Veteran Sydney musician Jim Mongrel has embarked on a new phase of his career as an acoustic-punk troubadour, spreading his own brand of political awareness.
Jim’s no stranger to the punk scenes around Sydney and Wollongong having played in numerous bands such as Run For Cover, Sydney City Trash and Handsome Young Strangers for the past 15, 20 years.
Now relocated to Murwillumbah (Tweed Shire), Jim is trying his hand as a solo punk performer. “After I decided to move up to the northern New South Wales area, knowing that when I got up here I wouldn’t have a band to fall back on like I always did, I really started to chip away at finishing songs I’d written over the years,” Jim explains.
“I started to make a go of it just solo acoustic, still playing punk songs and still three-chord songs going on about the government and all the things that are wrong in the world, but I thought I’d try and go it alone.”
Once Jim began working in acoustic punk, he discovered it stems from a rich tradition of outsider folk music in America that has its roots in the freight-hopping and ‘hobo’ sub-cultures, which is still around today.
“After starting to write and play and really delving into it I found there’s a huge scene in America of transient kids who travel around on freight trains and play gigs in old warehouses,” Jim says.
“It’s starting to take off over there and there’s this whole side to it I didn’t realise until I started doing it myself.”
Jim styles himself as ‘anti-social, anti-fascist’, taking the term from slogans used by the Antifa movement in the US. From his platform upon the stage, he unashamedly peddles a message through song of righteous fury against what he sees as the ills of the world.
“From a young age I was taught to speak my mind and if there is injustice and there is wrong [sic] you speak up and take a stand, don’t get pushed around,” Jim says.
“As I’ve gotten older I’ve noticed there seems to be a paradigm shift, especially in Australian culture, like it’s going back to that 1950s, White Australia mentality, that ‘white is right’ and no one else is welcome here. That’s not what this country is about.
“Our culture’s been diverse since day-dot and this is of course Aboriginal land as well, so this whole resurgence of white pride and neo-Nazism, I find the whole thing really offensive and I thought if I’m going to get up there and sing about something, I’m going to make it a permeating message through everything I do.”
Jim’s heading back to Wollongong at the end of December for a big party with old mates like Sim Shame, Billy Demos and Ess Em.
The gang is performing the Jim Mongrel & Friends Show, which Jim says will have more of a celebratory feel compared to his standard fare.
“I’m originally from Wollongong myself, I spent 15, 20 years playing in punk bands around there so having the chance to head home for the holidays I thought there’d be no greater way to get a bunch of friends together than [to] put on a show.
“It’ll probably be a bit lighter than the usual political rhetoric I go on with, just because it’s more of a celebration.”
Jim Mongrel & Friends perform at Dicey Riley’s (Wollongong) 30 December.
