TONY WELLINGTON
Australian Author, Photographer, Artist,
Politician & Film-maker
Publications
VINYL DREAMS
How the 1970s Changed Music
In the 1970s, rock music splintered into dazzling shards as technical innovation propelled experimentation. Music became a visual spectacle via glam, shock rock, disco and punk. Musicians co-opted elements of classical, jazz, electronic, world and avant-garde music. Monumental albums were born: Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, Carole King’s Tapestry, Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours, Joni Mitchell’s Blue. From Elton John, Led Zeppelin and Yes to Talking Heads, Tangerine Dream and The Clash, no other decade instigated such a gloriously diverse range of musical styles.
Brimming with beguiling stories and little-known details, Vinyl Dreams is a fast-paced romp through the musical decade that defined all that came after it. From the golden age of progressive rock to the new wave revolution, Tony Wellington traces the transformations that reverberate through to today, showcasing the fervour and enduring legacy of the decade’s music.
Vinyl Dreams is accompanied by a curated Spotify playlist with over 600 tracks.
"A damn good read. The seventies was a crazy, fun era for music
where the boys wore the make-up, but I didn’t! I was the anti-to
the glam. A gender-bending ride, filled with good memories,
good times."
- Suzi Quatro, rock legend
"Tony Wellington writes with incredible insight, passion, and
intelligence about music and the context in which it was created."
- Stuart Coupe, music journalist
"A thrilling journey that meticulously charts rock music’s
progress through the chaotic, fertile, high-energy, drug-fuelled
innovations that make the seventies possibly its most exciting era."
- David Williamson AO, playwright
"In Vinyl Dreams, Wellington happily shines a forensic light on the finest musicians of the age, while gleefully exposing the fakes, the frauds and the febrile."
- Rob Hirst, founding member of Midnight Oil
"One thing I love about this book is how Tony Wellington
humanises the rock star."
- Jon Coghill, Powderfinger drummer
Vinyl Dreams is published by Monash University Publishing.
RRP $39.99
Purchase from your favourite bookstore or go to
"His research is commendable, his illuminations manifold and his love for music palpable."
- John Shand, SMH and The Age
"I looked forward to reading this each night and found myself sharing plenty of anecdotes with friends and family. ... I already know this will be a book I return to."
- Goodreads
FREAK OUT
How a Musical Revolution Rocked the World in the Sixties
Freak Out is Australia’s coming-of-age story, of how we as a nation were dragged into global culture by the unstoppable momentum of rock and pop music. The sixties was an era of extraordinary change and earth-shattering events. The music scene responded with popular anthems that reverberated across the planet. What’s more, the gun was fired on a period of unprecedented musical innovation and creativity, the likes of which have never been repeated.
"The book rides buoyantly along on (Wellington's) illumination and interpretation of the facts and anecdotes he selects, the connections he makes, and the quality of his judgement. In contextualising an album or even just a line of a lyric, he often manages to shine fresh light on it, and - the best outcome of all - incline one to engage with the music again (or discover it)."
- John Shand, The Sydney Morning Herald & The Age
"It's also a thriller in its own way ... Freak Out will surprise even those who were there."
- Alan Lander, Your Local
"If you were around in the Sixties, then Freak Out will rekindle a lot of memories. If you were not, then I recommend it to you anyway. It is an important work and, at the same time, an entertaining look at an era that will never come again."
- Jim Fagan, Noosa Today
Freak Out is published by Monash University Publishing.
RRP $34.95
Purchase from your favourite bookstore or go to
sold out
WILD ABOUT NOOSA, a superb book celebrating the diverse wildlife to be found across the Noosa Shire. Over 200 pages of breathtaking colour photographs in a hard cover, coffee-table book. All text and photographs by author, photographer and former Noosa Mayor, Tony Wellington.
"Each photograph is accompanied by a story to tell the reader about the subject - common and scientific name included - and Tony’s personal anecdotes and experience imbue the collection with warmth, humour and evidence that Tony really is 'wild about Noosa'.
A highlight is the book’s intelligent introduction about life on this planet in general, and in particular- the species to be found ‘beneath our noses’. His prose is full of gems of wisdom as well as praise and tribute to the people and organisations who work hard to ensure the conservation of Noosa’s natural biosphere and ecosystems and survival of the wildlife."
- Kate Marian Rose, A Little Shop of Soul
To see examples of Tony's wildlife photography, see images under Photography on this website or go to his Facebook page of the same name: Wild About Noosa.
Noosa’s beaches, bush, waterways and wildlife are revealed in all their glory in this full-colour photographic book.
Wellington has turned his passion for the region into a superb 88 page visual tone poem. Beaches, mountains, lakes, hinterland and wildlife are all captured.
SOLD OUT
Queensland's Sunshine Coast is blessed with natural wonders and breathtaking scenery. This book is a celebration of the region, which stretches from the Glasshouse Mountains to the Cooloola section of the Great Sandy National Park.
Favorite tourist destinations of Noosa Heads, Maroochydore, Mooloolaba and Caloundra are represented along with their surrounding districts. Beaches, mountains, lakes, rivers, hinterland, human activities and wildlife are all superbly captured in this full-colour 96 page hard-cover book.
SOLD OUT
Noosa & Cooloola
A hard-cover colour photographic book (30cms x 26cms), 144 pages with words and photographs by Tony Wellington. Commissioned by Noosa Parks Association.
Noosa: the very word itself has become iconic. Today's Noosa is a major tourist destination as well as a magnet for residents seeking a lifestyle that combines urban sophistication with natural beauty. In how it has managed its natural environment and maintained a low-key human footprint, Noosa is quite unlike other coastal Australian settlements.
Many who visit or settle in Noosa fail to appreciate that its disticntive qualities were hard won. Most significantly modern Noosa is in large part the result of more than a half a century of effort by one visionary community organisation - Noosa Parks Association.
Immediately to the north of Noosa lies the massive wilderness area known as Cooloola. This is the mainland section of the Great Sandy National Park, notable for containing the largest vegetated dune system on the planet. Noosa Parks Association's role in rescuing this natural wonder is generally under-appreciated.
With engaging text and magnificent full colour photographs, this coffee table book presents both the familiar and hidden worlds of Noosa & Cooloola, and is a glowing testament to one of the oldest and arguably most successful conservation groups in Australia.
AVAILABLE AT NOOSA BOOKSHOPS & DIRECT FROM NOOSA PARKS ASSOCIATION
Happy? Exposing the Cultural Myths about Happiness
OUT OF PRINT
We live under a tyranny of happiness. Politicians, celebrities, advertisers, personal growth gurus - and now even Positive Psychologists - insist that we can each achieve greater happiness. But can we?
To find out, Tony has considered masses of empirical studies from around the world. He has also interviewed a wide range of notable Australians including Rev. Tim Costello, Richard Eckersley, Bill Leak and Dr Caroline West.
Of course everyone wants to be happy. Accordingly, we are inclined to accept at least some of the culturally-ordained avenues to achieve that blessed state. These include an ever-increasing standard of living; greater personal wealth; achieving fame; finding true love; embracing religious or spiritual beliefs; engaging with family and community; and such popular prescriptions as effective goal setting, reducing stress and raising self-esteem.
So which, if any, of these paths can actually increase our happiness in any lasting or substantial way?
The conclusions the book draws challenge our understanding of happiness and turn many cultural myths upside down.
This is a provocative, highly-readable and thoroughly entertaining examination of our culture and the way it influences us.
HAPPY? is published by Beaut Books.
"Tony Wellington should be congratulated for having the courage to stand up to just about every dominant, mainstream and ultimately forceful ideology in Western society about what should be making us happy and why." - Emma Rodgers, The Courier-Mail
"Pursuing happiness has become a Western obsession and Wellington's criticisms of the quick fixes pushed by the rapture pimps (fame, self-esteem, romance, religion and shopping) are timely." - Emma Tom, The Australian Literary Review
"The book is interesting and enlightening, particularly in pointing out that what makes us deeply content is a sense of belonging - something that is sadly lacking in the rush-rush modern world." - Jane Fynes-Clinton, Salt
Tony was the instigator and co-author with John Shand of the book "DON'T SHOOT THE BEST BOY! - the film crew at work".
This book details the film-making process from the Australian perspective, incorporating interviews with 27 Australian film craftspeople.
Published by Currency Press in 1988, the book is now out of print.
Tony has also written for Australian Jazz Magazine and the subsequent Australian Jazz and Blues Magazine. He was a contributor to "Themes and Issues - The Family", published by Oxford University Press in 1990. He has had articles published in a wide range of magazines and newspapers including Filmnews, Australian Artist, Courier-Mail, The Australian, Sunshine Coast Daily, Noosa News, Salt, etc. He has also penned forewords for various books and publications.