Music on the Desert Feet Tour

The Desert Feet Tour provides music workshops and concerts into remote indigenous communities. Here you will find all the songs we record in the music workshops and some of the songs various bands have recorded live at Desert Feet Tour concerts.


Indigenous bands recorded in the communities

One of the great additions to the Desert Feet Tour was sound engineer and musician Ewan Buckley. He has not only mixed each band from front of house so that they sound great, but he can also play a great acoustic set and record the local musical talent.

He records each concert and at the end of the night or early the next day does a fairly rough mix down. Although the quality of these recordings is far from perfect, it allows us an insight into some great musical talent in the communities.

These bands will seldom get the chance to record, and if they do, can sometimes wait for years to hear their masterpieces. We record and provide the bands with a copy of their recording the next day, and it is amazing to see how eager the band members are to hear themselves and start sharing their tunes around.

We hope that one day we could afford to spend a week out in each community and perhaps assist bands in recording an EP. Then the Desert Feet Tour would have a fully operational desert studio!


Live Band Recordings - October 2012 Tour



Live Band Recordings - Kimberley October 2011 Tour

Live band recordings - Kimberley Oct 2011 by Desert Feet Tour


This is a collection of some live performances by Indigenous musicians we invited to headline the Desert Feet Tour community concerts, in remote communities through Western Australia's Kimberley region. The invitation to play on the stage, coupled with our ability to multi-track record (that is, to record all of the instruments individually and simultaneously) their performance makes these nights extremely popular with local musicians, who rarely (if ever) get these opportunities. It's not unusual for these nights to go very late! We do our best to mix their performances overnight, or the next day, and give them back a mastered demo mix of their performance. These can usually be heard blasting out from various car stereos over the following days!


Here are the songs from the above play list individually.

Dry Metal Boys - Desert Warriors

Dry Metal Boys - Desert Warriors by Desert Feet Tour


A song by Ephraim, a fellow from Wangkatjungka in WA's Fitzroy River Valley, a member of the Dry Metal Boys, who are playing this song. Members of the band are from the language groups Wangkatjungka and Walmadjarri. Recorded live on stage by the Desert Feet Tour in October 2011 in Wangkatjungka.


Dry Metal Boys - Doojooloo

Dry Metal Boys - Doojooloo by Desert Feet Tour


A song by Jameson, a member of the Dry Metal Boys from Wangkatjungka, an Indigenous Community in WA's Fitzroy River Valley. This song is sung in Walmadjarri language (I think), and was recorded live on stage by the Desert Feet Tour in Wangkatjungka in October 2011. It is about a girl...


Seaside Drifters - Leaving the City

Seaside Drifters - Leaving the City by Desert Feet Tour


An original song by the Seaside Drifters, who came up from Broome's One Mile community, to headline the Desert Feet Tour show at One Arm Point in October 2011. It is a live recording - these guys were a real show, playing two very popular and charismatic sets. The singer is a little bit pitchy in the intro, but he gets there in the end and it's a cool song! So many of the artists we record in the communities sing about similar themes to this one - homecoming songs of getting out of town and going back home. In this case, home is Bidyadanga, south of Broome.


Yakanarra Band - Yakanarra

Yakanarra Band - Yakanarra by Desert Feet Tour


This is a collection of some live performances by Indigenous musicians we invited to headline the Desert Feet Tour community concerts, in remote communities through Western Australia's Kimberley region. The invitation to play on the stage, coupled with our ability to multi-track record (that is, to record all of the instruments individually and simultaneously) their performance makes these nights extremely popular with local musicians, who rarely (if ever) get these opportunities. It's not unusual for these nights to go very late! We do our best to mix their performances overnight, or the next day, and give them back a mastered demo mix of their performance. These can usually be heard blasting out from various car stereos over the following days!


Yakanarra Band - Fires Burning

Yakanarra Band - Fires Burning by Desert Feet Tour


This is a collection of some live performances by Indigenous musicians we invited to headline the Desert Feet Tour community concerts, in remote communities through Western Australia's Kimberley region. The invitation to play on the stage, coupled with our ability to multi-track record (that is, to record all of the instruments individually and simultaneously) their performance makes these nights extremely popular with local musicians, who rarely (if ever) get these opportunities. It's not unusual for these nights to go very late! We do our best to mix their performances overnight, or the next day, and give them back a mastered demo mix of their performance. These can usually be heard blasting out from various car stereos over the following days!


Music Workshops

The workshops cover a range of music based activities from song writing to rhythm to beat boxing and it is unusual not to not to find ourselves with a room full of enthusiastic children eager to be involved in making a song. The songs can either revolve around the community life and what is valuable to the children, or sometimes we try and work a song out around a health message. Our last tour was made possible by our October 2011 tour partners Diabetes WA so we had fun working in themes around eating healthy, dringking lots of water and avoiding diabetes. Below under the workshops section we have some of the songs for you to listen to. We warn you however, some are quite catchy!


Kids Workshops - Kimberley October 2011 Tour

Kids Workshops - Kimberley Oct 2011 by Desert Feet Tour


These are a collection of songs we recorded live in music workshop sessions with kids in remote indigenous communities through WA's Kimberley region. In these workshops, we introduce kids to different music genres from classical, to folk, rock, pop and hip-hop, as well as to a wide range of instruments demonstrated by our team, and then we show kids how to put together the core elements of songwriting - chords, progressions, structures, melodies and lyrics. Then we record the songs with the kids, and give them their songs on CD so they can hear themselves! What a buzz!!



Brehanna Green - Fish in the Water

Brehanna Green - Fish in the Water by Desert Feet Tour


A song by a young girl named Brehanna Green in One Arm Point Community, north of Broome, Western Australia - these are her lyrics and melody, and she is only 11! Candice Dempsey (aka Ulla Shay www.ullashay.com) helped her with the arrangements and recording. One Arm Point is a beautiful place, a community of Bardi people right on the tip of the Dampier Peninsula in WA's Kimberley region. The waters are crystal clear and teeming with turtles and fish (which Brehanna is singing about), which are an extremely important part of the Bardi diet, lifestyle and culture. They have their own ranger program, funded and run by the community, to ensure that their natural resources are managed well, and in accord with traditional ways of managing country as well as working with the scientific community and government.


Jarlmadangah Kids - In Jarlmadangah

Jarlmadangah Kids - In Jarlmadangah by Desert Feet Tour


This is the song we made with kids at the school in Jarlmadangah - pretty cool! This is such a beautiful place, great kids! You can learn more about Jarlmadangah Burru Community from their great website: www.jarlmadangah.com


One Arm Point Kids - Don't Want Diabetes

One Arm Point Kids - Don't Want Diabetes by Desert Feet Tour


A song by the kids of One Arm Point, with Bryte MC of the Desert Feet Tour, incorporating healthy messages brought along by the team from Diabetes WA. Bryte MC has a great workshop format where he performs a hip-hop rap that he writes with kids, and then records them rapping different parts of the song. He mixes it all up into a pretty rad hip-hop track!


One Arm Point Kids - Choose Water, Eat Healthy, Keep Fit

One Arm Point Kids - Choose Water, Eat Healthy, Keep Fit by Desert Feet Tour


It doesn't get any clearer or catchy than this - Choose Water, Eat Healthy and Keep Fit! That's how you don't get diabetes! We combined a great, fun educational session with Asha and Helen from Diabetes WA (http://www.diabeteswa.com.au), who showed the kids why they should avoid diabetes, and how to do it. Poor diet, especially eating too many fats and sugars (soft drinks, junk food), inactivity and not drinking enough water are sure ways to contract this disease, which affects more than four times as many Indigenous than non-Indigenous Australians. For days afterwards, we would catch kids singing this song to themselves as they were playing and walking around - and soft drink sales must have plummeted after our visit! Diabetes is one of the biggest preventable health issues facing Indigenous Australians, increasing the likelihood of smoking, dietary and alcohol-related diseases, and causing many health issues of its own. Some great info here: http://www.healthinfonet.ecu.edu.au/chronic-conditions/diabetes/reviews/our-review



Other Recordings

Although the Desert Feet Tour is primarily focused around indigenus music services into remote communities, we do occasionally branch out on route. On the recent Kimberly based tour, the Desert Feet crew visited Broome prison and Curtin Detention Center. Here are some recordings from these events.

Curtin Detention Center

Ahmad Saeedi - Live at Curtin Immigration Detention Centre by Desert Feet Tour


We met Ahmad Saeedi, an asylum seeker from Iran, at the Curtin Immigration Detention Centre near Derby, Western Australia. He told us his story - he is a rap music artist of some repute back home, persecuted for writing songs against the actions of his government. He had been imprisoned for 2 years, simply for his art, and had to leave his home in fear of more persecution. He made his way to Australia, finally landing by boat a couple of years ago. During the day, we were running music workshops with clients of the detention centre, and Ahmad was the star of the show - he played the keyboard, layed the beats and helped us with creating lyrics in English and Farsi (we think it was Farsi!). He is a tremendous musician, creating his own backing tracks using a standard cheap keyboard, at the same time as rapping his lyrics - this is a very difficult and complex feat! Then at night when we stage a concert - Ahmad took to the stage and really shone. He is obviously a seasoned performer and really worked the crowd. Despite singing in a different language, we could hear the angst in his songs and he really communicated through music. Ahmad was an inspiration to all of us on the Desert Feet Tour.


Curtin Asylum Seekers - Hazara Song

Curtin Asylum Seekers - Hazara Song by Desert Feet Tour


A song by a Hazara refugee from Afghanistan who took to the Desert Feet Tour stage when we played at the Curtin Immigration Detention Centre near Derby, Western Australia. We don't know what he was singing - but the crowd loves it!