Michael Cooke

I haven’t seen any reviews anywhere for this album which is surprising for a band that has released several albums. The title track off the album sounds inspired by 60s Brit Pop, which is a familiar point of reference for most pop-rock listeners. They do more than imitation, they take inspiration and create their own distinctive pop sound from this starting point. Although I don’t think I’m the intended audience for this band, or album, I can still hear their talent, ability and charm in these songs. Fans of guitar driven pop and sweet vocal harmonies will get the most from this album.

Spoiler warning, major plot points discussed in this review. “Tracks” begins in Alice Springs and details the events prior to an epic trip across the arid interior of Australia to the mid-West Coast. Robyn first has to learn how to handle camels before she can acquire camels and commence her journey. That learning and acquisition process was much harder than she had anticipated. The travel from Alice Springs through central Australia through the mid section of Western Australia to the Indian Ocean only commences about half way through the book. The journey is epic and despite some support structures in place, there were many close calls with running out of food and water along the way. My interest in her book was mostly related to her experiences in the Gibson Desert. I’ve visited several of the places she travels across and was interested in her historical recollections of the region in the late 1970s, a time at which the desert was not as badly impacted by feral animals and feral grasses. Her recollections and descriptions were also enhanced when Mr Eddie joined her to travel from Pipalyatjarra, SA to Warburton, WA. Although it was only a small section of the travel in terms of km, it was the most impactful part of the book for me. My academic interest in the Gibson Desert and the tribal people of this region, called the Yarnangu, is a clear bias in my review of Robyn’s book. I admired how Robyn made the effort to learn the Pitjantjatjara language while travelling through this desert region and her perceptive observations of indigenous spirituality and belief systems. As she travelled through their land, it started to make sense to her. Her progression from not understanding to understanding this region is very well detailed and described by her. The completion of her journey is bitter sweet and I did get quite upset and teary in those last few chapters. The edition I read included a post script written by Robyn in 2012 in which she detailed the changes to the desert region, with feral animals and plants encroaching on the fragile ecosystems, transforming them into something unrecognisable to her. When she originally traveled through the desert, it had been subjected to a prolonged drought. But that was not as environmentally devastating compared to the introduced species that have now come to dominate this region. The environmental systems are out of balance and degraded. The traditional owners are the ones best placed to revive the desert and return it to its former glory. I have worked with the Yarnangu on some of their restoration projects. They are supported but it’s a massive project, the scale and size of the area, the harsh conditions and the limited funding are all factors that limit their ability to revive the environment. Robyn makes it clear in her book that the environment is alive out in the desert, and she describes it as such without coming across as sentimental or condescending because she experienced it in a way that very few non-indigenous people are able to experience it: slowly and gradually.