No Signal: Rock and Roll survives in Sydney

by Christopher Kelly (Netherlands)

I didn't expect to find Australia

Hidden deep beneath the Sydney Skyline, stood in defiance between a TAB Bank branch and a website design firm, you can find the last living fossil of a bygone age. Frankie’s, located in the CBD of Australia’s artistic epicentre, now acts as a reminder of the good old days to a generation of people with ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ tattoos hidden below their pressed Armani suits. The seductive neon red and yellow sign outside disguises this orchestral oasis as a cheap Italian restaurant, keeping it preserved from the originality erasing hands of the Instagram age. In fact, I seriously doubt anyone within this time capsule even knows what Instagram is... Thank God. On a warm Monday night, I walked down the cigarette burnt carpet stairs and pushed back the saloon doors. Meandering through a crowd of ‘T-Rex’ emblazoned T-shirts and boys back in town, I realise there is a noticeable lack of obtrusive handheld search lights. That’s correct, there was not an Apple logo in sight. Instead, a cross-section of this diverse city spawned conversations over the oldest unifying force in existence: music. Taking in the cacophony of conversation, it becomes clear that this place acts as a shelter for Woodstock wayfarers and heavy metal heads alike, a nirvana for those born in the wrong era. Anchored at the bar, holding my place in line against the swirling currents of humanity, I become elated at my sheer luck for stumbling across this diamond in the concrete. Yet, my excitement is quickly muted by the realisation that I could never have found this place if it had not been for luck. How can it be that the delicate existence of these archaic watering holes and the Rock and Roll spirit they encase, remains balanced on the fragility of Chinese whispers. A multitude of one-dollar beers began mixing with the questions formulating in my mind. Questions about how places like this still exist in a world slowly suffocating in laminated menus and iPad-wielding waitresses. Questions that would later have their answers, straight from the men keeping this spirit alive. The stage at Frankies is more iconic than the Marilyn Manson signature on the bathroom stall. After talking to the bar manager, and by talking I mean fragmentedly shouting at eachother over the sound of ‘Sabeth Bloody Sabeth’, I learn that Frankie’s has been hoasting live music every night since 1971. The thousands of photographs that plastered the walls of Frankie’s where not ‘vintage’ recreations but rather genuine glimpses into a half a century of unpublished musical history. The recurring protgaonist in a lot of the photos, was a man I discovered to be named James Ferry. James ferry is two things; Firstly, he is one of two co-founders of Frankies back in the 70’s. A homegrown hippie who fell in love with Sydney’s surfing and musical worlds in equal measures. Secondly, he was the father of the drummer currently tearing through Maidens ‘Fear of the Dark’, as I turn back to ask my new best friend, the bar manager, for another libation. Frankie’s has stood as a refuge for liberal thought and debauched expression through lamentations of The Vietnam war, The Bay of Pigs, and The Watergate scandal. It has been a platform for musicians and protestors to vent and create for decades, yet the question still remains, what role does Frankie’s fulfill now that the worlds Rock and Roll spirit has acended up to ‘The Cloud’? And why are these places such a rartity? In a world where people live identical lives online, we begin to lose touch with true feelings. But when you walk through the doors of Frankie’s and the bass drum resonates through you, you are reminded that we are all still capable of primal expression. In fact, in my opinion, not only are we capable of it, we need it.