‘That’s what I’m singing for’: The dreamy Yolngu pop of Drifting Clouds
Hailing from northeast Arnhem Land, Drifting Clouds have drawn national attention pairing the deeply-held Songlines and family stories of songwriter Terry Guyula with a sparkling, ’80s-inspired chillwave sheen.
A year ago a music video began circulating online of a young Yolngu man dressed in a shirt and tie while standing barefoot in sand and saltwater. Flanked by a keyboard and synthesiser, the fuzzy 16mm film grain captures him crooning into a microphone as a golden sunset glistens over Larrakia Country.
The imagery was as striking as the music underneath it: pounding electric piano chords, sparkling synths and ’80s drums channelling everything from The Human League to New Order, and lyrics crooned in Yolngu Matha.
The song was called ‘Bawuypawuy’, credited to the enigmatically-named Drifting Clouds. The young man in the video was Terry Guyula, the group’s songwriter and frontman.
Guyula grew up around Gapuwiyak, a community in northeast Arnhem Land with a population of around 700. Speaking to InReview over Zoom from Darwin, Guyula says he was surrounded by music at home; his father and uncles all played in gospel bands, while raising young Terry on a steady diet of vintage hits from the Bee Gees to Billy Ocean. His father was often behind the keys, and it wasn’t long before Terry followed his lead.
“I used to lay down my head on the keyboard when my dad played, lay my head down on the speakers and listen to the sound,” Guyula tells InReview.
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"I used to lay down my head on the keyboard when my dad played, lay my head down on the speakers and listen to the sound."
Guyula started playing in his teens, and eventually spent several years in Perth studying music, dedicating himself to understanding the mechanics of pop music and harbouring dreams of starting his own record label to share his own self-produced songs. As ‘Bawuypawuy’ makes clear, he also developed a knack for spiralling synthesiser solos.
Drifting Clouds began a few years ago, when Guyula began “mucking around” on keyboard and creating demos on an iPad using Garage Band. He showed his first demo to his uncle, who helped him rework the track, before he started posting videos to TikTok and playing community festivals around Arnhem Land and Darwin – joined onstage by his uncle on keys, another uncle on bass, and a cousin on drums.
He soon caught the attention of producer and now-bandmate Zac Terry, who invited him to record what would become the band’s debut single.
‘Bawuypawuy’ drew immediate attention, scoring Triple J airplay, a high-profile slot performing at the National Indigenous Music Awards, and a busy touring slate that will see the group hit Adelaide for the first time in June as part of the latest Porch and Recreation festival lineup across the weekend of June 12 – 13.
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The track’s slick sound underpinned a poignant message, with lyrics – sung in the Liyawulma’mirr-Djambarrpuyngu language – that retrace the path of water “from the top of the river or creek when it first started raining, and then running through all the way to the ocean”.
“But it’s also in the Songlines we sing,” Guyula explains. “This water, this river, is for my Great Grandfather – that’s what I’m singing for.
“They call him ‘Peacemaker’ back in old days. When violence happens, like a big war, he used to come and settle everything down, and sort out problems, and make that peace together. He understands the place in Arnhem Land – animals, water, and everything. He’s coming from the sunrise and the sunset, he’s everywhere in Arnhem Land.”
In May the band released their second single ‘Rarrandharr’, with another memorable music video that finds Guyula surfing on a floating keyboard – playfully reminiscent of Yankunytjatjara artist Kaylene Whiskey’s 2019 film Kungka Kunpu. The clip also sees Guyula driving through the streets of Sydney, sporting wraparound shades as he sits behind the wheel of a silver Porsche (“Maybe one day!” Guyula says when I ask him about whether the ride is his.)
Like the band’s first single, ‘Rarrandharr’ also carries a deeper message: Arnhem Land has six seasons, with Rarrandharr signalling the hottest and driest period of the year.
“It’s like I’m saying ‘Rarrandharr is going to end’. Dry season is about to end, and Wulma is the first thunder cloud that springs rain. We know that when the first thunder clouds come, that the wet season is here.”
As the seasons change, Guyula and his community also reflect on the passage of time, and the cyclical nature of family and generations past.
“We think about them when the first thunder sounds, and the first rain,” he says. “We think about our loved ones – in the chorus I’m saying, ‘Mother and child, from the one family tree.’
“I’m thinking about my grandmother, my grandfather, and all the family with this first thunder cloud.”
The song concludes with a farewell to the dry season. “Thank you for being here with us, welcoming the wet season,” Guyula explains. “Welcome, you are welcome here. And I also say goodbye to my loved ones – passed away like my family.”
Then, one final flourish of arpeggiating synthesiser brings it all home.
Drifting Clouds play at Porch and Recreation festival at the Burnside Ballroom on Friday June 12
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