Welcome to Notes From Pig City. This is my online archive for as much of my journalism as I can keep up with. Published pieces will be reposted here as soon as they can be. I also write exclusively on my Patreon page; those pieces are not republished here.
I’m the author of two books: Pig City (2004), a book about Brisbane, and Something To Believe In (2019), a music memoir. I'm currently employed by AAP. I continue to freelance occasionally for other publications, mostly Guardian Australia, where it doesn't conflict with my full-time gig.
I have a wide variety of interests, and they’re reflected by the number of tabs in the main menu. You can click through those, or the archive list at the bottom to find what you might be interested in, whether you’re a casual visitor or looking for something specific.
If you want to get in touch send me a message here.
We were promised jetpacks. Instead, Gen X got neoliberalism, the New World Order and pre-millennium tension. To soothe it, we got Air’s Moon Safari, the 1998 space-age bachelor pad album that offered a nostalgic passport back to a future that never materialised in quite the way we expected. Immediately, Air (French duo Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoît […]
Air: Sydney Opera House, 26 May 2024 Read More »
There’s a classic Looney Tunes cartoon where Daffy Duck presents an act no other performer ever dared to emulate. Warning those with weak constitutions to leave the theatre, Daffy – dressed in a Lucifer onesie – consumes gasoline, nitro, a “goodly proportion” of gunpowder and uranium-238, then swallows a match and blows himself to smithereens. Cheered
Hoodoo Gurus’ Stoneage Romeos: still death-defying Read More »
Mick Harvey is looking back on the showreel of his life. It’s the video for his song When We Were Beautiful And Young, where startlingly intimate images – of his parents, backyard cricket, through to lifelong partner Katy Beale and their children – are mixed with footage of old friends, collaborators, the much-missed and dearly
Mick Harvey: Don’t Look Back Read More »
When a band that calls itself Regurgitator has managed to stay together for 30 years, you can’t really complain when they return to their own vomit. That’s just nominative determinism in action. So, a warning: their 11th full-length recording, Invader, may contain traces of their earlier work, especially Unit, their classic album from 1997. Of
Regurgitator: Invader Read More »
Shane Chidgzey is talking a mile a minute, sounding half street hustler, half tech bro. “I didn’t come from the music industry initially,” says the Sydney-based entrepreneur and owner of Brisbane’s The Zoo, one of Australia’s longest-running music venues. “I was looking for a way to disrupt, because I like to disrupt as a basis
The Zoo: No Rum, No Double-Shots, No Dickheads Read More »
Fifty years after their formation in Sydney, the vastly influential punk band Radio Birdman are preparing to call it a day, with a final series of Australian shows over winter culminating with a farewell gig in their home town. But is this really goodbye? Songwriter and guitarist Deniz Tek isn’t making promises. “The rationale is
Radio Birdman: Reign in Blood Read More »