Where it all started...

My earliest musical memories were of the old people in Cherbourg, who used to put on a show down at the hall, singing and dancing. Here my uncles and aunties sang Country and Western songs. Vivian Forbes was the music teacher at the primary school. She played piano and was very strict about singing in tune. I was moved from living in the boy’s dormitory, to Opal House, South Brisbane in the 60s.  

Mum’s sister, Auntie Aileen Brady, took me and my brothers out of Opal House, while my sisters stay there. We were living in Paddington, going to Milton State School and on to Kelvin Grove High. Uncle Don Brady was a Methodist Church pastor. We sang with my Aunty Pat Morgan in the choir. I was about 14 years old, when I ran away to return to Cherbourg in the 70s. 

When I went to prison in 1974 or 75, I learnt to play the guitar we share. We used basic open chords like G, C and D, with some minor chords thrown in. This was the way my elders played guitar. Uncles and brothers in tordoning camps up north, out west and over the border were another big influence on my music. It was common for people like Matt Dann, Spec Ryan and Uncle Henry Gundy to have a guitar or a ukulele. 

The first songs I wrote were about domestic violence. Victim of Abuse was for Auntie Rosie Johnson, then Stand Our Ground and In Tune. I wrote the songs on our album, in the 80s.  

I started going to the Woodford Folk Festival, playing chalk boards, in the 90s, staying in the Murri Camp organised by Anthony Newcastle.