Streets Of Our Town

With Brisbane hosting the annual APRA Awards in 2014 for the first time, it's completely appropriate that a legendary former Brisbane musician is being honoured with the Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music. Lindy Morrison was not only the drummer for The Go-Betweens during their most fertile period spanning the '80s (as well as numerous other bands over the years including Xero and Cleopatra Wong), but she's also spent years campaigning for musicians' rights, meaning that this award will sit nicely alongside the Order Of Australia medal that she received last year for her services to the industry.

“I've been working more hours with the music industry's own charity Support Act. I've been a social worker with them for about 15 years – I have a Social Work degree, I don't want anyone to think that just because I'm a drummer I became a social worker for the musicians' benevolent society,” she laughs. “That's taking more time because I've been given more hours as there's been an increase in need – I suppose people are getting older. Basically we only pay bills for people who get sick, but they must have had career in the industry – lots of musicians, lots of roadies, lately we've had some promoters and venue owners. It's the best thing the industry has ever done. The whole industry is behind it, all the money's raised by the industry – it really is a decent thing.

“I'm also working on a project that I do every year at this time called the Bondi Youth Wave, which is directing groups of young people – we put them in bands and write songs and play on rock instruments and work towards recording and performing. Then there's the PPCA, which is the Commonwealth collection society for recording artists – I sit on that board. Copyright is one of my big passions – we need recording artists to be looked after properly and have legislation that works in their benefit and not against them.”

Morrison's passion for musicians' rights can be traced back to lessons gleaned from her own storied musical career.

“It dates from after my time in bands, and it came about because I started looking at our contracts and trying to unravel them – obviously because I was interested in looking at the royalty flow,” she continues. “I was kind of shocked by how the system worked, and I discovered how the recording artists – as far as I was concerned – were really hardly done by in terms of how the law treated them, so I went on a path to try and see things change in favour of recording artists. And of course the more you go into it the more you see that it's not just recording artists but it involves composers as well, so composers are also going to be affected by any legal changes. I lecture on the arts and copyrights as well, so I'm also talking to visual artists about their specific case law and their collection societies too.”

Having undertaken this string of altruistic industry roles it's little wonder that Morrison is being recognised with such a prestigious accolade.

“I'm incredibly happy,” she smiles. “Initially it disturbed me slightly, because getting an award like this is such an honour and you want to be able to live up to that honour – I hope I'm able to. It makes you think about things – how you are and how you act and what you do. You probably think about it too much when you're first told you're being bestowed such an honour – it makes you look into yourself too much, which sometimes isn't too good an idea.”

And despite now calling Sydney home, given her background it's apt that there will be a distinctly Brisbane vibe to Morrison's role in the ceremony.

“[The Go-Betweens' violinist] Amanda Brown is presenting me with the award, and Robert Vickers – the bass player from The Go-Betweens – is flying out from New York, and the three of us will be doing [Go-Betweens track] People Say,” she enthuses. “Robert Forster was unable to do it with us, but the band Big Scary are flying in from the States to play – we'll have two drum kits onstage, Tom [Iansek] is singing. It's going to be brilliant.

“And I also have to do a speech, so I'm talking about Brisbane and the effect it had on me. The things that happened in Brisbane that shaped me – there are a few stories that Brisbane people will find really interesting. The fact that it's the first time that [the APRA Awards] have happened in Brisbane meant that I had to [take that approach]. Brisbane really shaped me so I'm really happy that I'll be there to receive this honour.”