Melbourne and Sydney Edition Difference 2

Go-Set: 10 January 1970: Page 15: Melbourne

Go-Set: 10 January 1970: Page 16: Sydney

Relatively speaking, Go-Set was consistent between its Melbourne and Sydney editions. However, in this issue the gig guide is placed one page apart in the two editions.
Another issue of significance in the Sydney page is that some venues have multiple locations.
With the Melbourne page, although the heading of the column is the tradition "Know Where", it is part of a larger page called "Go-Set Disco Guide". Whether this is a reflection of the audience expectation or is a standard set by Go-Set management is unknown at this time. I will have to go back and look at when the page heading was first used. The more common use of the word "disco" is more generally association with middle to late 1970s.

1970 - 3 January Top 40 Chart

Top 40 Chart 3 January 1970 Compiled by Ed Nimmervoll

By 1970, all the compilation of the Top 40 charts was handled by Ed Nimmervoll. Ed had been studying architecture, and had an underlying interest in music. The charts he produced for Go-Set were based on a methodology he worked out. He had started supplying Top 40 charts to the Go-Set office in 1967. The office did not know who he was, but published them anyway, along with the explanations sheet that he provided with them.
I don't know whether they paid him, it is most likely they didn't, at least not in the beginning. As Colin Beard has said before, nobody got paid, but there were benefits for working for Go-Set, which I will mention in another post.
Ed Nimmervoll's charts are excellent, and they were the only National Top 40 charts at the time. The Kent Charts (no relations) would be another 4 to 5 years off.
Philosophically, Go-Set's strategy was both to unify the Australian pop/rock nation, and at the same time show its constituent parts. The chart is something of a unifying picture versus the edition philosophy of now having separate editions for Melbourne and Sydney. Alignment occurred amongst the States as the WA and Queensland editions were also contained in the Sydney edition. Melbourne got its own version. The story of how they produce these different editions will be addressed in another post.
Ed Nimmervoll is quite thorough in his sourcing of charts. Breaking down the data, the spread of stations is as follows:
NSW: 4: 2UW, 2SM, 2UE, 2CA
VIC: 4: 3UZ, 3AK, 3DB, 3XY
SA: 1:  5AD
TAS: 2: 7LA, 7HO
WA: 3: 6PR, 6KY, 6PM 
QLD: 2: 4BC, 4IP
Total Number is 16 stations
The actual means of calculation is something I have a great interest in. The only person who really knows is Ed Nimmervoll, so it to him we must ask the question. However in the meantime, we can see the spread of the stations is concentrated into the 8 stations of NSW and VIC. The remainder is spread over the other 4 States. The WA aspect of the calculation is based on 3 stations compared to SA (2) and QLD (2). Ed once said the calculation took into the population proportions of each State.
One example of the detail in the chart relates to the sources of the data in the context of the song position. Looking at song 31, Carroll County Accident by Bobby and Laurie. The song was in for the 2nd week, it had previously been at position 38. The calculation was based on charts from Victoria, Queensland and Tasmania. Sadly we don't have the full Top 40 chart  for the States in question, to see the specific place information, but that was not the purpose  of the chart. Readers were more interested in the sense of Australian ness of the song position rather than how the song was performing in each State. Thus the sense of a united country was presented. Ironically, Carroll County Accident was the cover of a song from the USA.

Melbourne and Sydney Edition Difference 1

Go-Set Sydney edition 3 January 1970 Page 8

Go-Set Melbourne edition 3 January 1970 Page 8

By 1970, with different offices in different capital cities, Go-Set was able to produce different editions of the issue. This is one example of the different pages.
The Sydney edition ran an item called Donnie's Place. It was the Sydney version of Ian Meldrum's gossip. Donnie was Donnie Sutherland, who would go on to host Sounds (commercial TV), while Meldrum went onto host and talent coordinate for Countdown (Australia's ABC).

The Sydney office was quite different to the Melbourne office, and I will explore this issue is a later posting.

The  Melbourne page is characterised by the Wendy Saddington column. Wendy was a musician, more specifically, she sang the blues.

I will analyse the content of each page, but for the moment, just enjoy the different styles.

Go-Set 3 January 1970 Page 1

A grainy colour version (thanks Barry)

Image is from the Microfilm held at the NLA

Russell Morris featured on the first edition for 1970.
He was probably the most successful recording artist of 1969 with his single Johnny Young written song "The Real Thing". The single was produced by Ian Meldrum, but all the technical and production work was actually done by the engineer John L. Sayers.
By 1970, Go-Set had found its groove. Two of the original founders, Tony Schauble and Doug Panther had gone, and the focus of the magazine was on pop with a growing coverage of rock music and issue.
1970 would also be significant for the release of Revolution, and the inclusion of the Rolling Stone (magazine) Supplement. Go-Set was reaching maturity, both in content and appearance.