NAKED CITY: YOU WOULDN’T BE DEAD FOR QUIDS!

It’s probably just a sad coincidence but in the last couple of weeks we have lost two of the great observers of the Australian urban landscape in writer Robert G Barrett and musician-cum-poet Peter Lillie. Barrett died at his Terrigal home after a long battle with cancer whilst Lillie died in Sydney following a fall and problems brought on by liver disease. Both had a great association with their respective cities, Barrett in Sydney and Lillie in Melbourne where they forged a unique place in the less celebrated cultural milieu.

Barrett was a student at Bondi Beach Public School and Randwick Boys High School, leaving at 14 to work as both a butcher at Bondi and a boner in various meatworks. After completing a series of WEA writing courses he tried his hand as a freelancer eventually scoring a column with People Magazine. In 1984 he published his first book, a collection of short stories entitled You Wouldn’t Be Dead For Quids and later went on to write over 20 titles, selling over a million copies.

Many featured his politically incorrect, knockabout character Les Norton, renowned for his womanising, punch ups and fraternising with the Kings Cross underworld. Barrett was often criticised for being racist and sexist with his earlier novels but later gained a kind of cult status amongst devotees of crime fiction. Whilst he was no great wordsmith his books contain a remarkable attention to detail and as such are an essential archive of rough and tumble Sydney from the 1980s onwards.

What Robert Barrett was to Bondi and Kings Cross, Peter Lillie was to Carlton and his native Melbourne during the halcyon days of the 70s and 80s counter culture. As the songwriting mastermind behind bands such as The Autodrifters, The Relaxed Mechanics, The Leisuremasters and The Pelaco Brothers, Peter played alongside musicians such as Joe Camilleri, Stephen Cummings, Rick Dempster, Peter Martin, Ed Bates and Johnny Topper. His legacy of songs include the much recorded They Built The Ute, Samurai Star, Hangin’ Round The House and Adventures In Pain… In Paradise, to name just a few.

As well as a songwriter and musician Peter was also a talented cartoonist, a successful playwright and a passionate observer of the more oddball side of Australian pop culture and so-called ‘ockerbilly’. His songs and cartoons are full of absurdist humour, rich in references to  70s TV themes and Australian pop icons such as Zig & Zag and early Rolf Harris.

Ironically the last few years of Peter’s life could well have come from the pages of a Robert G Barrett novel.  After falling out with the Melbourne music scene he had bought a caravan and headed for Sydney, a city in which he hoped to make a fresh start but one in which his Southern quirkiness seemed sadly out of place. He had been living in the caravan and playing the odd one-off show around town when he died a few weeks ago. Apparently he realised he would need a liver transplant after many years of hard living, but the end came sooner than expected.

Tributes have flowed from many of his Melbourne contemporaries including former owners of Missing Link Records, Keith Glass and David Pepperell. Glass stated that Peter was, “a true Melbourne music treasure”, while Pepperell added Peter was, “far too wonderful for this mundane world. Peter was a remarkable talent but just didn’t fit into the music business. The world needs more of him and less of so many others.”