WHOOPEE BLUES-Fiona Cochrane-MDFF & F Project Cinema mini documentary film festival

9th July 2025 @ 7:30pm: Whoopee Blues by Fiona Cochrane 

Brothers Mic and Jim Conway have been playing music since their school days, when they started the Jellybean Jug Band, which later evolved into the Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band. In the early 1970s, Captain Matchbox became a runaway success with old 1920s and 1930s tunes like My Canary Has Circles Under His Eyes and their own comical songs, such as Wangaratta Wahine.

Mic is passionate about visual entertainment, vaudeville, and creating instruments from everyday objects. Over the past 40 years, he has performed in countless band line-ups, each reflecting his unique vision of performance, circus, and vaudeville.

Jim, on the other hand, is a natural musician with a deep affinity for the blues. He found his calling early on with the harmonica during his time with Captain Matchbox, becoming one of Australia’s foremost blues harp players.

As has been said of them, the brothers make sibling rivalry an art form, yet they remain very close. At the age of 30, Jim was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS), which has progressively worsened over the past 40 years, leaving him virtually quadriplegic and unable to play the harmonica. Despite this, Jim is married, and Mic has his own family, and the brothers have remained side by side through the years.