Australian music icon Michael Gudinski with the Minogue sisters, Kylie (left) and Dannii. Photo: GETTY IMAGES
There are some days you never think will come. Hearing this morning that Michael Gudinski had died is one of those.
A man of inexhaustible energy and ideas, a passion for Australian music and the artists that create it, a love of his home city of Melbourne that was as brash and endearing and a devotion to our shared obsession, the St Kilda Football Club, these are all part of the story of one of this country’s most extraordinary individuals – the likes of whom we will never see again.
Gudinski was a “boomernaut”, a child of the ‘60’s who came of age in the 1970s as a man with a vision of what Australian music meant to the people who were crying out to hear their voice, their story, their songs on the radio and bursting out of TV sets, not just the spoon-fed imported sounds from the cultural imperialists in the UK and the United States.
In this interconnected landscape where any point on the globe is now accessible with a smart phone, it’s difficult to convey just what a culturally revolutionary moment it was for Australians to hear songs on the radio written by them and for them.
Gudinski understood the power of that connection, and with Skyhooks, his first major success with Mushroom Records, he was able to unlock that place called home in the heart of Australian music fans.
This was particularly true for Melburnians, who revelled in the tales about Lygon Street and awkward phone calls from some girl from Balwyn.
Along with film makers like Bruce Beresford, Peter Weir, Gillian Armstrong, Fred Schepsi and artists like Brett Whiteley, Gudinski reset the cultural landscape in this country, providing a platform for Australians to be themselves, raise their voices and share their vision.
The great records associated with Mushroom are too many to account for here, but there are a couple that for this writer, completely redrew the way I saw the world.
The Triffids “Born Sandy Devotional” (1985) remains a peerless masterpiece that sketches an Australian landscape in a way that has only ever been matched by fellow Western Australian, Tim Winton.
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Gudinski put it all on the line in 1979, as his company teetered near collapse, to bankroll Split Enz’s “True Colours” album. The result was a post-punk, antipodean masterpiece that spawned the monster hit “I Got You” and remains a record with such vibrance and allure that if it were released today, I’d be running down the street to the nearest record store to snaffle my copy.
And then there is Kylie.
What Gudinski saw in her whilst others only saw a soap actress was pure, magical star power.
His faith in her ability gifted Australia a national treasure, a beloved queen of song, who like her heroes, the super Swedes ABBA, owns a chunk of real estate in most Australian hearts.
Like all great stories, it wasn’t just a parade of endless triumphs. Gudinski tried and tried again to break America, rock’s El Dorado, but it never really happened for him, something that left him frustrated to the end.
He had any number of bust-ups and blues with artists and promoters, and could dish out as good as he got, but he was also inclined to make peace, with an arm around the shoulder and an eye to the future.
Gudinksi was always thinking about tomorrow. The next artist that would set his pulse racing, the next band that might shake the foundations, the next unforgettable gig that people would talk about for the rest of their lives.
His passion for the music first, and the business as a means of supporting it, is illustrated by the big, rambling company he will leave as his legacy. How it survives without his omnipotence is a question for another day.
Whenever I saw Michael, his first question to me would be: “What do you think about those Saints?”
Like many in the artistic community, he was lovestruck by the tragic-comic romance of the St Kilda Football Club and its star crossed history. He did a tour of duty on the club’s board, and like so many of us, dreamed of that day when they would go marching in once more.
He won’t be with us, arm-in-arm, if and when they do, but he will be with us in the songs we sing, the stories we tell about the gigs we’ve seen and the music that made us, forever more.
Captured him perfectly. No doubt Gudinski will be remembered for the big Aussie stars, but there’s a huge catalogue of local bands, one-hit wonders and even OS touring artists whom he promoted. He truly did frame the listening of multiple generations of Australians.
Nice one Frank, what a shock this was.