Don't Look Back Podcast

Mum of three, beloved musician, sometime actor and now popular radio host on her Melbourne ABC local radio show, Clare Bowditch has a lot of irons in the fire. A natural story teller, Clare talks with warmth and openness about a dark time in her life, a time when she couldn’t read the paper or even listen to music and shares the song that was her constant and healing companion.

Michael Franti shares intimate tales of the evolution of his music and its message

Life Without Buildings showed her how language can spark an emotional response

Whether he's re-interpreting the songs of French icon Serge Gainsbourg, or assisting the likes of Nick Cave and PJ Harvey to bring their artistic vision to life, Mick Harvey's renown as a trusted and insightful collaborator is well known. In this episode, Mick Harvey shares his deep appreciation of the fearless and uncompromising work of Nina Simone and how her song 'Four Women' with its blurring of musical lines and mysterious story telling continues to inform his own captivating work.

As a writer and performer with a huge love of musical theatre, Eddie Perfect sees songs as serving very precise and multilayered functions. He says the 1970 soundtrack for Stephen Sondheim’s musical comedy ‘Company’ and in particular the weary but scathing performance by Elaine Stritch illuminated the various important roles that musical pieces can fulfil within a broader story setting.

Eleanor Friedberger invites us into her childhood, one filled with her own tastes and musical discoveries but also one that’s been influenced by a kind hearted older brother. Matthew Friedberger not only bought Eleanor her first guitar but introduced her to the quintessential New York band. Find out the iconic Velvet Underground song that stoked her long fascination with The Big Apple and helped her take her first artistic strides.

Richard Fidler takes us back to the much darker and despairing times of his youth in Canberra. The recession 80s and looming nuclear crisis threatened to wipe out civilised society. In this climate some menacing and melancholic music captured the mood of the time and the imagination of a young Richard Fidler. Join him as he shares the magnificence and bleak tones of Killing Joke's 'Requiem' which gave him a sense of dancing to the impending apocalypse and ultimately, an odd sense of inspiration.

He’s a talented singer, songwriter and showman, but Felix Riebl has had a lifetime of constant push and pull in his relationship with music. It began with the search for identity, then the struggle for expression and these days it’s about allowing himself to enjoy the mystery of the language of music. Felix shares some of the moments that have shaped his journey, his secret burning six string regret & the song by Jamaican guitarist Ernest Ranglin that opened up a whole world of music to him.

Wonder of the natural world is the key inspiration for acclaimed visual artist Patricia Piccinini. Through her works, she’s aiming to coax us out of our accepted ways of thinking to take a walk along the line that divides the natural and the unnatural, the beautiful and the grotesque. She shares how the emotional complexity of Morrissey’s ‘November Spawned a Monster’ stirs her with its intense poignancy and yearning, and a song that’s a true reflection of the focus of her evocative work.

Touring speaker, writer, broadcaster, actor & former frontman for hardcore punk legends Black Flag, Henry Rollins has a packed CV for a guy who’s professed never to have had any concrete plans in life. His intense enthusiasm & a restless curiosity are the fuel that’s sustained a lifetime of pushing boundaries and challenging the status quo. Here, Henry Rollins tells the story of pioneering punk band, Bad Brains, one mind blowing gig & how their song ‘Pay To Cum’ continues to fill him with awe.