In 1979 No Fixed Address was formed by a group of budding students studying at The University of Adelaide’s Centre for Aboriginal Studies in Music (CASM). Preceding bands such as Yothu Yindi and the Warumpi Band, No Fixed Address have really left their mark on the Australian and World music scene.
No Fixed Address have toured with the likes of Cold Chisel, Midnight Oil, Split Enz and INXS, as well as being the first Indigenous band to play on Countdown and to tour overseas.
This week, No Fixed Address is set to take Her Majesty’s Theatre by storm in a huge celebration of their career. Ahead of Thursday night’s performance, original guitarist, songwriter, vocalist, and proud Gunai man, Ricky Harrison spoke to Glam Adelaide.
Looking back at No Fixed Address’s career, Ricky shared where it all started for the band.
“We were going to CASM (The University of Adelaide’s Centre for Aboriginal Studies in Music) at the time and we were studying to be musicians, as well as to learn how to read and write music. From my point of view, all I wanted to do was learn how to play music and maybe form a band, which we did. We’d get around performing in Adelaide — at colleges and stuff around the city. I’d been writing songs since I was 16, and one of our first songs we did was Vision, which was a reggae number. We mostly started playing punk rock at the beginning but we didn’t really see our potential until we met a teacher named Graham Isaacs. He taught us stagecraft and worked on performance opportunities with us, so that gave us a chance to get some new songs down, work on some old material and work towards getting our songs out.”
With such a successful career with many achievements, Ricky spoke about some of his personal favourite moments.
“There were quite a lot from over the years. Being inducted into the National Indigenous Music Awards Hall of Fame and the SA Music Hall of Fame would be right up there. Before that, touring England was one of my most memorable performances. When we performed there, it was a different crowd to what we were used to.”
No Fixed Address’s music is very honest and raw, with their lyrics often delivering a strong message.
“We wrote songs that were close to us about how we lived our lives and how we were treated by society. We wrote songs about ourselves as individuals, as Aboriginal youth, and it sort of reflected on all Aboriginal society, about what was happening around the country. When we wrote the lyrics, they were straight from the heart. How we felt about everything and what we wanted to do or what we wanted to change and what we saw, being able to put it to music and work on it was really good.”

This Thursday, August 24, No Fixed Address will be performing at Her Majesty’s Theatre. They will be supported by the award winning First Nations Voices with Glenn Skuthorpe, Nancy Bates and Jungaji. No Fixed Address are dedicated to their craft and their performances give their audiences a taste of what a true connection to Country really feels like.
“To me, it’s like this: if you go to an Eagles concert, you go to hear all their old songs. So that’s basically what we’ll be doing — we will be playing a lot of our old stuff. We are going to be joined by some other artists as well. I love it when the adrenaline kicks in during a live performance. It is going to be a great night of music.”
Tickets and further details can be found at https://www.adelaidefestivalcentre.com.au/whats-on/no-fixed-address .
Photo credit: John Janson-Moore
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