Michael Witheford

Biography & Autobiography, music, humour

 

Michael Witheford was born in Sheffield, England in 1962 and emigrated with his parents to Tasmania in 1965. He attended Trevallyn Primary School, where he was dux of the school, and then Riverside High School, during which time he was a soccer rep for Tasmania. He completed his HSC at Launceston College in one year.

Michael had a number of jobs in the '80s before moving to Melbourne. There he became a well-known music journalist and musician. As bassist for the Fish John West Reject he recorded two LPs and two singles, and played in all major cities in Australia.

His next band Lust In Space were a fixture in the Melbourne indie scene in the mid-90s, and were played on BBC Radio by John Peel. They recorded two LPs.

Michael’s first novel, Buzzed was published by Penguin in 2003. Buzzed was about an obsessive quiz show wannabe and his adventures when he finally gets on TV.

In 2014, Michael released The Very Worst Of The Beatles, a mainly comic examination of some of the Fab Four’s less than Fab moments.

Michael’s new book, Turn It Up! is about his lifelong devotion to music, whether as listener, writer, or performer. He tells stories of how his bands nearly but didn’t quite make it, why bands like Queen should be taken seriously, the attractions of the Bay City Rollers, and what punk did to him. He revisits interviews with artists like Bjork, Nirvana and Bjork.

Anyone who sometimes wonders if they should grow out of music fandom but never do, will find this book a funny and familiar read.

 

 


Books by Michael Witheford

Turn It Up!

Turn It Up!

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Turn It Up! is part-memoir of the author’s time both as a member of various bands and rock journalist, as well as a slightly unorthodox history of pop music, celebrating some of the unsung and unloved bands of the past fifty years, and how various acts shaped his life in many ways beyond ‘just music’.
For the many people who have had a record player as the centre of their universe, or who have never quite got going with that band they were in, Turn It Up! will be a funny and familiar book