Legendary band Yothu Yindi and their trailblazing call for a treaty

Review: Writing in the Sand: The Epic Story of Legendary Band Yothu Yindi and How Their Song Treaty Gave Voice to a Movement by Matt Garrick (ABC Books)

Readers are advised this article contains depictions of deceased people. Special thanks to Witiyana Marika of Yothu Yindi for confirming it is acceptable to publish the late Mandawuy Yunupiŋu’s name.

Few musicians have had as profound an impact on Australia’s cultural and political life as those in Yothu Yindi. Formed in 1986, this revolutionary band brought together Indigenous musicians from the Yolŋu town of Yirrkala in Northeast Arnhem Land and their non-Indigenous, or Balanda, friends who played in a Darwin band called the Swamp Jockeys.

Their union became fertile ground for new musical dialogues between very different styles, cultures and ideas with the band’s innovative songs drawing on Yolŋu musical elements and lyrics.

Their sources were Manikay, the ancestral Yolŋu song tradition performed in public ceremonies, and Djatpaŋarri, a playful and exuberant popular song form composed and performed by young men in Yirrkala from the 1930s to the 1970s. These overt borrowings afforded Yothu Yindi their distinctive sound.

Sung in both English and Yolŋu languages, Yothu Yindi’s early hits included spirited rock anthems such as Djäpana: Sunset Dreaming and Treaty. These songs affirmed traditional ideas and values for local Yolŋu audiences, while resonating across Australia with the Aboriginal Reconciliation movement of the early 1990s.

The band’s biggest hit, Treaty, released in 1991, was informed by the Yirrkala community’s deep sorrow over their 1971 Supreme Court loss in a case brought against the bauxite mine that had consumed their surrounding homelands.

The song contributed significantly to popularising calls for the Australian government to negotiate a treaty with Indigenous peoples in recognition of their human rights and unceded sovereignty.

Despite the gravity of such themes in many of Yothu Yindi’s songs, the band’s generosity of spirit towards people from all walks of life shone through.

Growing into a group of increasingly diverse musicians over time, Yothu Yindi advocated their own vision for an Australia in which Indigenous people and others could live together in mutual respect and harmony.

Read more: My favourite album: Yothu Yindi's Tribal Voice

An anthem for all Australians

Writing in the Sand: The Epic Story of Legendary Band Yothu Yindi and How their Song Treaty Gave Voice to a Movement is a new book by Matt Garrick, an award winning writer and ABC News journalist based in Darwin. It is both Garrick’s first book and the band’s first biography.