Tony Wellington Bundle Buy

Freak Out

Freak Out is Australia’s coming-of-age story, of how we as a nation were dragged into global culture by the unstoppable momentum of rock and pop music. The sixties was an era of extraordinary change and earth-shattering events. The music scene responded with popular anthems that reverberated across the planet. What’s more, the gun was fired on a period of unprecedented musical innovation and creativity, the likes of which have never been repeated.

Music spoke to young people in their own shared language, urging them to view themselves as decidedly separate from mainstream society – even suggesting they might ‘drop out’ altogether. For a brief time, millions of young people across western culture actually believed they could successfully reinvent society. Liberation for pacifists, women, people of colour, homosexuals, students and the oppressed seemed to be just a short revolution away.

There was no room for complacency or apathy in the face of the Cold War, Vietnam War, and the constant threat of nuclear annihilation. Australians may have been spared the fear of bomb blasts, assassinations and kidnappings; however, the ructions abroad invaded our national psyche, and the music that was generated in that milieu infiltrated Australian culture and transformed society forever.

Vinyl Dreams

After the dense miasma of the sixties, the seventies hit like a hangover. Idealism took a pounding as cynicism began to pervade Western culture. Stagflation, Watergate and a futile war in Vietnam all weakened faith in government, while environmental disasters and an oil crisis proved there was even more to worry about than a Cold War. A culture of ‘me’ began to replace the hippie ideal of universal love. Yet at the same time, women and the LGBTIQ+ community stepped forward to actively assert their rights.

This tumult saw remarkable changes in music. Rock splintered into dazzling shards as technical innovation propelled experimentation. Music became a visual spectacle via glam, shock rock, disco and punk. Musicians co-opted elements of classical, jazz, electronic, world and avant-garde music. Monumental albums were born: Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, Carole King’s Tapestry, Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours, Joni Mitchell’s Blue. From Elton John, Led Zeppelin and Yes to Talking Heads, Tangerine Dream and The Clash, no other decade instigated such a gloriously diverse range of musical styles.

Brimming with beguiling stories and little-known details, Vinyl Dreams is a fast-paced romp through the musical decade that defined all that came after it. From the golden age of progressive rock to the new wave revolution, Tony Wellington traces the transformations that reverberate through to today, showcasing the fervour and enduring legacy of the decade’s music.

Mixtapes and MTV 

For better or worse, the 1980s shifted the dial on expectations of what pop and rock music should be. The decade was more than just mullets and shoulder pads; it was also the heyday of synth pop, and the golden eras of both heavy metal and hip-hop. The two biggest-selling albums of all time hail from the 1980s: Michael Jackson’s Thriller and AC/DC’s Back in Black.

The Sony Walkman shifted listening from a shared to a solo experience, while vinyl records gave way to cassettes and then CDs. The arrival of MTV was cataclysmic, turning music into something to watch, not just listen to. Against a climate of political conservatism and ostentatious materialism, the music industry embraced the notion of charity rock. Powerful female performers took centre stage, while indie, new age, world music and acid house each staked their territorial claims.

Witty, vividly written and brimming with stories, Mixtapes and MTV charts the musical highs and lows of a tumultuous decade, one which saw the influence of corporate greed, the rise of the AIDS crisis and the fall of the Berlin Wall. From Duran Duran to Run D.M.C., Madonna to Metallica, Springsteen to Sinéad O’Connor, this book offers new insights into a decade that changed music forever.