it a go. Maybe it was the sudden muse I had awhile back on writing a chronicle of sorts of the Malaysian music scene, and Pig City would be a great, and possibly the only, reference I can get inspired with.
Pig City chronicles the growth of the music scene in Brisbane, Australia, from the birth of punk – be it bands or medium – in Brisbane in the 70s, following the outbreak all the way across the globe in the United Kingdom, to the many musicians’ great exodus out of Brisbane to greener pastures in the thriving Sydney in the 80s, to the homegrown bands finally getting a break internationally in the 90s. Most of this all happened during what past political candidate for the Queensland Greens would call “a dark passage in the state’s history”, referring mainly to the premiership of one Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, the longest serving Premier of Queensland, who held office with a conservative iron fist from 1968 till 1987.
And that’s the collective theme of the book: music history that walks hand in hand with political history. How in the 70s, despite being in what could easily be deemed as a “police city”, pioneers like The Saints and The Go-Betweens were formed, as well as the then Guerrilla radio station 4ZZZ, then in the secure bosom of University of Queensland, and under the watchful eyes of Big Brother Joh and his preferential law and order against street protests and anything that’s not “in the books”. How in the 80s, inspired by the first generation of Brisbane punk, many bands were formed but then quickly fell apart, and rookie bands were faced with the choice of going to Sydney for more exposure, which for some, did not work out, as the ever indie 4ZZZ reeked of trouble when their finances ran low against the rising acid trend. How in the 90s, after Joh’s reign has ended, as Brisbane scrambled to find herself in between the more developed Melbourne and Sydney cities, Brisbane-based bands finally turned international heads with the becoming of Powderfinger and Savage Garden.
To be honest, I have never given Brisbane too much credit, compared to the more likeable Melbourne, for me anyway. I thought the city to be rather – dirtily sterile, if that oxymoron even makes sense. Maybe it’s just me, but the city seems to lack life. (You should have seen my surprise when I sauntered into the city district on a weekend to find it empty). Perhaps that would explain why I never felt the urge to stay back after I graduated. But people who know me better know that is not really the main reason. Hence, I never really took time to explore which are the Brisbane bands, and how they have shaped this pig city.
I suppose, compared to more flourished cities like Sydney and Melbourne, Brisbane has always been a tad behind, even back then, during the story timeline for Pig City, which judging from the book, it has everything to do with Bjelke-Petersen’s conservative premiership back then. After reading Pig City, it did open my eyes to a side of Brisbane I don’t really know. And I could have possibly missed what I would consider as Brisbane’s “most exciting times” by a breath, or at least the tail end of it, only heading there for tertiary education in 2006. By the time I got there, things were already fine and dandy, nothing too wild that I couldn’t handle. (In fact, the “wildest” thing I experienced was seeing a stark naked man running across the street in the middle of the night). As Stafford has put it at the end of his novel: “Now you could go to a gallery, go to a restaurant, go see a band, play in one yourself. No one was about to stop you trying.”
Fortunately, there is Pig City to look back on. Stafford pieced together the novel with such meticulous research, aligning everything that happened in the music world and the political world with such precision you would think it just happened yesterday. Stafford’s fluent narrative combined with interviews quotes from scattered band members gave readers a closer look at a band’s rise and fall, what happened before, during and after, everything that made and broke the band, as if they are your close friends, and you are getting personal narrations from them.
To give an example, I suppose, I would not have known what Savage Garden have gone through as they dwindled off the radar to oblivion. Who knew that despite the instant musical chemistry between Darren Hayes and Daniel Jones, things did not pan out for the long run simply because Daniel can’t be arsed with all the promotions and travelling. (That would explain why he was always at the back of music videos, or just not there at all). And the fact that their last chart topper ‘I Knew I Loved You’ is not as romantic as it sounds, and was practically churned out in seconds under managerial request for the next ‘Truly, Madly, Deeply’ to reign the Billboard charts. Who would have thought, eh?
I would say it’s a good book to read. I can’t imagine if Pig City has any specific occasion for it to be picked up and read by someone who is only interested in the tune and not the history, or by someone who generally doesn’t read, period. Unless Brisbane somehow has a place in your life, or a fan of music history. Like how you wouldn’t pick up Scar Tissue by Anthony Kiedis or go through the trouble of reading The Rolling Stones’ 50 year anniversary Views from the Inside, Views from the Outside – Part 1 ebook, unless you are even an inkling of a fan. I mean, it did take me seven years to read Pig City! But if you do have the time, don’t mind if you do to read it, because being accurate alone is enough to read Stafford’s articulately breezy work.
That being said, I could not help comparing Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s political resume to my country’s current Prime Minister, especially at such testing times nowadays. I wouldn’t say the reflection is uncanny, but you can’t help noticing that the consideration is there:
“His uncompromising conservatism, his political longevity, and his leadership of a government that, in its later years, was revealed to be institutionally corrupt, made him one of the best-known and most controversial political figures of 20th century Australia. Bjelke-Petersen’s Country (later National) Party controlled Queensland despite consistently receiving the smallest number of votes out of the state’s leading three parties, achieving the result through a notorious system of electoral malapportionment, or gerrymander, that gave rural votes a greater value than those cast in city electorates… Bjelke-Petersen was a divisive premier and earned himself a reputation as a ‘law and order’ politician with his repeated use of police force against street demonstrators, and strongarm tactics with trade unions, leading to frequent descriptions of Queensland under his leadership as a Nazi police state.”
– Wikipedia.org
Whilst the recounts of these street protests in Australia back then were more violent and worse than what the protesters have gone through during the Bersih 2.0 rally in 2011. Whilst their federal elections were more transparent, compared to our latest general election.
Perhaps Stafford is talking about some current Australian politician I do not know of, but his author’s note did end with this: “If liberty’s price really is eternal vigilance, our collective amnesia will ensure we see Bjelke-Petersen’s like again.”
Perhaps. This is it?
You can’t help but wonder, you know.
And who knows? Perhaps amidst all these political chaos happening, there would spring up from snow like daisies local indie bands worth talking about, and writing about decades from now. I guess I’d never know until I really get down on it, and start working on the book, eh?
Disclaimer: For the record, for those who don’t know, or those residing in Malaysia, this is a non-halal book. Safe for reading, nothing to do with a delicious Chinese delicacy that is not allowed for the Muslim religion. And no harm has been inflicted upon any live pigs of the sort. Sadly.
Backseat Radio II 