Andrew Duffield is best known as keyboardist for iconic new wave band, Models. Born in Melbourne in 1958, Duffield studied electronic music under classical composer Felix Werder and while still a teen he performed with experimental punk bands Whirlywirld (featuring Ollie Olsen), and Bohdan & the Instigators.
In 1978, Duffield joined Models as keyboardist in a role that would define his career.
As a songwriter, Duffield contributed songs on all Model’s records up to The Pleasure of Your Company (1983) album, alongside founding member Sean Kelly and including their Top 20 hit ‘I Hear Motion’. He would later co-write one of the band’s best-known singles, ‘Barbados’ from their most successful album, Out of Mind, Out of Sight, (1985). That album also yielded the chart-topping hit of the same name and marked Models’ commercial and international breakthrough.
Duffield’s tenure with Models was marked by occasional departures and returns and in 1985 he left the band and turned his attention to composing for film and television. Whilst composing over 500 television commercials and themes that included ‘Round the Twist’ (ABC-TV), Duffield joined Absent Friends with Sean Kelly and vocalist Wendy Matthews.
In 1990, Absent Friends released the Top 10 album Here’s Looking Up Your Address which featured the single, ‘I Don’t Want To Be With Nobody But You’, which won Single of the Year at the 1991 ARIA Awards.
In this interview, Andrew Duffield discusses his extraordinary musical career in keyboards, sampling and technology, his friendship with the late James Freud, and Model’s induction into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 2010.
Interviewer: Jane Gazzo
Location: Hamer Hall, Arts Centre Melbourne, 2023