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| I have very mixed feelings about this just-published book, in which numerous (seven) pieces of my journalism are reproduced (in full) along with five photos I took (which are incorrectly credited not to me). My feelings are mixed because, as the lawyers like to say, permission to do this was neither sought nor obtained. The same as it wasn’t for any of the rest of the material in the book, which amounts to around 100 items of contemporary journalism on the Laughing Clowns, written by around two dozen of the usual suspects, from the late Andrew McMillan to Craig N. Pearce and Barney Hoskyns to the late Wanda Jamrozik. So while I might be nominally pleased that such a book exists as a document of the Laughing Clowns and as an addition to the bibliography of Australian music, and even if it is reasonably well-balanced, all this is undermined by its unethical approach, some preposterous conceits, and the number of conspicuous howlers it contains. Even if you accept that it’s a virtual bootleg – and even if, given its tiny print-run, it’s the sort of thing that many of us unconsulted ‘contributors’ would ordinarily just have let through to the keeper – a cover price of $60 is just the least of the reasons why we are all pretty peeved. The book was published as a companion piece—not a catalogue but an adjunct—to an exhibition called “When What You See: The Art of Laughing Clowns,” at the Brisbane gallery Pestorius-Sweeny House, opening in December 2025. I am prevented from providing any substantial background on the book’s genesis and its editor, David Pestorius, for legal reasons, or rather illegal reasons. The book is only linked to the exhibition via a short introductory piece by Pestorius. As an example of art theory overreach it is typical, superimposing layers of meaning on a few early Clowns gig posters and photos that amount to sheer misinformation. I mean, if the Clowns had any sustained visual identity, it was the artwork of Ed Kuepper’s partner, Judi Dransfield Kuepper – but she gets short shrift. Even Kuepper himself is bemused by some of the connections Pestorius has forged. But that’s the art world – never let the facts get in the way of a good theory. The Clowns’ first manager, the late Ken West, is grossly misrepresented, and I’m more than qualified to say that as an old friend of his and the editor of his as-yet unpublished memoir Controlled Kaos, in which he goes into deep detail on his salutary time with the Clowns. But it’s easy to distort Ken, because he’s no longer here to defend himself. The anthologized material is drawn from the vast and comprehensive archive of the Boswell of the Brisbane Sound, Donat Tahiraj, but—sadly and stupidly—Donat has subordinated his material and good intentions to an editorial agenda not of his own making. I do appreciate his efforts to try and maintain some balance, but still, it’s an indication of further misrepresentation when right at the top the book claims with no small fanfare that the first published written words on the Clowns were by Andrew McMillan, in the form of a short news item run in RAM in October 1979. When in fact, as a matter of public record, the first published written words on the Clowns were by me, in a major feature in Roadrunner magazine spread across two pages in September ’79. I can’t help wondering if it suited the book’s argument better that the first bit of Clowns coverage in the press should express bamboozlement rather than enthusiasm. The book also, ironically, almost inadvertently contradicts another of its own claims—a claim that some of the ex-Clowns themselves sometimes make, too—namely, that the band hasn’t got its due. But how many Australian bands have had exhibitions in galleries dedicated to their visual imagery (however wayward)? None that I can think of offhand. How many Australian bands have had a scrapbook of their press-clippings published? Only Radio Birdman, I think. And apart from the fact that it’s not for my want of trying, it’s hard to imagine a collection of tearsheets as voluminous and quite as glowing as this one. The Laughing Clowns deserve better than this. I did my bit, as a sometimes probably too shrill a champion of the band in real time (the seven pieces of journalism reproduced here wouldn’t amount to a third of what I wrote about the Clowns), as well as and through my 1981 book Inner City Sound and subsequently my 1996 book Stranded. But if I’ve moved on since then and it’s now up to others to take on the task. I just wish they’d do it, so it’s done once and for all.  |
