ENTERTAINMENT of another once I’d lived here. I would ask myself: is it the beach? Sydney has a beach. Melbourne has a beach, albeit freezing cold and a bit shitty. So maybe not the beach. Is it the people? Well, there was certainly a mixed demographic, but this wasn’t the usual tribe I’d hang with. I generally preferred wanky academic types, not tree-hugging candlemaking hippies. I didn’t do esoteric or new age, and I didn’t change my name. I wasn’t Sanyassin. So I guess it wasn’t W W W. E C H O. N E T. A U / S OA P - B OX really the people. It certainly wasn’t the opportunity. Back then hardly anyone worked. Maybe in a cafe. It definitely wasn’t a place to make your career. I could never fathom what my connection was with this place. My family thought I was nuts. Why would a girl with so much promise drop out and move to a dead-end beach town with nothing to I love Byron Bay. It’s why I came here 27 years ago. It’s why I offer? I still can’t answer that. Except by saying that when I stayed here. I never meant to. It was like falling in love with came here I had a profound sense of home that I’ve never had anywhere else. A sense of belonging that eluded me in someone you never planned to fall in love with. Someone the place where I grew up. In the other places where I had without a job or shoes. Someone who asked nothing of been. For some inexplicable reason, like many others who you but that you stay. Of course it wasn’t a committed were probably as confused as me, I felt that I was part of this relationship. Byron wasn’t like that. And nothing traditional place. That my story was going to happen here. I certainly or secure was ever offered. Just the chance to see who couldn’t see how. Back then there were no startups. Except you were away from the mainstream. It was like falling in The Echo – it started up not long before I got here. But love with someone who loved the very essence of you. they weren’t called startups back then; they were just new Not everyone could handle it. I certainly resisted in the businesses that generally would fold by winter. Byron wasn’t beginning. I was going to live a very different life. Be a very an ‘obvious’ place like it is now. You’re not taking much of a different person from the person I am today. But this is it. risk if you come here now – it’s a solid investment – there’s This is my life. These are my friends. This is my family. This is an impressive array of industry and opportunity for the my community. This is the life I created after being seduced young and the funky and the privileged who now call this by Byron. Don’t think I didn’t try to leave. I did. Several times. place home. My place. Their place. No-one’s place. I stood among them the other night at the opening of Habitat – But I always came back. It was hard to walk into the arms
MANDY NOLAN’S
SOAPBOX
I LOVE BYRON
live
created ironically by an old friend who was similarly drawn here not long after me. I marvelled at the beautiful young hipsters. Generally I’d be scathing. I moved among them like a ghost. They couldn’t see me. For a minute I almost climbed on top of a balcony to screech at them ‘Don’t you know who I am?’ But I sipped gin from my jar and enjoyed the obscurity, thankful that I’d got undressed four times to a suitable level of ‘cas’ to move among the hipsters unseen. Of course they don’t know who I am. I am meaningless to them. As the generation who lived here before me were meaningless to me. I never acknowledged the people who lived here before me. Neither did that generation the one before them. Byron is like a layered cake, where each new layer thinks they’re the first ones to find this place. Just like I did when I first came here. Each wave of newcomers seems to have a severe case of Terra Nullius – a belief that there was nothing before them. The preceding generation watches them, smouldering in resentment for the newcomers driving up real estate or clogging the roads and basically ignoring them. We’re sulking. But mainly because when I miss the Byron I used to love I miss the girl I used to be. The Indigenous people must find it amusing to hear each of us talk about how the place doesn’t feel like ours anymore. As I watched the latest crop of ‘new’ Byron I had a small epiphany. Apart from the traditional owners, Byron doesn’t belong to anyone. It’s no more mine than it was the old-timers who came here or the newbies with their topknots and startups. It’s one of the Universe’s change rooms. As corny as it sounds, magic still happens. Just don’t fuck it up.
TORA’S FREE HOMESHOW!
WITH
LIVE MAK MERRYN JEANN + KEELAN
music BEAUTIFUL GIRLS
FRIDAY DECEMBER 22ND 7PM FREE GIG
Byron-born 4-piece electronic act Tora formed in 2013. With their fusing plush layered production and instrumentation, as well as their graceful vocals, they have won hearts all over the world! Releasing their self-titled debut EP, and following in 2014 with another successful EP in Eat The Sun, Tora’s soulful electronic music has had them compared to seminal artists such as Radiohead and James Blake. Tora (origin: Greek, meaning ‘now’) have kept up a continual progression since their inception, dropping an array of singles and collaborations, all It was 2002 when Australia roots rock trio The Beautiful Girls while building a rapidly growing global listenership. made their release Morning Sun – a melting pot of sunny surf Tora have performed at Glastonbury, Falls Festival, Splendour sounds and refreshing reggae undertones – that established In The Grass, The Great Escape UK and Canadian Music Week. the band’s unique aesthetic. The title track quickly became They have also toured both in Australia and internationally a staple on Australia’s National Youth Radio Station Triple J with artists such as RUFUS, Miami Horror and SAFIA. and, with the impetus of fan favourite Periscopes, Morning Tora will take the stage at Byron Bay Brewery this Friday Sun quickly claimed to Number One of the Australian at 8pm for an intimate and free Independent Album chart, staying there for months. In 2003 show! Support on the night will be The Beautiful Girls release the band’s first full-length album, by Merryn Jeann and Keen Mak. Learn Yourself. The album went on to become a groundbreaking success, debuting at Number One on the Australian Independent Album chart, knocking Morning Sun out of the way to do so, and was selected as feature album on Triple J. They have had numerous Number One albums, ARIA and Prana is an Australian international APRA nominations, glowing reviews and several international artist, singer, songwriter. Lead singer tours, and now they have chosen to pay homage to their of The Bindoo Babas. Conscious roots by touring the songs from the now Gold-certified music for the discerning mind. seminal Morning Sun EP and Learn Yourself album along He plays The Empire Cafe in with other selected crowd favourites from their extensive Mullumbimby on Friday night from catalogue. 5pm. Good food, good vibes and Catch them at the Hotel Great Northern, the place really bloody good music. where it all began for these guys, on Friday 5 January.
PRANA AT THE EMPIRE
CONT P78
North Coast news daily: www.echonetdaily.net.au
The Byron Shire Echo December 20, 2017 77