Easter Fuel Price Shock & The Sounds Of Australia 2026

Your listing, too.

I'm on my media podcast.

Okay, pop quiz.

What did this iconic speech?

I will not be lectured about sexism and misogyny by this man.

I will not.

And this jingle have in common.

Well, they're both quintessentially Australian.

Sounds, speeches and jingles that have shaped life here down under.

This week, the National Film and Sound Archive have just added nine more iconic Aussie sounds to the list.

Today, Claire Murphy is here with me to unpack them all.

It's the quickie for Wednesday, April 1, I'm Taylor Strano.

Here's Claire now with the latest news headlines.

Thanks, Taylor, and Inquest will reconstruct the final moments of fugitive Desi Freeman's life in detail

for a coroner to determine the circumstances around his death.

The 56-year-old was fatally shot by police on a remote property in Thola Galong near Woolworth

on the Victorian New South Wales border on Monday after a months-long manhunt.

As one of the nation's largest searches concludes,

a coroner will take over the investigation and look into the circumstances surrounding the seven-month period.

Freeman was wanted over the fatal shootings of Neil Thompson and Vadim Duarte-Hottart,

officers who are among a team of police serving a warrant at his poor punker home in late August.

Families hoping to get away over Easter are unlikely to get cheaper petrol before the long weekend,

while regional people could be waiting weeks for relief.

The federal government cut wholesale fuel prices by 26 cents a litre in a bid to head off the worst economic effects of the war in Iran.

But the change would not be felt straight away,

because service stations still need to sell all their older, higher-taxed fuel stock before bringing in the cheaper fuel.

That process would likely take anything from a day or two for high turnover metro stations

to two or more weeks for some regional areas.

A giant trans flag, the largest in the world, has been unfurled in Brisbane

with trans and gender diverse advocates protesting the Queensland government's restrictions to gender-affirming health care.

The flag which took 30 people 10 days to sow and measures 40 metres by 20 metres

was revealed on international trans day visibility

to protest Queensland State Government policy

that has seen them become the first to ban hormone treatments for children diagnosed with gender dysphoria.

Under the ban, hormone therapies are no longer accessible to new patients aged under 18.

Trans Justus, my engine member, Jodie Hall, the group behind the flag,

said trans people deserve access to the things we need to live a good life

and part of that is access to health care that gives us freedom to live our lives like everyone else.

Golfo Tiger Woods told authorities he was looking at his phone and didn't realise the truck in front of him had slowed

before his roll over crash in Florida last week.

According to the police report, Woods had two hydrocodone pills in his pocket

and officers observed him to be lethargic, slow, sweating profusely

with eyes that were bloodshot and glassy with pupils that were extremely dilated.

When asked during the criminal DUI investigation if he took any prescription medication,

the report said the 50-year-old golfer replied,

I take a few while adding he'd done so earlier in the morning.

Woods was arrested last Friday on a charge of driving under the influence

after his land rover rolled on a two-lane road near his Jupiter Island home,

having travelled at high speeds and clipping the truck.

He was released on bail later that night, known was injured in the crash.

According to Royal Sources, Princesses, Beatrice and Yusine,

the daughter of Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, will not be at the Royal Family's Easter Church service.

Mountbatten Windsor, the younger brother of King Charles,

was arrested in February by police on suspicion of misconduct in public office.

Andrew, his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson and the pair's daughters attended the Easter service

at Windsor Castle last year, a traditional annual gathering for the family.

But Royal Sources says the Princesses would not be there this Sunday,

adding it was their decision not Charles's.

Thanks Claire, next.

What does Australia sound like?

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island listeners

are advised that this episode may contain audio of deceased persons.

If you could press play on Australia, what would you hear?

The National Film and Sound archive has been working hard to compile

the great Australian mixtape, not its official name,

but a collection of all the sights and sounds that have shaped life here,

from way back in the 1890s right up to today.

There are nearly 700,000 unique works in there,

adding up to around 7 million items, both physical and digital,

and it just keeps growing every single year.

From the old telly shows you grew up on,

to the movies everyone still quotes, award-winning songs,

and moments from the pop culture canon they're all accounted for.

Which brings us nicely to 2026,

nine more pieces of Aussie history have been added to the archive,

and Claire Murphy is here to talk through the list with us.

I'm so excited to talk about this.

I love talking about sounds.

As someone who's been in radio and now podcast for my entire career,

sounds are so important.

They can do so many things. They can create memories.

They can take you back in time.

They can make you feel things.

I love this so much.

I love this too. I love that we have this Australian collection

in the National Film and Sound archive,

and every year we're just taking down memory lane

within the editions.

So there are nine new editions in 2026.

Do you want to kick us off with the first one?

Yes, I do, because for those of you who own You Know Marsha Hines

for her being a judge on a talent show,

back in the day, she was Australia's Queen of Disco.

Yes.

And in 1977, she released this song.

It's called You.

Something very special about you.

It became Marsha Hines biggest hit, unsurprisingly.

Disco was massive in 1977,

and this just hit the sweet spot.

Marsha's vocals are fabulous.

It had all of the elements that 1977 Australia needed.

Only made it to number two on the charts, which is interesting.

It's such a moment in Australian time,

and it kind of legitimized us as a musical strength

because Marsha's American,

and she gave it kind of this legitimacy.

It was written by an American songwriter,

but she's quintessentially Australian.

Yeah.

Also on this list, Claire, another song.

So the entirety of the list and the archive

is not all just music,

but I do want to talk about another track

that did make its way into the archive this year.

It's actually pretty recent.

When we think about archives,

our mind extends back quite far.

But I want to take you to 2004

to this iconic piano riff.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter.

The way things grew again.

Yeah, a little bit of Missy Higgins.

Yeah.

Some scar.

It takes us to such a time

for those of us who are of a certain age,

because we're talking, this is peak emo years.

2004.

We're all a little bit sad for whatever reason.

We had no idea what was coming.

They could potentially make us even sadder.

But in fact, then, that music really spoke to our souls

and Missy Higgins went for the jugular band.

She's got several songs like this,

which just rip your heart out and stomp all over it.

Yeah, ironically, this song is about being in the industry

for a little while and people try to reshape

and reformat what it is that you do.

And for some reason, that was really relatable

to everybody who was not trying to be a pop star

in nearly 2000s Australia.

It's also a woman who is writing her own music.

She is a musician.

She's playing that piano.

It recently in an awards ceremony,

like that song still hits, man.

And it continues to do so you're right.

So it actually clocked up at number four in Triple J's,

hottest 100 of Australian songs last year.

And during the year that it was released 2004,

it came at number two.

So it was very much an year warm of the next time.

Speaking about tearing our hearts out,

this next bit of audio that is going into the sound archive this year

comes from a 2015.

But in order to explain it, we need to go a year back.

Because in 2014, Rosie Batty was at a cricket match

with her son Luke.

He was just 11 years old when her ex partner and Luke's dad

arrived at the scene and in a horrific moment

of family violence killed Luke and then took his own life.

And at that moment,

this really thrust domestic violence

into the headlines and spotlight,

like we'd never really seen before,

it was still very behind closed doors its family business.

This was national headlines.

It was so shocking that everyone in the country

kind of came to a halt and was like,

how could this have happened in this public place?

Lesson a year later, Rosie Batty was made Australian

of the year and she gave this speech on being handed her award.

I am truly honored.

I would like to dedicate this award to my beautiful son, Luke.

Here's the reason I have found my voice

and I'm able to be heard.

Whilst we celebrate the wonderful country

that we live in today,

there remains a serious epidemic across our nation.

No matter where you live,

family violence exists in every pocket of every neighbourhood.

It does not discriminate

and it is across all sections of our society.

It is so deeply moving and devastating

and I wish there was a world

wouldn't a universe a reality when this never happens.

But Rosie Batty has opened that conversation

and that dialogue up for so many Australians

who either didn't know of sort of the extent

of domestic violence in Australia

or were being introduced to it for the first time.

She did speak to other victim survivors

and their children in that message.

One thing that was really interesting is she spoke to men

and said that we need you,

like you're part of this conversation,

we need you to help us end family violence.

And I think that's when people started to go,

hang on a minute, this isn't women's business.

This isn't something that women should be dealing with

or fighting against or trying to not become victims of.

Men are part of this conversation too

and she made that really clear.

It's very interesting for someone to be able to

take the worst moment of their life

and turn it into their life's work.

And she's just such an incredible woman for that.

Okay, Claire, from something quite serious to something

that you've probably heard nearly every single day

and not thought much about,

the archive is not just songs,

it's not just quotes and films and speeches.

It's also just like everyday sounds.

May I introduce this one to you?

You're very familiar with that sound I imagine?

Like, let me tell you this, Taylor Strano,

I was five years old when these crossing buttons

came to be in Australia,

and I have really visceral memories

of standing with my mum at an intersection

and holding my finger on the middle part

which is used for people who are hearing impaired

and sight impaired,

and it sends a pulse through at the same time

as the actual sound does.

And I just remember being so like entranced

by this thing and so interested in it.

And now it's just become so much a part

of the Australian way of life.

If I hear it out of context,

it'll transport me to an intersection somewhere

in Australia.

Well, somewhere out of context,

and I'm not sure if you've picked up on this,

but Billie Eilish was also quite taken by the fact.

Oh, I heard about this.

Yeah, so you're taking Biden,

it brings you back to us at Bourbon Street in Australia.

She heard it while she was here down under,

and it actually formed a sample

that you might have picked up

in arguably one of her biggest songs ever,

which is Bad Guy.

Bad Guy.

Duh.

Yep.

And she's talked about this in media previously

about how that all came to be.

I love that.

It's just a little bit of Australian slipped into

some Billie Eilish.

A couple of very quick mentions, Claire,

we have such a long rich history

of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art being made.

As part of the Australian songbook.

And one of those tracks is being taken into the archive this year,

Tabaran by Rubble,

which is the title track from a record

that came out in 1990.

And it's around that time in Australia music

where a lot of Indigenous artists were teeming up

with contemporary Australian artists,

and you hear it in this track specifically.

It's like that thing of speaking in native language,

and then teeming it up with those contemporary,

almost dance sort of sounds.

Yothu Yindi is another really good example of this.

Yeah, it's so interesting,

because before that,

we heard Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural music

really just in cultural settings.

Yeah.

And when it started,

I think it was really interesting

that it was really interesting

and cultural music really just in cultural settings.

Yeah.

And when it started to see songs like Treaty

or like this come through,

it's like,

it started us understanding

that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture

isn't just about something that happens at Uluru, for example.

Like it's everywhere.

It's part of our everyday life.

This felt like a way for us to kind of just start bridging that gap a little bit.

They were awarded for it as well.

Like they won the 1992 RA for the best Indigenous release

for this that is going into the archive.

Also on a similar sort of ilk is a radio broadcast

from the year 2007,

the federal court recognized

the Yungora People's Native title

over Nuncan Barth Station up in W.A.

It's Kimberley Region,

and the ABC Kimberley Mornings with Vanessa Mills broadcast

that decision,

which is the first time that it ever happened.

It's pretty incredible.

It was able to bring what was such an important court proceeding

to local people of the area

and send it out to the masses in the region.

The federal court of Australia is just about to begin.

Justice Robert French is walking down in his flat road

to the white marquee that's been set up.

Court is now in session.

Everybody is standing.

They're all bowed.

Please proceed with the federal court of Australia now and certainly thank you.

Yeah, it's really interesting with Native title

because it was used to scare Munga for a long time

and when we started to understand that Native title

didn't mean that someone was coming for our backyards

that it meant protection of sacred sites,

that it meant conservation of land

from a people who've been taking care of country

for tens of thousands of years.

And so to be able to broadcast that

I think is such an important moment

in Australian history

and at a better understanding of how Native title still plays

a role in Australian cultural and political landscapes

and how it's still something we're still working on now.

If I say the words one, three, 00 to you,

how are you going to finish that sentence?

One, three, double, oh!

Six, triple, five, oh, six.

Yes.

If you're listening in the car with your general for children

they might be looking at you going,

what's that mean, Mum?

That actually makes me really sad

because this is something that younger generations

won't have as a collective memory moving forward

because they don't watch free to air TV

and that is these kinds of TV commercials.

That's a reading and writing hotline.

Yes.

There was a few other of that.

Are these ones relatively new compared to the other ones?

Yes.

Because like things like the slip-slop slap message

from the seagull,

or there was like life being it

and there was also the vitamin song.

I don't know if you remember the vitamin song.

Or the vitamin song might be stretching too far away.

But I can't sing the vitamin song because once I do,

I'll be singing it for the next week

and I can't do that to myself.

But these ads were specifically designed

that the music and the message

were so closely linked together

that they would drop an earworm

and then you'd never forget it.

And we're talking decades later,

we can all still sing the reading and writing hotline number.

Yes, that is burned into our collective consciousness.

I even did a web around the office.

A couple of the Gen Zs were also across that,

which makes me feel so it still has legacy now,

even though we're not watching free to air.

Does it still work though?

What, the new find out?

Can you ring it?

Let's give it a call.

One, three, two, one, three,

three, double, oh, six, triple five, oh six.

Oh, six, okay.

That's cool.

Hello, reading and writing hotline.

Okay, so can confirm that the reading writing hotline

still exists.

That's had a very nice chat with the operator, Offe.

Oh, I love that and they just answer immediately.

There's not even like a computer voice

that you have to speak to first.

There's no follow the prompt tones,

click number seven and do a star jump.

I love it.

That.

And it's a real person.

I am truly shook by a real person

just answering the phone.

This is wonderful.

They should redo the ads.

They should put those out until like YouTube ads

or something.

I'm pretty sure they exist out there.

Okay.

Oh my gosh.

Hellas Toronto.

I saw someone walking down the street

literally a week ago wearing this next sound on a t-shirt.

And I know that makes no sense.

But back in 1991,

a man named Jack Carlson was arrested

in Brisbane.

And this is what he said

when he was taken by police

and popped into their vehicle.

This is democracy manifest.

What is the charge eating a meal?

A succulent Chinese meal.

A succulent Chinese meal has become a sandwich.

I don't even know if we use it all in the same context

or for the same reason.

But sometimes we just say it

because he was in the valley

who was having a succulent Chinese meal.

He was accused of credit card fraud

which is why police were there to arrest him.

And here's a fun fact,

Hellas Toronto.

The journalist who was on the scene,

whose cameraman filmed that interaction

is none other than Channel 7's senior reporter,

Chris Reason,

who we now crossed to here on the cookie

because he's currently in Lebanon in a war zone.

Friend of the pod.

That is such an iconic,

iconic piece of Australian audio.

The vision is priceless.

It is like, he's wearing like ugly,

khaki outfit.

But it's so of the time.

But this is democracy manifest.

Democracy manifest.

He sadly did pass away,

Jack Halson in 2024.

He was aged 82.

And another fun fact,

Chris Reason,

interviewed him again decades after that arrest.

So go on YouTube.

The clip's gone viral

and you can actually watch Chris's interview with him there too.

Okay.

Not to make it all about me and my personal interests,

but to bring us home,

the final piece of audio

entering the archive this year,

is this.

And the mama used to sell her time.

What's the matter to you?

Hey!

Hey!

You think you do?

Why you look so sad?

It's not so bad.

It's a nice place.

Shut up, your face.

It's the song of your people, Taylor Strato.

Song of my people.

It is from Joe Dolce.

He was playing this character,

blending Italian and Australian,

I don't know,

communities, quirks.

It's so fun.

It's so silly.

You've definitely heard it.

I need you to know, though, Claire.

Shut up.

You face.

Or shut up.

You face.

Shut up, your face.

Yeah.

Became the best selling single

ever produced in Australia,

spending eight weeks at number one,

topping the charts in 11 countries,

including the UK and Germany.

So it transcends Australian sound.

I would love to know how this was received in Italy.

Both at the time and now.

Like, does it translate into Italian,

shut up your face?

Like, is there a...

No, it's not exactly.

No, it's not exactly.

And obviously it's of its time.

I'm not sure we were as culturally aware

back in the 80s.

Back then, it was embraced.

It wasn't to make fun of Italian immigrants.

It was like a loving tribute almost.

You know how in some houses growing up,

people had like the plastic fish on the plot.

Yeah.

You press the button and it would sing.

Yeah.

Or the Santa Claus that would sing.

Growing up in my very Italian migrant grandparents

fresh off the boat house,

we had a statue of a pizza chef holding in a cordon

and you would press the red button

and this is the song that would play.

Stop it.

They loved it.

Claire Mercury, thank you very much.

Thank you.

This has been such a wonderful little trip down memory lane.

This is great.

And thank you for taking that time to feed your mind

and your ears with us today.

If you are not already,

make sure you're following the quickie

and your favourite podcast app

because you would miss out on things like this.

And that would be a true crime.

That is the chance.

That is democracy manifest.

Is what that is.

The quickie is produced by me,

Taylor Strano,

Alaria Brophy,

and Clemerphy,

with audio production by Luke Hill.

Mama Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land and waters

that this podcast is recorded on.