Catherine Strong

Aesthetic cosmopolitan, national and local popular music heritage in Melbourne’s music laneways

Abstract There are currently few examples of popular music being officially celebrated as heritage in Australia. Interest in this area is growing, however, and this paper examines how Melbourne, the capital of the state of Victoria, has recently named three laneways after rock artists, namely, AC/DC Lane, Amphlett Lane and Rowland S. Howard Lane. Using interview and observational data collected at the laneways, we demonstrate that these spaces respectively reflect aesthetic cosmopolitan heritage (AC/DC Lane), national heritage (Amphlett Lane), and sub-national heritage (Rowland S. Howard Lane). The number of visitors to these laneways varies greatly across the sites, and reflects the national and international success of the artist commemorated. The laneways’ success as commemorative sites is also related to intersections of globally circulating ideas about what constitutes ‘rock’, what urban spaces should look or feel like, and how heritage is expected to be enacted (especially for tourists). Within this field, there are specifics relating to the Australian music industry that appear to find clear reflection in the sites chosen and their level of success as memorial spaces.

Popular Music Heritage, Grass-Roots Activism and Web 2.0: The Case of the 'Save the Palace' Campaign

Although the study of popular music heritage is rapidly becoming an established aspect of academic research, little attention has been focused on attempts made by groups of music fans to preserve aspects of their local popular music heritage when these are seen to come under threat. This article examines the ‘Save the Palace’ campaign in Melbourne, Australia, and argues that it provides an important illustration of the tenacity of local music fans when faced with the closure of an important venue, and their capacity to organise themselves into a cohesive campaign through social media technology. Through its examination of the online interactions that characterised the Save the Palace campaign, the article also facilitates an extension of the concept of the virtual scene beyond its more conventionally understood definition as a platform for fan discussion dedicated to a specific artist, genre or place. In the case of Save the Palace, a different manifestation of a scene is observed whereby fans of a broad range of artists and genres temporarily join forces online to protest against the threat to a specific aspect of their shared local music heritage. In this sense, Save the Palace also sheds significant light on how social media assist in giving a voice to competing discourses of cultural value. Thus, even as the Palace and countless other local music landmarks like it across the world are demolished to make way for new developments, their significance as important markers of local generational identity and belonging, and of emotionally inscribed urban identity, remains. Through their online sharing of personalised memories of the Palace as an iconic music venue, supporters of the Save the Palace campaign serve as a further example of how the internet has worked to broaden our understanding of the definition, nature and function of popular music heritage.

‘We love the bands and we want to keep them on the walls’*: gig posters as heritage-as-praxis in music venues

Abstract Gig posters and flyers have remained a reliable means of promoting musical performances well into the digital age. Although the primary function of posters is publicity for both musical acts and venues alike, they are often retained as memorabilia of a performance long after the last note has rung out. They are, however, an under-examined aspect of popular music’s culture and heritage. While posters have been included as part of the material items that make up popular music heritage when studies of this have been undertaken, the particular roles that they can play in this area have not yet been examined. However, when taken as an aspect of music heritage posters are significant as representations of an ephemeral ‘moment’ within local music history for both audiences and performers. Furthermore, as venue décor they align performance sites with a range of musical and aesthetic identifiers that act as visual representations of heritage. We argue that the posters are a form of heritage-as-praxis that helps to create a sense of identity and community in the venue, giving punters a clear idea of what the venue provides musically, and signifying the space as representative of a certain subsection of the city’s broader music scene.

Musical genius and/or nasty piece of work? Dealing with violence and sexual assault in accounts of popular music’s past

ABSTRACT For many years, the mistreatment of women in particular has essentially been normalized in many parts of the music industry. In recent years, however, there has been an increase in women coming forward and telling their stories, and asking that men be held accountable for wrongdoing. This interdisciplinary (sociology and philosophy) paper pursues two key feminist questions prompted by recent developments. Firstly: How has the construction of the history of popular music legitimated the continuation of this situation? ‘Looking back’ historically and sociologically, examples are provided of the legitimation or ignoring of violence against women (VAW) in the history of popular music to date. Secondly: How should we [archivists, historians, heritage curators and popular music educators], from now on, construct the history of popular music in a way that doesn’t legitimate VAW? Turning to ‘look forward’, applied ethics frameworks are used to explore different aspects of this second question.