A rocking new exhibition at Wollongong Art Gallery will delve into the city’s music history, writes GLEN HUMPHRIES.
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You may not have heard of Wollongong bands like The Marksmen or The Sunday Painters, but record collectors around the world have.
And they're willing to part with a decent wad of cash to get their hands on one of their recordings.
The Sunday Painters were a three-piece band from the 1980s and they certainly left their mark - copies of their vinyl singles have sold for well over $300.
But Why, the only single from 1960s surf band The Marksmen, is even more expensive. The band themselves paid for the single and only released 500 of them. A copy of the single sold on eBay for more than $2000.
"I have found that people, their eyes light up when they talk about their youth or young adulthood and the bands that they went and saw.''
The chances are high that people who lived during those bands' heyday don't remember them. But Wollongong music historian Warren Wheeler has set out to change that.
About five years ago he started the website Steel City Sound, which chronicles the history of the Wollongong music scene. And on Friday, his exhibition of the same name opens at the Wollongong Art Gallery.
Through his efforts, people will remember the bands they grew up seeing on a Friday and Saturday night at places as varied as the Ironworkers, the Oxford, the Patch, Pioneer Hall and Zondrae's.
And some bands who have been forgotten through the years will get the attention they deserve. That's the driving force behind Wheeler's work, that this stuff is important and needs to be celebrated.
"There's a car museum or a war museum that preserves that important cultural things, but what we don't do very well is preserve our artistic or our musical heritage," Wheeler says.
"We've got a strong musical heritage here and it's now an opportunity for people to discover that and give it the kudos and the praise it deserves."
The exhibition arose out of a smaller one Wheeler organised a few years ago at what was then Yours and Owls. Soon afterwards, the city gallery contacted him about doing something bigger.
Then 18 months ago, Wheeler started collecting whatever Wollongong musical treasures he could find. Some came from his own collection but others came from local musicians and fans responding to Wheeler's numerous calls for help via the exhibition's Facebook page.
While people took a while to get into it, Wheeler says the response ended up being pretty strong.
People had been keen to get involved.
"All the stuff that their partners told them to throw away countless times over the years, they've finally been able to find a use for it."
Also, the delay in responding was understandable, Wheeler says, because in many cases he was asking to borrow items that are very important to people. They'd obviously want to make sure they were going to be looked after - and that the exhibition was actually going to happen.
And it is happening - all over the ground floor of the Wollongong Art Gallery, which features four smaller galleries.
Each of them has a different theme - one features a display of T-shirts with an interactive timeline.
Each of the five decades are written on the wall and people can grab a sticker, write a memory on it (such as a great band they saw in that decade or the show where they met their significant other) and then stick it onto the timeline.
The Mercury gallery has been transformed into a venue, complete with stage, bar and sticky carpet, where videos of live shows are played.
There is also a performance list that details when each band's "set" comes up, so fans don't miss it.
And a "hall of fame" that will include photos, records and other artifacts.
People can also take home their own Steel City Sound - each copy of the exhibition catalogue comes with a 23-track compilation CD. The CD runs chronologically, starting with a track from 1961 by The Wanderers and ending with a 2014 tune from Hockey Dad.
The Wanderers' song was the earliest Wollongong rock tune Wheeler could track down. But he knows of at least one that is older still.
"Wollongong's first rock and roll recording that I'm aware of was by a group called Johnny Johnson and the Rebels," Wheeler says.
"This would have been in the late '50s, just after Little Richard toured. These guys went down to Victoria and recorded an album's worth of material. Unfortunately no known copies are still in existence. Which is a real shame."
As well as the compilation CD, over the coming months Music Farmers will be releasing a trio of split seven-inch CDs of new or rare recordings from Wollongong bands with covers designed by local musicians who are also artists.
Wheeler says the hardest part has actually been tracking down copies of the music itself.
"Tracking that stuff down has been quite a hunt at times," Wheeler says.
"Recorded music, as powerful as it is, it can also be very disposable. So people do just get rid of it, especially in the digital age.
"People say 'why do I still need CDs, why do I still need records, everything's digitised'. So they get rid of it."
Even if they don't have the vinyl any more, they still have the memories. And, as Wollongong feels like it's moving forward, Wheeler says, people want to hold on to their memories for a while longer yet.
"As we travel down that road we're not yet prepared to let go of our past," he says.
"I have found that people, their eyes light up when they talk about their youth or young adulthood and they remember the bands that they went and saw. They remember the venues and the people they met, the people they fell in love with.
"They also remember the tragedies, people that they've lost along the way, people they haven't seen for 20 or 30 years. So it's been a very beautiful experience, meeting new people and hearing their stories. And then getting them into a room together when they haven't seen each other for 20 years."
He's aware that some might not think Wollongong's music scene is deserving of such reverence. For him, that attitude is part of the city too - but something that needs to change.
"This is my home town," he says.
"As many of us do, I have a love-hate relationship with this town. We love it for everything it offers, but there is also room for improvement.
''In terms of art and culture, that's one of the areas where we can improve. Not in terms of quality, because we produce some great music, but in terms of preserving it and giving it its due and actually supporting the scene.
"We can always do better at that."
Steel City Sound - 50 Years of Rock and Roll in Wollongong opens at the Wollongong Art Gallery on Friday and runs until March 15.