Rijn Collins Melbourne, 2016I know little about Cohen, but I’m learning about you. You tell me a story as we drive, and I turn towards you, my hands out to catch the falling words.
Vin Maskell Café, La Trobe St, Melbourne. Lunchtime June 2010Some songs need fresh air. They need to be able to breathe again. They need to be able to float away into space and not come into our orbit for a good while.
David Oke Anglesea, 1984 and 2010There has always been a bit of rivalry between Anglesea and the neighbouring town Torquay. I think that it is more than the local netball, football and lawn-bowls competitive spirit.
Anson Cameron Basement Discs, Melbourne, 2012Rare times, a hole opens in a life and a song appears from nowhere to fill it, explain it, exploit it… a fluky medicine - the voice you needed to hear at the moment you needed to hear it. Sometimes you blunder onto a song that fits the need.
...Jacek Koman owned that studio. He snarled, sang, and sneered. I had never before watched a character of mine brought to life, off the page and into the room. The experience was intoxicating....
Nathan Johnson South-Eastern Australia, 1985Sometimes we travel far away and I feel like we’ve reached the end of the world. Wagga Wagga, Yass, Goulburn. I trace our route excitedly with a highlighter on my fold-out map of Australia.
Lucia Nardo Family gathering, Melbourne, 1996I felt a plum-size lump, unyielding to my touch. Dan yelped with pain. That moment is etched in my memory. I knew our lives were about to change. I wanted to push the lump back down, along with all the terror it was about to unleash.
Maria Majsa One bedroom apartment, Herne Bay, Auckland 2007You can fall in love with songs just like you can fall in love with people and because I discovered Elliott Smith after he’d died, it was like falling in love and breaking up at the same time.
Kahli Scott Brisbane, Australia and London, UK; April 2016There’s been a shadow over me that doesn’t seem to lift when London’s grey skies do. And Randy Meisner’s voice keeps popping into my head.
David Oke Tennessee and Alabama, April 2016Some of the small towns we passed through were obviously buoyant and surviving well. Others had a few too many vacant stores with grimy windows and closed down gas stations.