Michael Hutchence once said there’s something intrinsically Australian about a bunch of school friends getting together at a young age, pulling together as mates, and making something happen.
That instinct — plug in, show up, back each other — is the spine of Australian music.
Because Australian music has never been one sound. It’s pub floors and protest songs. Pop hooks and dance floors. Bush poetry, grief, joy, resistance and resilience — often all in the same set.
So what does it mean to celebrate Australia Day outside of politics?
It starts with a nod to the artists who shaped the country’s musical backbone, decade by decade.
The 1970s were when Australia found its voice and turned the amps up — AC/DC, Skyhooks, Cold Chisel, Little River Band, The Angels, Dragon, Farnham, Ross Wilson, Sherbet, Russell Morris.
The 1980s took Aussie music global — INXS, Midnight Oil, Crowded House, Men at Work, Paul Kelly, Hunters & Collectors, The Church, Icehouse, Nick Cave, Mental As Anything.
The 1990s sharpened the edge — Silverchair, Powderfinger, Savage Garden, The Living End, You Am I, Regurgitator, Grinspoon, TISM, The Cruel Sea.
The 2000s blurred the lines — Kylie Minogue, Missy Higgins, Jet, The Avalanches, Wolfmother, Gotye, Empire of the Sun, The Presets, The Waifs, John Butler Trio.
The 2010s stopped asking permission — Tame Impala, Sia, Vance Joy, Flume, Courtney Barnett, RÜFÜS DU SOL, Amy Shark, Angus & Julia Stone.
The 2020s brought new power and new truth — Tones and I, Ocean Alley, G Flip, DMAs, Thelma Plum, The Kid LAROI.
And through every era, essential voices remain non-negotiable: Archie Roach, Yothu Yindi, Gurrumul Yunupingu, Christine Anu, Kev Carmody, Baker Boy, Emily Wurramara.
Icehouse said it best in Great Southern Land: “So you look into the land, it will tell you a story.”
Australia Day isn’t a marketing moment. It’s thousands of hands holding guitars, banging drums, thumping keys and leaning into microphones to tell one story — the story of us.
And on what’s predicted to be one of the hottest Australia Days in years, spare a thought for the Aussie musos standing outside in the heat, sweat dripping into their instruments, still singing the soundtrack of this great southern land.
As Paul Kelly noted “Our songs hold the stories of this country — its people, its heartbreak, and its hope.”
So on this Australia Day, we celebrate the land, the people, and the future — a great southern land held together by music, mateship, and the stubborn belief that if you plug in and pull together, something magic might happen.
Written by Nichola Burton. I work in partnership with Agents, Artist Managers and Event Producers, who juggle a diverse range of relationships in the Musoverse, to curate, manage and measure data in systems, experience, creative and content to support the entire Musoverse operation in my enterprise A Little Pitchy Copyright 2026
