My Happiness

This isn't the last song, is it?

Is it My Happiness?

No.

Was that the last song?

Yeah, good memory.

Uh, let's do it.

My Happiness, live from Brisbane Riverstage.

A just a t- tr- treat, taste, one of the words, uh, of what you are gonna hear as they tour September, October next year.

[laughs]

Uh, was it, was it because of that? It was like our band, My Happiness was our song, and we ended up, I ended up breaking up with her in 2010 literally-

Oh, no

... uh, we had tickets, we had, they announced the, uh, the farewell tour, and we ended up, well, I think we had tickets to, like, five different ones, um, between Sydney-

Oh

...

Powderfinger song you want to talk about from the '90s? So Know My Happiness.

Yeah.

I have to say, though, I am personally very excited for this.

I think any Australian pretending that they aren't hyped about getting to see songs like These Days, My Happiness, Passenger, Perform Live, I think they're lying.

But what are your... powder finger excitement levels like we...

I don't think I've ever talked about this band before.

They played 34 shows around the country to half a million people in each show in Perth, perhaps about 10,000 people.

And what my memory of that concert was that these days my happiness kind of sparked this massive sort of 10,000-strong choir on the gardens there.

Yeah, the crowd was very loud.

I interviewed Darren Middleton, the guitarist, a few years later for a solo tour, and he said, He said that the crowd in Perth was the loudest on the tour, but maybe he was just

They are those songs that a huge crowd can get behind and sing along and feel connected to.

I reckon you're right.

I think they are anthems, songs like These Days and My Happiness and My Kind of Scene and The Day You Come.

The only band I can equate them to is Crowded House where they're really welcoming the audience and everyone sings together and Powderfinger, they had a bit of edge to them sometimes.

Right, okay.

The, one of the first posts read, "I see your signs on the street now, do you?" Um, and then that's the opening line to My Happiness.

Wow.

Right? Um, if this is not a reunion, people are going to be furious.

... as the Three For All.

Yes.

Starting with the Finger, My Happiness.

[laughs] Yep, that's how they, that's our intro.

Okay.

Fact three: The hit song My Happiness by Powderfinger probably made the band about $1.25 million in royalties alone, according to industry sources, not the band.

Wow.

Uh, yeah, that's, that's kind of ballparking what that one successful song would've been worth to that band.

Australian bands would do this, and they'd play these beer barns that were 1,500, 2,000 capacity, okay? And all cash bars, right? There was, there was money to be made.

Okay, but what kind of money? What would a solid, well-regarded, kinda top-tier Australian band have been making back then in late '90s, early 2000s Australian dollars?

So I'd say the Powderfinger song My Happiness, right? That was a single off their album Odyssey Number Five.

Let's just say Powderfinger's My Happiness, uh, the album sold around 550, 60,000, so it was a lot.

Yeah, she went to a couple festivals, but kind of as a regular thing to go quite often, it's a really important thing because it's more than just a weekend in Byron or Lorne or wherever you go.

It's about whether we can afford, like literally afford, cash-wise, to not put a few thousand strangers in a paddock and let a song do a thing that only a song can do.

That's a really powerful thing, a really important thing in our country.

It's one thing, though, if a music festival can't afford to run because of how much stuff costs, but it's another thing if a festival can't run because there's nobody to put on stage.

Because in April 1999, Australian acts were 12 of the top 50 chart spots, near enough a quarter of the entire chart.

Silverchair, Savage Garden, Madison Avenue, Killing Heidi, all up there.

And every single one of them with a brand new song released within a year from that chart, okay? The same chart from the same week this year has one Australian artist in the top 50.

Not 12, one.