“Making it up as we went”: how Milk! Records helped to shape the sound of Australia
The existence of independent record labels has always proven to be an invaluable aspect of any local music scene. Once you reject the big business of the major labels, you open yourself to an entirely new world of artistic expression, innovation and community. Throughout music history, independent labels have been at the forefront of pioneering new scenes, from the post-punk and acid house of Factory Records in Manchester to the indie explosion of Domino. In Australia, it was the DIY stylings of Milk! Records that fostered the music scene of Melbourne for many years.
Initially, Milk! was set up in 2012 by then-unknown singer-songwriter Courtney Barnett as a way of legitimising her self-released CDs. What started out as a hastily drawn bottle of milk, however, soon became a defining cornerstone of Melbourne’s indie and DIY movement. Reflecting upon the foundations of the label, Barnett once recalled, “There was no other support or money. The only thing was the logo”. Seemingly, you can get pretty far on “just a logo”, as Milk! went on to bring attention to a wealth of now-beloved artists.
In addition to Barnett, the label was also run by her then-partner Jen Cloher, who released various solo projects under the Milk! brand. For years, the label existed as a way for Barnett and Cloher to get their own material out into the world, as well as connect with fellow musicians and artists operating within Melbourne. For Barnett, who first moved to the city in 2008, it was an invaluable resource to find like-minded people in her area.
In 2015, after years of bubbling away within the local music scene of Melbourne, Milk! was exposed to the wider world for the first time with the release of Barnett’s full-length debut. Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit should surely go down as one of the finest indie rock albums of the 2010s, acting as the introduction to the incredible songwriting talents of Barnett. Of course, the album went out with that milk bottle scrawled across the back cover.
Despite the success and, presumably, revenue that Barnett’s debut brought to the label – which has, up until that point, been operating on virtually no budget and a rotating roster of artists largely made up of friends of Barnett and Cloher, Milk! never lost its DIY ethos. “It was so DIY,” Barnett later told The Guardian, “We were just trying to get things done. And making it up as we went.”
This DIY, off-the-cuff way of operating bled over into the musical output itself. Virtually every release put out by Milk! during its 11-year tenure was awash with an organic, spontaneous and DIY quality. In many ways, the releases put out by the label over the years are the archetypal indie rock releases, imbued with a sense of real honesty and dedication to the art, completely ignoring the corporate business that much of mainstream music has become.
Milk! ceased operations in 2023, with Barnett’s career going from strength to strength and limiting her abundance of free time. Nevertheless, the lineage of the label can still be felt within Melbourne and the wider music industry as a whole. Sure, it never made any money and eventually had to close down after 11 years of largely obscure releases, but the impact of a successful independent label is so much more important than profit. Nurturing local art and music scenes is the greatest thing that an artist can do for their community and Milk! Records certainly did that.
