INNER CITY SOUND (1982/2005)
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Inner City Sound was first published by Wild & Woolley in Australia at the start of 1982. As a collection of mostly previously-published articles and photographs, I was merely the book's editor, who relied on the good work and generosity of a wide range of contributors to make it happen. The book was shepherded to publication by Carl Harrison-Ford, who sold Pat Woolley on the idea in the first place, and it was artworked by Marjorie McIntosh with a cover designed by Phil Brophy. It quickly sold out of print, and after many years during which it was equally canonised and vilified, not to mention bootlegged, the book some fans call 'the Bible' finally returned to print in 2005 through Verse Chorus Press, accompanied by a standalone companion piece Inner City Soundtrack 2CD set through Laughing Outlaw Records. An Inner City Video was also mostly produced around this same time but never released. “No one took Australian music seriously until 1984, when the combined impact of Nick Cave, the GoBetweens and the Triffids suggested the odd gem coming from Down Under had been no fluke. Inner City Sound substantiates this wealth of riches” – Mick Houghton, UNCUT |
Pic by Suzi Pullen. Click thru for a surprise...
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“Remains a true classic of Australian music books… like peering into a lost world, there is a rawness and youthful edginess, a whiff of danger as if anything were possible, before it somehow all got swallowed up and corporatised and re-manufactured into pop music” – Des Cowley, RHYTHMS “Still the best book about Australian music in the 70s” – JUICE |
The legacy lives on: Melbourne artist Jon Campbell admires his (bootleg!) copy
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When the new edition of the book came out in 2005, I wrote a Preface you can read here. I wrote a reminisence for Riot magazine that you can read here, and you can see all the details on the CD here. Right here now is a pdf of the Family Tree poster that i originally drew in 1980, and was updated and included in the CD: |
“A shockingly vast document.. the most striking aspect is the prevailing musical sophistication. Very little on these two disks now appears as naïve, whereas a British equivalent would struggle once past the 25-song mark. The beauty here is that, untainted by the British press, Australian bands were free to experiment beyond genre. In Australia the music emerged organically, punk edge softened by melodic touches, hints of electro-art punk and new country. It’s a huge and hugely refreshing roller-coaster” – Mick Middles, RECORD COLLECTOR
The legacy of Inner City Sound is both deep but has also been corrupted. I take pride in the book’s prescience, and the impact it’s had and is still having, but it’s a disappointment and frustration to have to put up with the rip-offs, bootlegs and perversions; I’ve just had to come to appreciate that old adage, pioneers get arrows in their backs. A number of (mainly compilation) albums have been released overseas under the same title, and I can hardly complain about that since the syntax was obviously always good and they can’t be aware of my ICS and obviously aren’t trying to ride on its back. And I took it as flattery that when in 2015 a museum exhibition about the music scene in Woollongong fired off the tag and the look to emerge as Steel City Sounds, just as I am flattered by all parodies and tributes. But if I was a bit annoyed at first when a website called innercitysound.com.au emerged, I had to accept that this is the nature of the internet and that the site provides a valuable service for fans, namely as a tape-swapping hub. But still I was annoyed that the site broadened out its remit to include music, bands like, say, Midnight Oil or Icehouse, that were never part of ICS and so still shouldn’t be. Then I was even more annoyed when a pitch for a TV documentary adaptation of the book was presented to the ABC, with no word to me whatsoever, and even further annoyed that the ABC gave it the time of day again without any reference to me. That was when I knew I had to act to protect my legacy and I did so but to no success. And so ICS still reverberates, and if I only begrudgingly gave my good graces to the Inner City Sound Facebook group – and if I have to accept that even despite misgivings about the way it was put together, Product 45 is a fair if tad too-nostalgic extension of the tradition – I’m just pleased people are still talking about Inner City Sound, referring to it and sometimes even buying it.
“Walker himself confesses to embarrassment over parts of his wet-eared scribblings, yet he's still extremely proud of his baby. And well he should be. Out of print for ages and a hot eBay ticket as a result, Inner City Sound was one of the first books to attempt to systematically chronicle this staggeringly vibrant, creative period in Australia's musical history” - Fred Mills, HARP
“An essential educational tool for all and a powerful weapon in fighting back the aggressive ahistoricality of the popular culture machine. Get a copy. Memorise it. Treasure it” - David Gerard, rocknerd.com "I grew up with Inner City Sound, lived vicariously through it. It gave me a first hand account of a time and place in music history, a vibrant, innovative period I was too young to enjoy myself” – Richard Kingsmill, TRIPLE-J “When we got our picture in Inner City Sound, we thought we were set. Actually, it was the pinnacle of our short, very inglorious career” - anonymous former band member | |||||
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“Hugely important” – Simon Holmes, the HUMMINGBIRDS
“(An) infamous punk diatribe” – Michael Smith, DRUM “We weren’t in it” – Reg Mombassa, MENTAL AS ANYTHING “My first copy of Inner City Sound fell apart from over-use so I had to buy a second. I began diligently ticking off from the discography each slice of vinyl I was able to obtain. Later on, in the early 1990s, I went back to Inner City Sound and it became the starting point for my own series of ‘retro-zines’ that eventually led to my encyclopaedia. Thanks to the pioneering efforts of Clinton Walker, now here we have one of the seminal texts of Australian music writing back in circulation” - Ian McFarlane, ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF AUSTRALIAN ROCK & POP “Did Clinton Walker write that Inner City Sound book? I don’t have a copy. I can tell you that he has always been biased against us and for the Saints to the point of gross journalistic dishonesty. A pitiful fellow” – Deniz Tek, RADIO BIRDMAN “I think it was 1980 or ’81, Clinton Walker released a book called Inner City Sound, which we all went and bought, and in it, it had interviews with bands that we couldn’t see because we were too young, so we’d go to the record shops and buy records by these bands. It was like a reference book.” - Keish, the HARD-ONS “A unique snapshot of Australia’s musical underground… an absolute joy” - Kieron Tyler, MOJO 2005 (RE) LAUNCH PARTY: |
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Jules Normington, Donald Robertson, Tony Mott
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With Jay Katz and Andy Nehl
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With Roger Grierson and Richard Guilliatt
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