X-clusive! X marks the spot as design unveiled for INXS Museum

“The archives expand over 40 years and we have never thrown anything away. The number is limitless and very extensive.”

INXS creative adviser Christopher M. Murphy is providing TMN with an exclusive update of the proposed INXS Museum in Ballina, in coastal NSW.

Earlier this week, Murphy and project partner Sara Szabo spoke at a meeting hosted by the Northern Rivers NSW Business Chamber, and attended by the Ballina Shire Council.

They unveiled a 3D model of the museum building, which is designed in the shape of a giant X.

Ultimately more buildings will be added, for them to spell INXS. This can be seen by visitors as they arrive at the near by Ballina-Byron Gateway Airport.

Murphy chose the 12,000-metre site precisely so it would be readily accessible to national and international music fans.

Visitors to the multi-million dollar entertainment, tech and business hub will climb up a sweeping staircase into the Wembley Room, as a mix of holograms and video footage see INXS kicking through one of their most triumphant moments – playing to 72,000 at London’s Wembley Stadium in the northern summer of 1991.

The plan, says Murphy, is that the room can also be used for musical performances by local acts.

Elsewhere in the complex there are interactive exhibition spaces with INXS memorabilia, along with working rooms, a café, and arts spaces to turn the area into an entertainment, tech and building hub.

At this week’s meeting with the Northern Rivers NSW Business Chamber and Ballina Shire Council, there was considerable excitement at the tourism and economic prospects of the museum.

Murphy tells TMN, “Financial advisers are comfortable to say at least $200 million per annum to the local economy.”

However, businesses and Council reiterated the necessity for the local community to support the project if it is to succeed.

This will only be done, the discussion went, if citizens are provided with hard economic facts about how the museum hub would socially and culturally benefit the young people of the area.

Ever since he took over management of INXS in the late ‘70s, the far-sighted Murphy kept every bit of INXS merchandise, including contracts, posters and gold records.

“There are tens of thousands of rare and one of a kind archives. There are near 10,000 original photos alone.”

He stored them on his large farm near Ballina, and only rediscovered them a few years ago, and had to work out what to do with them.

The idea of the INXS Museum hub began two years ago, with discussions reportedly held for a number of sites.

The plan is to open it in 2019, with a massive international campaign.