A 2019 music discovery that has fundamentally changed my appreciation of music. Archie Roach is considered a living treasure and hearing him speak, the stories through his songs, you can understand why. But here’s what I learned and how you can support him.

I was introduced to Archie Roach when I was offered tickets to the Australia Day Twillight show at the zoo in 2019 with a good friend GK. First up, never been to the city zoo. There were crazy fun pics that will definitely never see the light of day. Who is GK? He’s a good friend that is crazy enough to say, hell yeah to most of my outrageous roadtrip adventures!

Yup – the guy on the right. I call it imitating Red Dead Redemption. I quietly love this shot. And yes, it was done on a phone and only had the black and white filter applied.

So who is Archie Roach?

Taken straight from Wikipedia:

Archibald William Roach, AM (born 8 January 1956, Mooroopna) is an Australian musician. He is a singer, songwriter and guitarist, as well as a campaigner for the rights of Indigenous Australians.

Roach’s debut solo album, Charcoal Lane, was released in 1990. It featured the song “Took the Children Away”, which was added to the National Film and Sound Archive’s Sounds of Australia registry in 2013. Also in 2013 he won a Deadly Award for Lifetime Contribution to Healing the Stolen Generations as well as for Album of the Year. Along with fellow Deadly winner Pat O’Shane, he called for an end to the Northern Territory Intervention. Roach has toured around the globe, headlining and opening shows for Joan Armatrading, Bob Dylan, Billy Bragg, Tracy Chapman, Suzanne Vega and Patti Smith.

In a world where everyone is hurting, I promise you that you will feel better when you listen to this song. It’s called…

We won’t cry.

I know history has winners and losers. But here’s how they had a peaceful protest with this song.

But from all of this, this song. This is the song that really got to me. We need to be compassionate. But taking the high road can be a challenge. This song helped me when things have been tough. I hope that you too will find solace with this amazing artist.

Get Back To The Land

If you have SoundCloud and reside in Australia, you can hear his album. I would highly recommend buying the albums so you can always enjoy it wherever you go and support an amazing icon.

This is his Let Love Rule album which has get back to the land on it.

Here’s his live in concert collection that is absolutely wonderful. This is the one to get so you can enjoy the majority of his discography. But the album versions are also amazing… which is why I doubled up on all of them. Haha.

And here’s my favourite rendition of a classic song. It’s simply amazing.

You can support him here.

In all times, my wish for you, is that you get to have an epic friend like GK. Here’s to all of us having adventures in the future!