Preserve what was written.
Australian music deserves a record that lasts. Our starting point is the original Mess + Noise writing: the stories, reviews, interviews and voices that documented it.
We will preserve original text, known authorship and original publication dates. Restored stories will return to their original web addresses wherever the source can be verified. Material whose authorship or date remains uncertain will be flagged for review.
Make the restoration visible.
Historical pages will carry the label “Restored from the Mess + Noise archive”. Original publication dates and restoration dates will be recorded separately. Archive sources will be retained in the restoration record.
We won’t silently rewrite the past. Necessary extraction repairs will be recorded, and material corrections or modern additions will be clearly identified. Restored writing, updated historical pages and new work will remain distinct.
Review before republishing.
The recovered archive is being assessed. This holding site does not yet publish historical articles, and recovery does not mean that every original page is available or complete.
Archived images will not be automatically republished. Image sources and usage rights will be reviewed separately from article text.
A NOTE FROM JOEL KING
Before the next chapter.
Mess + Noise mattered because it documented Australian music while it was actually happening—the artists, rooms, records and conversations that formed the culture around it.
When I acquired the Mess + Noise domain and began recovering what remained of the archive, I didn’t want to erase that history by immediately turning it into something new. The first responsibility is to restore the original work properly: its writers, photographers, dates, context and original addresses wherever they can be verified.
That work takes time. Every recovered page needs to be reviewed, credits need to be checked and image rights need to be considered separately. Where something has changed, we’ll identify it. Where something cannot yet be confirmed, we’ll say so.
Mess + Noise will return as an independent home for Australian music. Before that next chapter begins, we’re making sure the first one can be found again.
Keep contributors in the picture.
Authors should be able to correct attribution, add context, update their biographies or request removal. We are preparing a direct contact route for those requests and for new story pitches.
Read the contributor information
A note about the forum
The historical community and forum are a separate restoration project. This holding site does not reopen the forum.