Juke Magazine

Juke - Australia’s National Rock Music Weekly

Juke Magazine was a weekly Australian rock and pop newspaper published in Melbourne from 1975 to 1992. A key feature of Juke was its extensive gig guide, which attracted a lot of attention of bands, booking agencies and venues. Over time Juke took on a more national focus as a music newspaper, and the gig guide evolved to cover more of a national perspective of gigs across Australia.

The article mentions the 12 and includes comments from Tom Petersson about the 12-string bass: “And then there’s Tom Petersen on bass. A feature of his performance is the use of a custom-made 12-string bass, from which he produces some of the most interesting sounds I’ve heard from a bassist.”

“As Tom explained later, the guitar was made by the Hamer company, to Tom’s specifications.”

“‘At first, they refused to do it because they thought it was just too weird an idea. I finally convinced them, and now they’re making more for other people. I think Nick Lowe wants one.’”

“‘The strings are in four groups of three and are tuned so that each set of three covers three octaves, starting from normal bass tuning.’” (Editor’s note: Tom’s 12 was tuned to two octaves, not three.)

“Petersen’s bass style - which includes a lot of bass chords - suggests that he was formerly a guitarist. ‘I was a guitarist - a long time ago,’ he reveals. ‘I started out playing guitar when I was younger, but switched to bass ‘cos it seemed easier.’”