If you’re a songwriter looking for some inspiration and a welcoming community of like-minded artists, you’d do well to pack up your things and make for the inner northern suburbs of Melbourne, which were recently found to have retained their spot as the top postcode for songwriters in Australia.

As the Sydney Morning Herald reports, figures released by APRA AMCOS indicate that most of the Australasian Performing Right Association and Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society’s national members are based there, with Brunswick taking over the top spot from Northcote.

Northcote, home to several prominent Melbourne live music venues such as the Northcote Social Club, had previously held the national top spot for a decade, but now drops to number two, with Brunswick proving to be a buzzing hub of alternative, blues & roots, folk, classical, and pop/rock songwriters.

In fact, looking at the breakdown of genres, some surprising facts turn up. For example, it may surprise some Aussie country lovers to learn that Northcote and not Tamworth is in fact home to Australia’s country music heartland, as far as songwriters are concerned.

“Melbourne’s like Austin in Texas, it’s a very strong live music area. Because they can make a living out of it, it provides that creativity that makes it all worthwhile. The direct comparison would be Nashville and Tamworth. It’s an alternative, rootsy form of country music,” said broadcaster and journalist Dave Dawson.

APRA AMCOS’ top 10 suburbs are rounded out by Sydney postcodes, including Newtown-Enmore, Bondi, and Surry Hills-Darlinghurst. By genre, urban, world music, electronica, and screen composers are most prevalent in Bondi, while Newtown-Enmore tops the charts for the number of metal songwriters.

“The data indicates that Melbourne’s inner North has firmed as the national songwriting capital over the last decade,” said Andrew Harris, Principal Analyst at APRA AMCOS. “But digging into more recent trends there are emerging signs that the inner West of Melbourne and parts of South East Queensland are songwriting growth spots to look out for in the near future.”

While there was a shift away from the Bayside area — music hub St Kilda fell from number four to 10 following the closure of several venues and record stores — Victoria showed the strongest growth by State in the last 12 months, followed by Queensland and Western Australia.

Get unlimited access to the coverage that shapes our culture.
to Rolling Stone magazine
to Rolling Stone magazine