Bill Quinn – Writer, MC, Radio Presenter

January 6, 2019November 5, 2025 Overheard Productions Art and artists, Business Referrals, Festivals, Interviews, L-Plate Learning, MC, Music general, radio

230692_1024298781201_4425_n — Bill Quinn and John Schumann (Redgum, John Schumann & The Vagabond Crew), Concert Stage, Woodford Folk Festival, December 2007

Owner/operator of Overheard Productions, 2003 to present

Sponsor/singer in Born To Sing 1000 – 2023 at Perth Concert Hall, Sunday 11 June 2023.

And again on Saturday 28 June 2025 (sponsor only).

Sponsor of 102.1FM 8CCC Community Radio – Alice Springs & Tennant Creek (Dead Parrots Society and A Little Bit Country), 2021 to 2022.

Contributor to Trad & Now magazine (folk and anything roughly related), Ducks Crossing Publications, December 2006 – December 2024.

Festival and gig MC from 2005 onwards

Radio presenter:

2008 to 2012 – Artsound FM 92.7/90.3FM/artsound.fm (ACT)

2019 to 2020 – 104.1 Territory FM/territoryfm.com (NT)

2020 – Guest presenter via phone, 107.5FM 2EAR-FM/2EARFM.weebly.com Thursdays at 7.15pm AEST on Ian Traynor’s Thursday evening show (6-10pm)

2022 to 2023 – 107.9FM Radio Fremantle, ‘Folking Around’, Mondays 9-11pm AWST and online at: https://radiofremantle.com.au/shows/folking-around

2023 to 2024 – 102.1FM Radio Adelaide – Rich & Real. Filling in here and there for now with no regular program.

Trivia quiz host 1992 – 2012. Maybe again…

Peripatetic, interviewer, blatherer Ongoing. Always. Ever-present.

Gypsy. Effectively on the road from Kamberri (Canberra) since 18 March 2013, with a 2.5 year stop in Darwin (March 2019 to August 2021), just over a year in Fremantle, another 12 months plus in Adelaide, and now traipsing around New South Wales seeking my next base.

Currently in residence in Greater Sydney on the lands of the Dharug people, and I pay respect to the custodians past, present, and emerging. These are lands that are called ‘Australia’ and Terra Australis, a land of many nations, that were never ceded by the traditional owners.

More details at www.OverheardProductions.com/About

Bill The Housesitter — Bill Quinn, Bloke, v2011

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Bush Gothic – Looking Forward To A Festival In The Past, May 2018

May 12, 2018March 10, 2020 Overheard Productions Festivals, Interviews, Music general Australian traditional music, ballads, Bill Quinn, Bush Gothic, bush music, folk, folk music, Melbourne, music, Overheard Productions, traditional

Bush_Gothic_01 — Image courtesy of Bush Gothic

Back in early February 2018, I interviewed Jenny Thomas from Melbourne-based folk band Bush Gothic, at a time when both of us were looking forward to attending the National Folk Festival in Canberra at Easter.

One of us got there. It wasn’t me.

It was to have been my first National since 2013, a year when I barely felt like I was there. Some nights I was tucked up in the tent by 10.30pm. It happens sometimes.

But of course, your worst day at a festival beats your best day doing many other things, so…

Events transpired that at the 2018 festival, instead of running around with various recording devices, filing copy for a small coterie of publications, I was roughly 400kms north on Lake Macquarie, providing various gardening and handyman services for a friend.

If you want to give your (or any) god a good laugh, make some plans!

Back to the subject at hand.

Bush_Gothic_02 — Image courtesy of Bush Gothic

It’s been an absolute delight and pleasure to not only see Jenny Thomas and Jenny M. Thomas and Jenny Thomas and the System and the current incarnation of Bush Gothic perform, but also to interview Jenny several times, both here on the blog and also on radio in Canberra.

It’ll be great to see Bush Gothic perform again, down one of many dusty roads, but for now, here’s the interview we did in February. You’ll just have to put your headspace into some sort of cerebral TARDIS and pretend we are looking forward to another five or six days of magic at an upcoming National Folk Festival.

*** Sound file will be removed by the end of March 2020 ***

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Big Tobacco Company – Alternative Progressive Metal from Ohio, May 2018

May 11, 2018March 10, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, Music general Alternative, America, Big Tobacco Company, Cleveland, metal, music, Ohio, Progressive, USA

BTC_01 — Image courtesy of Big Tobacco Company

When opportunity and access to the appropriate hardware of the trade allows, it’s great to go on a whim and speak with random bands and artists around the globe.

On one memorable occasion, I was connecting with an Icelandic MOR band (Dikta) and within the week their interview with me was on radio in Canberra. That led to some lovely chats with their management in LA as well.

Something similar happened in March 2018 with Bobby Ullmann from Big Tobacco Company on Twitter.

Big Tobacco Company come from Cincinnati, Ohio and their sound has the sort of raw, rough edge that you might expect coming from people who live on the southern edge of the cold and forbidding waters of Lake Erie. Or it would be if I got the name of the city right, because that’s Cleveland that’s on Lake Erie.

Ok, American geography is not a strong suit. I have Google Maps.

I’m just guessing that if you’re that far up the country, it’s going to be colder than balls – except for maybe a week or two in July and August.

High tech interview setup at St Marys Rugby League Club, NSW, Australia

Minimal research before our interview proved to be a bonus. Some might call this ‘laziness’; the glass half-full version is: ‘living in the moment, all spontaneous and shit’.

No, seriously, it’s been beneficial in the past to not know too much about the interviewee before diving into a stack of questions, guided more by their responses than any predetermined views about the music, the genre, and the band’s ethos.

And so it was with Bobby. Any and all surprised responses from the interviewer are genuine.

Big Tobacco Company have a new self-titled album out now, and you can listen to tracks and buy them individually or en masse via their website.

On a stunning, clear, late summer lunchtime in St Marys in far, far western Sydney, Australia I pulled up a pew in the rugby league club and had a great chat with Bobby.

*** Audio file will be removed by the end of March 2020 ***

BTC1 — Image courtesy of Big Tobacco Company

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Coming To Blues On Broadbeach: Blues Arcadia, May 2017

May 12, 2017February 5, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, Music general blues, Blues Arcadia, Blues music, Blues On Broadbeach, Broadbeach, Gold Coast, Queensland

FB_IMG_1494543408098 — Image courtesy of Blues Arcadia

Blink twice, and in a two shakes of a lamb’s tail, it’ll be time for Blues On Broadbeach, that annual four day free festival of meaty and felafel-y good blues music in the heart of Queensland’s Gold Coast at (wait for it) Broadbeach.

About a dozen years ago or so it seems, Chris Harvey of Blues Arcadia sat down with Bill Quinn of Overheard Productions at Stones Corner Hotel to have a chat about the then way distant festival.

This interview is vividly memorable for several reasons, mostly because it was the day that, after giving Bowen and Ayr and surrounding areas a drenching and satching, Cyclone Debbie finally blew in to Brisbane.

We got our chat in just before the heavens opened.

Herewith the chat.

Please excuse the references to the then upcoming Stones Corner Festival. That’s in the rear vision mirror now, and my colleague of sorts Ashley will be presenting her review in an upcoming edition of Trad and Now magazine.

I’d say see you at Blues on Broadbeach, but you’ll just have to have my share of the fun, and flood social media with pictures, videos (if allowed) and reviews.

Rock on!

Bill Quinn
In a Central Queensland caravan park camp kitchen typing with one finger!

David M McLean, Skinny Devil Music Lab and Lexington Music Awards, January 2017

January 5, 2017March 8, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, Music general America, awards, blues, David McLean, guitar, guitar lessons, Kentucky, lexington, Lexington Music Awards, Skinny Devil Music Lab, teacher, USA

David M McLean is yet another of those prolific musical entities that are the engine room of independent music.

You know the sort of person who slogs away in the foreground and background, tirelessly making things happen and ensuring the world is a music-filled and art-filled place to live, breathe, and hear.

A writer, composer, guitarist, producer, teacher, and possibly most front-brain right now, the brains* behind the Lexifest music awards for Lexington, Kentucky.

* Refer to the interview for how the brains and brawn of this event are distributed and attributed.

In 2017, I spoke with David as he sat in his truck with his cell phone somewhere on a cool Lexington KY evening. We spoke so long that my intention was to break the interview into two parts. However, after a series of technical gremlins and many edits later, I’ve whittled this down into the one sound file.

Part of the editing leaves the back end of our chat slamming like a door in a stiff breeze, so apologies for the abruptness.

*** Audio file will be removed by the end of March 2020 ***

I’m looking forward to hearing about Lexifest 2017, and here’s hoping the blizzards stay away from town in the run-up this year.

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Fred Smith Launches ‘Dust of Uruzgan’ Book, October 2016

October 23, 2016May 2, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, Music general ADF, Afghanistan, audio, book, book launch, Canberra, Dust of Uruzgan, Fred Smith, military, music, Uruzgan

fred-smith01 — Image courtesy of Fred Smith

The first lesson of communication is that everyone digests information in different ways, and the savvy communicator has their content in multiple formats for multiple audiences.

Fred Smith certainly has a few bases covered with his ‘Dust of Uruzgan‘ project.

“It started as a war then turned into an album and then into a theatre show then into a musical and now into a book. It’s a pretty straightforward sort of setup, really.”

Fred Smith spoke just before his Brisbane book launch and a house concert in Maleny.

There is an award in a supporting role for Fred’s daughter Olympia, but we cut out and saved some of the higher high C notes she regaled us with for the extended 12″ remix of the audio file that originally appeared in this article.

Fred next takes the book on the road to Melbourne, Victorian regional centres, Canberra, Sydney, then back to Queensland for some regional appearances.

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From The Vault: Interview with Myf Warhurst, Spicks and Specktacular, December 2011

October 22, 2016July 8, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, Uncategorized audio, interview, music, Myf Warhurst, radio, Spicks and Specks, television

In eight days’ time (Sunday 30 October 2016), Overheard Productions is closing its doors OR it might be transitioning into something similar only different.

Yeah, I’d put money on the latter!

Hold on. 30/10/2016 = 13 = 4 = death. Strangely appropriate in one way, but a bit final given my plans! Meh, that numbers game is like a horoscope to me. Interesting for shizs and giggles, but not to be taken overly serious.

[Just look over there while I throw some salt over my left shoulder and turn around three times.]

Over the next eight days, I’m going to (as time permits) resurrect some old interviews and sound files. I’m paying these days for unlimited Soundcloud space, so I might as well make use of it.

This is one that I strangely never attached to a WordPress document, which is very weird since it’s one of my favourites with one of my all-time favourite on air/screen people.

When the Spicks and Specks offered me a choice of Alan Brough or Myf to interview, I did think that Alan would be a fascinating man to speak with given his encyclopaedic knowledge of music and his brilliantly dry and funny wit.

But dude. Myf Warhurst. MYF WARHURST!!!

I was like a cat on a hot tin roof, though not as alley cat-like as my daughter figured (as mentioned in the interview).

Enjoy.

Myf is currently presenting the lunch show (11am to 2pm ADST) on Double J radio (digital radio, online and Channel 200 on Free To Air television). Though at the time of writing (Saturday 22 October 2016), I believe she may still be overseas and the chair is being skillfully warmed by the aforementioned Alan Brough.

No, that must have been a pack of lies, as my late mother would say. Looks like she’s back!

Karen Green Artist (Canberra) talks about art, social justice, and Grey Woman Matters, October 2016

October 7, 2016March 5, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews 50, art, artist, Bill Quinn, Blue, Canberra, exhibition, humanity, interview, Karen Green, Overheard Productions, radio

grey-woman-matters-2014-exhibition — Grey Matters Woman exhibition, 2014. Image reprinted by kind permission of Karen Green.

Audio of interview with Karen Green Artist also of Grey Matters Woman.

Karen Green talks with Bill Quinn of Overheard Productions about art, entering the Archibald Prize 2016, and expressing her passion for social justice through art and Twitter.

Karen Green first came to our attention via her art on display at the Tuggeranong Arts Centre.

Karen came into the studio with fellow artist Gosia Orzechowska one morning for a chat, and Overheard Productions has been interested in her works ever since.

*** Audio file will be removed by the end of March 2020 ***

In more recent times, Karen Green has been very active on Twitter, sharing thoughts, links and events about social justice. It was this interest that led to a chain of events that saw her enter a portrait of Kon Karapanagiotidis of the Melbourne-based Asylum Seekers Resource Centre in the 2016 Archibald Prize.

Kon Karapanagiotidis by Karen Green.
Entry in 2016 Archibald Prize. Image courtesy of Karen Green. Continue reading →

Harry Manx – 2016 Australian Tour

September 23, 2016February 5, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, Music general, Trad and Now Acoustic, australia, Australian tour, Bill Quinn, blues, Canada, folk, folk music, Harry Manx, interview, Melbourne, Mohan Veena, music, Mystissippi, New South Wales, Overheard Productions, performance, singer-songwriter, Sydney, tour, trad and now, Vancouver Island

harrymanx-header — *Image courtesy of Harry Manx*

To tell the story of Harry Manx would take several lifetimes, and hopefully a progression of life-form hierarchies over those lives to tell the story, because the story is so mesmerising and complex that we would not be very present and in the moment of most of those lives, and that could put the telling of the tale at risk as we would not be making gradual and continuous improvement as…

Moving on…

Harry Manx performs at the 2012 National Folk Festival

Harry Manx has already begun his 2016 Australian tour which will take him from Sydney down to Victoria (where he is on stage tonight, Friday 23 September in Frankston) then around to Queensland, South Australia, Perth and up to Broome and Darwin, ending in the beautiful, lovely, gorgeous, I-may-be-a-little-hereditarily-biased New South Wales locales of Katoomba.

Ah, Katoomba. If there’s a more intimate, special venue than Clarendon Guest House, I want it stuffed, mounted, and hung above my fireplace – or I at least want an invite to your venue if it can go close to kicking the Clarendon into a cocked hat. Or any poultry millinery for that matter.

And finally wrapping it all up at Club Saffire in Merimbula.

So it’s a very eclectic path Harry treads, and look, I’d draw you a picture if I had a free hand, but imagine a much-twisted paper clip that’s been sitting on your desk all day on a slow Friday when you’ve been watching the clock since 9:36am – now you’re in the ballpark.

OR picture a moose that somehow wandered into your yard, found your sippin’ liquor in the shed, and is now making a bedraggled, loquacious, and somewhat winding stagger back to the forest by a circuitous route, two-thirds of it sideways.

You got it! Continue reading →

[VIDEO] The Great Overheard Productions Train Tomfoolery Continues: Tuesday Updates, September 2016

September 14, 2016April 24, 2020 Overheard Productions Interviews, L-Plate Learning, Miscellaneous, Uncategorized australia, Bill Quinn, chip butties, dogs, One of these things, Overheard Productions, police, Queensland Police Service, Queensland Rail, train, trains, Trouble at 't mill, Yorkshire

20160913_225308 — *Overheard Productions and the Queensland Police Service: trying to get our ducks in a row*

This ongoing police procedural drama/situation comedy is sponsored by the makers of the Matt Barker Radio interview on Overheard Productions:

https://overheardproductions.com/2016/09/12/audio-interview-with-matt-barker-radio-podcasts-and-digital-radio/

I’ve said it before and will keep saying it: you just cannot make this shit up!

Three days after the Friday night police incident where a whole passenger train was detained for ten minutes while members of the QPS swarmed around me at the Lota train station, and after many phone calls, I’m still in the dark.

I’ll give you the Wednesday updates later, but for now, here is where Ankerss Ahrr-Whey tracks down a neighbour of mine to find out what the heck is going on.

Garry briefs us for a short while until his meal starts to go cold and his accent ships off from north England to…. we’re not quite sure where.

And for those of you who saw the teaser, you know want some more of this:

(A little tip for amateur video-ers, Youtubers: if you’re recording a live performance, be sure to include even just a little of the applause at the end. Otherwise, it’s a bit like a door slamming shut in your face when you stop talking with a friend. I was going to go with a butt cheeks analogy; aren’t you glad I didn’t?)

And now that we’ve gone there, let’s go here. Muggins is there, front and centre at about 0:10. A time of my life when song just took me somewhere I’d never been before.

ENDS hopefully this century…