Everyone who remembers Frankston’s Big Fish Rock Dance from the early 70’s knows it was so much more than a school-hall dance. It was grouse!
In a golden age of bands it attracted many of the best including Daddy Cool, Spectrum, LRB, Lobby Lloyd and The Saints. It became an icon for the area’s teens.
Big Fish was the brainchild of Geoffrey Collins and a couple of his mates. In the back streets of Frankston, at Frankston High School hall, it was named after the ‘big fish’ statue outside, this weekly dance eventually saw 1500 kids coming through its doors. Standard attire was thongs, cord jeans and a stand-out length of sun and surf bleached hair.
Skinheads and sharpies ruled Frankston’s CBD at the time. This was a different vibe.
“I had a young family of five children and was regularly involved in volunteer youth work. I saw problems for Frankston’s young people so I approached the council with the idea of starting a dance.” Geoffrey said. “Two younger work friends, well known ex-boxer Mick Canavan and Richmond footballer John Sutton both thought my idea of a ‘dance’ was a bit dated, so together we organized our version of a rock dance at Frankston High School.”
The first gig was in the summer of ’71. Word spread like wildfire around the schools and among surfers. Big Fish soon became maybe the best rock dance in Melbourne.
The second event was a full house, packed and pumping with adolescent essence.
Parents loved it too. They reckoned that their kids were in a safe place.
Big Fish Rock Dance was also a stepping stone venue for the bands that later entered the hall of fame, such as Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs, Daddy Cool, Skyhooks and Chain.
MPM publisher Lisa Walton and Shire Cultural Planner Andrea Ebsworth both have fond memories of Big Fish. “We would walk there, mum and dad were happy for us to go,” Andrea said. “It was always so much fun.”
“It was amazing, I saw so many bands with my mates from school, we would dance all night and there was never any trouble,” said Lisa.
Peace, love and music were the in-thing for the dominant ‘ flower power’ cult of peninsula kids in the early 1970’s.
“We never had any trouble,” recalls Geoffrey. “If a kid wasn’t picked up by a parent we would drop them off. The police helped us as well. It was actually the catalyst for pubs to start having bands.”
Big Fish was youth driven, at the peak of its success, most hotels had not yet even considered putting on bands.
Dominated by the peninsula surf-youth culture, Big Fish Rock Dance lasted till the mid 70’s, just as pub-rock was being born. It later moved to the smaller Mechanic’s Hall, next to The Deck, in Frankston and eventually closed after a series of nearby fights.
Big Fish spawned a generation locally with an interest in music and the arts- the ‘children of the revolution’ have long been alive and well on the Mornington Peninsula.
Courtesy of Mornington Peninsula Magazine
