I first met Morgan Lewis when we were 17 in the 2JJJ studio. The show was Drum Media and we were both there because the NSW Minister for Education, Terry Metherell, had introduced a stupid system that would disadvantage students around the state. Independently, we had been outraged and called the station, along with a couple of other students – one of them Sacha Horler.
After the show, the five of us got together and started the Secondary Students’ Coalition. In the long run, we organised a protest of 100,000 students in the Domain in August 1988 to coincide with a Teachers’ Strike in the middle of our HSC trials. We organised buses from around the state to bus in regional kids. I was one of the communications co-ordinators and I ran lists of school captains and phone trees and ended up on Good Morning Australia arguing our cause. We won: Metherell backed down and the measures were modified as per our requests, and delayed for two years so that students could make subject choices knowing about the implications. It was the start of my activism – this thing *worked*! One of our gang, Antonia, ended up running off with one of the ABC journalists who’d interviewed us (can’t remember her name…) which was a terrible scandal given the age difference.
I’ve seen Morgan become an amazing drummer and performer and bumped into him from time to time. Thursday night, I went to the Amnesty International Freedom Festival. I expected the Procussions to be amazing (they were). I wasn’t sure about the various Australians. Aussie hip hop isn’t nearly as polished as the US strain, even though I knew Elf Transporter was likely to be there and good. What I wasn’t expecting was that Sydney act “Morganics”, second top on the bill, would be my old mate Morgan.
Turns out he’s a pretty well known MC these days. He’s been up in Arnhem Land teaching the kids how to express themselves through rapping. I spent the whole set grinning like a loon.
Then the Procussions came on. They rocked the planet. What a great, great night. (Even Merlin – yes, that one – in his act Debasa wasn’t bad… believe it or not.)