I don't know what he was singing but everything stopped, the bells, the chatter, the wind in the grass. Everything except the backlit clouds stopped a moment to hear his song. We were sitting in the graveyard drinking, we had about twelve people, two guitars and one tambourine, we had beer bottles in brown paper bags and a thirst for howling out songs. It wasn't until I decided I had better go home, after Madam Squeeze and I picked out our careful moonlit way through trees, over fallen grave stones and down a path towards the gate that I remembered there was such a thing as churches.
The big church near the graveyard gates was busting at the seams with the bespectacled and the solemn. We snuck into the vestibule as the congregation rose as one and began singing a slow and ancient song. I had grass stuck on my dress and tinsel sticking out of my hair. I was holding three empty bottles, one porter, one cider and one beer. The stench of cigarette butts coming out of the empty beer bottle would have knocked out a lesser mortal than me but I felt quite sure that while I was happy to sit an old grave and drink beer and sing I wasn't happy to leave the empty bottles there. The song was slow and ancient and though they must have numbered in the hundreds I could hear above their voices that good old racket coming from the back of the graveyard where Spencer was perched on a headstone leading his own small congregation in song.
I sat at the edge of the circle in the graveyard tonight, lying on the grass to sip cider and puff smoke at the impossibly fast clouds moving across skies, trees and moon. Spencer and Madam Squeeze were there, Madam sitting comfortably beside me, Spencer perching up high strumming out songs. The rest of them howled, sang and rattled with their accustomed abandon, some of them waltzing like the possessed in a clearing. I'm not sure what I was doing, you can tell just by looking at me that I'm more careful with my heart, mind and songs. Some us of talked about ritual and the good urge for joining together in grief, joy, love and song. I wasn't quite ready to howl at the moon as the others do but I can tell you one thing, I'd rather be drinking on a gravestone than don my spectacles and stand in a congregation miming the art of music to what should have been a moving and ancient hymn but had instead the eerie effect of guilt, obligation, ironed trousers and isolation.
Some ideas are stupider than others
You can traipse all over this city wearing dark glasses and a green dress and still not find what you are looking for. I suppose it was hormonal but all the people on the bus made me want to weep, this was not listed as a possible side effect.
Yet another author
I was talking to this author at the bar, he was saying "people think who you are when you talk to people and eat food and clean your house, how you behave is who you are but it's not. Who you are is on the page."
I nodded politely until he wandered off. I felt like saying 'buddy you got no idea, I'm not even standing here, this thing you're looking at and talking to and is a fucking mirage, the only place I am at all is on the page, especially right now, in this moment, listening to you.'
I nodded politely until he wandered off. I felt like saying 'buddy you got no idea, I'm not even standing here, this thing you're looking at and talking to and is a fucking mirage, the only place I am at all is on the page, especially right now, in this moment, listening to you.'
Apple Tragedy in a game of I suppose you know who wrote this
So on the seventh day
The serpent rested,
God came up to him.
"I've invented a new game," he said.
The serpent stared in surprise
At this interloper.
But God said: "You see this apple?"
I squeeze it and look-cider."
The serpent had a good drink
And curled up into a question mark.
Adam drank and said: "Be my god."
Eve drank and opened her legs
And called to the cockeyed serpent
And gave him a wild time.
God ran and told Adam
Who in drunken rage tried to hang himself in the orchard.
The serpent tried to explain, crying "Stop"
But drink was splitting his syllable.
And Eve started screeching: "Rape! Rape!"
And stamping on his head.
Now whenever the snake appears she screeches
"Here it comes again! Help! O Help!"
Then Adam smashes a chair on his head,
And God says: "I am well pleased"
And everything goes to hell.
The serpent rested,
God came up to him.
"I've invented a new game," he said.
The serpent stared in surprise
At this interloper.
But God said: "You see this apple?"
I squeeze it and look-cider."
The serpent had a good drink
And curled up into a question mark.
Adam drank and said: "Be my god."
Eve drank and opened her legs
And called to the cockeyed serpent
And gave him a wild time.
God ran and told Adam
Who in drunken rage tried to hang himself in the orchard.
The serpent tried to explain, crying "Stop"
But drink was splitting his syllable.
And Eve started screeching: "Rape! Rape!"
And stamping on his head.
Now whenever the snake appears she screeches
"Here it comes again! Help! O Help!"
Then Adam smashes a chair on his head,
And God says: "I am well pleased"
And everything goes to hell.
It's not a final solution but it is nonetheless a solution
Sometimes there's only one solution and that's to hit the old man jazz scene at The Hero of Waterloo where I'm guaranteed to find Boli, a large group of old men in hats and some of that wandering jazz you only get to hear when the people playing it have been doing it for at least forty years.
Additional note - make that sixty years.
Additional note - make that sixty years.
Typewriter vs submarine
There's a very good reason for my radio silence, I think. Lord knows I've pissed off approximately most people I know at one point or another by writing about them. I sometimes do it without a second thought for their good opinion of me because words have always been more important. Everybody knows words are how I make maps of myself. There has been the odd exception where I care a great deal and go to lengths to unruffle, apologise or explain but ordinarily the words will win every internal battle and come out some way or another which is why right now I'm feeling kind of strange.
I have an almost unstoppable urge to turn typewriter and clatter this thing out one black letter at a time only the thing that is stopping me is powerful. This is alien territory like a mountain range without ridges or satellite pictures of the wrong planet beamed straight into my GPS. Gemma tells me the thing is called respect and this disturbs me not a little because always in the back of my head is the idea that I have a great deal of respect for the people in my life but Gemma is usually right when it comes to matters of my brain.
It seems this automatic decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into. I'm going to dust off my imaginary submarine and take an ordinary plunge. I will navigate this situation, whatever it turns out to be, with my onboard human tools with no recourse to the atom splitting power of typing. There will be a calm echo bouncing off the shells of privacy and respect but don't misunderstand me, everything else I'm doing will be, as usual, subjected to my incessant reworking with pens.
I have an almost unstoppable urge to turn typewriter and clatter this thing out one black letter at a time only the thing that is stopping me is powerful. This is alien territory like a mountain range without ridges or satellite pictures of the wrong planet beamed straight into my GPS. Gemma tells me the thing is called respect and this disturbs me not a little because always in the back of my head is the idea that I have a great deal of respect for the people in my life but Gemma is usually right when it comes to matters of my brain.
It seems this automatic decision is final and no correspondence will be entered into. I'm going to dust off my imaginary submarine and take an ordinary plunge. I will navigate this situation, whatever it turns out to be, with my onboard human tools with no recourse to the atom splitting power of typing. There will be a calm echo bouncing off the shells of privacy and respect but don't misunderstand me, everything else I'm doing will be, as usual, subjected to my incessant reworking with pens.
Let's think about this
It seems obvious to me. We should all be carrying this fact in our heads, solid as lead, to nod at once in a while if we stop suddenly in the kitchen clutching an unnecessary plate in our hands. There was a time in this city when grief welled greater than reason and there were masses gathering in halls to contact the dead.
I don't know how they carried the burden of uncertainty in tandem with the washing. I don't know how they swept floors and darned socks while all the men were missing and everywhere seemed empty. Growing sons should not be a source of fear but as they came of age they left on boats by the thousand. It was easier to feed a mouth than a memory until spiritualism came to Sydney.
I'm not saying I want to start contacting the departed but let's think about this and maybe try a little experiment. I'll keep you posted.
I don't know how they carried the burden of uncertainty in tandem with the washing. I don't know how they swept floors and darned socks while all the men were missing and everywhere seemed empty. Growing sons should not be a source of fear but as they came of age they left on boats by the thousand. It was easier to feed a mouth than a memory until spiritualism came to Sydney.
I'm not saying I want to start contacting the departed but let's think about this and maybe try a little experiment. I'll keep you posted.
Just like a house but in a shoebox
He was leaning back in his chair holding his arms out to the describe the length of a shoebox while I sipped solemnly at my snake bite. He said "the way to a man's heart is through a diorama" and then he nodded as if to close the matter but I wouldn't let it drop. If this is in fact true why are there not millions of people all over the world sitting bent over tables busy with scissors, paint and glue? I suppose there is the possibility that he is right and all this time I had no idea which would of course explain quite a few things. I have never once made a man a diorama.
An absence of disaster and other further doings of Dale R Slamma
So all this time you thought it couldn't be done. You were convinced that one could not shampoo one's hair whilst jumping up and down and dancing in the shower without some terrible crashing consequence occurring. You were wrong.
Hello happiness my old friend
It is possible to be diffused with happiness in a plain and simple way. Essential and humble as a small and favourite teapot taken down from a high shelf and held between two cupped palms.
I think I need a brain wash
I have decided to give my brain this one chance to explain to me why it woke up at 7:45am this morning, a Sunday morning, after we (my brain and I) went to bed after 3am. I'm wide awake, ready to throw on shoes and run out into the world but I'm not going to. Rational thought tells me I need to rest and drink approximately seven thousand litres of water.
It was never my intention to drink about a bottle of champagne before going to the Excelsior last night but the waitstaff just kept cruising past. There were round and shining silver trays seamlessly floating past my elbow approximately every three minutes with free drinks. I was starving and the food was much slower to circulate than the wine. I was crammed into The Argyle with five million people dressed in sailor suits, formation shark unitards or Hawaiian shirts. The Argyle is one of those divine buildings where the floorboards seem like they're constantly being crossed by the ghosts of convicts but of course they've turned it into a hideous bar for shiny people. It was one of those work Christmas parties that have a budget so large it's frightening. I'm more used to the annual staff lunch where all five staff at a non-profit arts organisation go across the road to a pub and choose the cheapest things off the menu and share one bottle of wine, then go back to work in the afternoon. I wasn't ready for the shock of five million gyrating people in full fancy dress throwing back as much booze as is humanly possible.
I left after an hour and discovered, as I walked along the quay that it wasn't the green harbour swaying in waltz time but me. I made it up three flights of stairs, onto a train and then up the hill to The Excelsior. I arrived with a lilt, a pocket full of miniature plastic sea creatures and a plan. Each miniature plastic sea creature was assigned to a specific person based on strict criteria that made a hell of a lot of sense at the time. One seahorse for Daisy, one shark for Spencer, another shark for Madam Squeeze and the sparkly lilac seahorse for Halogen. Spencer, Madam Squeeze and Daisy hadn't arrived yet so I presented a bemused Halogen with his seahorse then sat down and proceeded to talk such nonsense that several people offered to go and fetch me a glass of water. Three hours and seven glasses of water later I was decidedly more sober and beginning to regret my decision to present Halogen with a lilac sparkly plastic seahorse, Spencer, Madam Squeeze and Daisy are of course more used to my ways and present no problems in the area of miniature plastic sea creature presentation regret.
After I had achieved an ideal state of kind of sobered up I found myself having a real good time. Spencer's band was magnificent, as always (seriously people if you don't own a copy of Damn You, Ra yet then I don't know what you are doing) I had one of those nights where conversation is easy, interesting and free. The music did it's job of providing a reason to breathe. I keep rediscovering how live music builds my bones, kind of courses through me like temporary architecture holding up my ceiling.
It was never my intention to drink about a bottle of champagne before going to the Excelsior last night but the waitstaff just kept cruising past. There were round and shining silver trays seamlessly floating past my elbow approximately every three minutes with free drinks. I was starving and the food was much slower to circulate than the wine. I was crammed into The Argyle with five million people dressed in sailor suits, formation shark unitards or Hawaiian shirts. The Argyle is one of those divine buildings where the floorboards seem like they're constantly being crossed by the ghosts of convicts but of course they've turned it into a hideous bar for shiny people. It was one of those work Christmas parties that have a budget so large it's frightening. I'm more used to the annual staff lunch where all five staff at a non-profit arts organisation go across the road to a pub and choose the cheapest things off the menu and share one bottle of wine, then go back to work in the afternoon. I wasn't ready for the shock of five million gyrating people in full fancy dress throwing back as much booze as is humanly possible.
I left after an hour and discovered, as I walked along the quay that it wasn't the green harbour swaying in waltz time but me. I made it up three flights of stairs, onto a train and then up the hill to The Excelsior. I arrived with a lilt, a pocket full of miniature plastic sea creatures and a plan. Each miniature plastic sea creature was assigned to a specific person based on strict criteria that made a hell of a lot of sense at the time. One seahorse for Daisy, one shark for Spencer, another shark for Madam Squeeze and the sparkly lilac seahorse for Halogen. Spencer, Madam Squeeze and Daisy hadn't arrived yet so I presented a bemused Halogen with his seahorse then sat down and proceeded to talk such nonsense that several people offered to go and fetch me a glass of water. Three hours and seven glasses of water later I was decidedly more sober and beginning to regret my decision to present Halogen with a lilac sparkly plastic seahorse, Spencer, Madam Squeeze and Daisy are of course more used to my ways and present no problems in the area of miniature plastic sea creature presentation regret.
After I had achieved an ideal state of kind of sobered up I found myself having a real good time. Spencer's band was magnificent, as always (seriously people if you don't own a copy of Damn You, Ra yet then I don't know what you are doing) I had one of those nights where conversation is easy, interesting and free. The music did it's job of providing a reason to breathe. I keep rediscovering how live music builds my bones, kind of courses through me like temporary architecture holding up my ceiling.
Sometimes a drummer just wants to play guitar
Well it's close to 3am. I drank a bottle of champagne in a place where everyone except me was dressed like a sailor. I went across town to see some bands, the bands were grand but what sticks out in my mind is when a small and hideously drunk man calling himself Stanley crawled into my lap and said I shouldn't waste any time then pointed at his friend and winked at me. Now is the time to feel stupid, when I am home and still wearing red lipstick and everybody knows about the crush I have on Stanley's friend. Yep, time to feel stupid.
I wish him well and hope that everything he's worked for comes true
Somebody's paying me to check references for them so I'm sitting in a cubicle two days a week telephoning strangers and talking about other strangers but I'm not saying I don't like it. I like the top down snapshots I'm getting of these people. I like a life rated out of ten for punctuality, reliability, overall performance and their ability to meet sales targets augmented with strange and rambling personal anecdotes. Most of the applicants are young so I end up talking to the owner of the petrol station where they worked in uni holidays, or the president of the sports association where they volunteer as a junior coach. The people I'm telephoning can't wait to have their say, can't wait to rattle off the ten versions of how they're holding hope cupped in their hands for the smart young person they paid to wash cars or set up a straight line of orange cones. I feel like I'm getting a bird's eye view of something here, something I haven't seen before.
The Walk On By
The Walk On By appeared from nowhere. One day I’d never heard of them, and then suddenly they were everywhere. After only months on the Sydney scene they have lined up three international shows. I’ve seen them once before, appearing at in-store at Repressed Records with The Holy Soul. It was early afternoon and the sheer noise of them pushed me out of the record shop and into the street where I watched like a child with my face pressed against the window.
Descending into the depths of Club 77, armed with earplugs, I was determined to sit through any level of noise and see for myself what everyone is talking about. The Walk On By throw out an enormous sound. I snuck around the side of the stage to make sure that I had counted correctly. There are indeed only three of them. Leah Keramea is spectacular on drums. Her head hangs forwards leaving visible a short curtain of hair, the tied waist of a black trench coat and her elbows moving casually as though of their own accord. It is tempting to be jealous of the casual way she smacks out rhythm as though it was easy.
Dave Bourke is almost disturbingly energetic on bass. He seems to have mastered a precise climbing sort of bass line that walks up your bones. If I had any criticism it would be that he somehow sounds too precise, too clean and assured in the middle of such a crashing wall of sound. There was a brief pause while the band switched instruments, Keramea walking to the front swapping her drums for a guitar. She has the kind of presence that makes a crowd lean forward. I have to admit it was the highlight of the set when she started screaming ‘glass you fucking cunt’ into the microphone.
An angry American began walking around holding up a sign “Start a mosh?” There were no takers so in between songs she started yelling at the crowd to stop just standing there watching the band and nodding their heads. The crowd yelled back ‘fuck off’. I guess nobody told her about Sydney and standing around nodding your head. She then borrowed red lipstick and a mirror from some poor woman in the crowd. The American smeared her mouth red until she resembled nothing but a clown.
Frontman Soloman Barbar certainly looks the part all dressed in black with his wild and miraculously vertical hair, pointed moustache and one of those white neck-ties that you tie like a ribbon into a bow. Barbar has a tough job standing in the front with the aim of pulling focus amidst the kind of sound that crashes. It would be easy to forget that in terms of gigs this is a baby band taking its first steps. The Walk On By sound interesting enough to get away with breaking oceans of sound over my earplugged head. They would benefit from a more confident and assured vocal delivery but like I said, this is a new band beginning the hard task of earning their stripes playing in dives and late night bars. I’m all for watching them work their way up to playing in better venues, I think its going to be an interesting ride.
First published on LiveGuide
Descending into the depths of Club 77, armed with earplugs, I was determined to sit through any level of noise and see for myself what everyone is talking about. The Walk On By throw out an enormous sound. I snuck around the side of the stage to make sure that I had counted correctly. There are indeed only three of them. Leah Keramea is spectacular on drums. Her head hangs forwards leaving visible a short curtain of hair, the tied waist of a black trench coat and her elbows moving casually as though of their own accord. It is tempting to be jealous of the casual way she smacks out rhythm as though it was easy.
Dave Bourke is almost disturbingly energetic on bass. He seems to have mastered a precise climbing sort of bass line that walks up your bones. If I had any criticism it would be that he somehow sounds too precise, too clean and assured in the middle of such a crashing wall of sound. There was a brief pause while the band switched instruments, Keramea walking to the front swapping her drums for a guitar. She has the kind of presence that makes a crowd lean forward. I have to admit it was the highlight of the set when she started screaming ‘glass you fucking cunt’ into the microphone.
An angry American began walking around holding up a sign “Start a mosh?” There were no takers so in between songs she started yelling at the crowd to stop just standing there watching the band and nodding their heads. The crowd yelled back ‘fuck off’. I guess nobody told her about Sydney and standing around nodding your head. She then borrowed red lipstick and a mirror from some poor woman in the crowd. The American smeared her mouth red until she resembled nothing but a clown.
Frontman Soloman Barbar certainly looks the part all dressed in black with his wild and miraculously vertical hair, pointed moustache and one of those white neck-ties that you tie like a ribbon into a bow. Barbar has a tough job standing in the front with the aim of pulling focus amidst the kind of sound that crashes. It would be easy to forget that in terms of gigs this is a baby band taking its first steps. The Walk On By sound interesting enough to get away with breaking oceans of sound over my earplugged head. They would benefit from a more confident and assured vocal delivery but like I said, this is a new band beginning the hard task of earning their stripes playing in dives and late night bars. I’m all for watching them work their way up to playing in better venues, I think its going to be an interesting ride.
First published on LiveGuide
Pump the brakes bitch
Waking up with a mouth full of half-chewed liquorice pieces at 3 in the morning was not my finest moment. I was still wearing my dress but I had mercifully kicked off my shoes before laying down on top of the covers. I think I undertook one of those weaving walks home where I was throwing one foot out in front of the other with a casual disregard for boundaries such as straight lines or footpaths. It was just me and the cockroaches on Enmore Rd. I used to cringe at the sight of the fat black things scuttling audibly everywhere I went but like the aeroplanes and the out of town visitors it's now just one of those Newtown facts sliding through my brain like GPS.
Turn your snare off
If it's a clay shape then I don't want it, not even if you pushed it into being with aching fingers. Hold out your hands for the cold and moist lump, fold your fingers around the heavy weight and walk silently away.
Better run through the jungle
Today the idea of him has the hit and stick of napalm but tomorrow I plan on wearing a fireproof suit.
A blanket pinned up across a window will come down in a heavy grey fold if you let slip just one of those pins
I suppose I was seven or eight years old when he told he was a blackberry. I was confused but pleased that he was playing one of his silly jokes with me. I laughed at him and said 'don't be silly you can't be a blackberry because you are a person'. I don't remember how old I was when I found out that he had said Black Beret and not blackberry.
He died last Wednesday, curled up and snuffed out but it wasn't entirely unexpected. I didn't see him crawling towards the long night like some of the others did but I heard the change in the light some years ago. Everybody supposed that she would nurse him down gently until the breathing stopped. Everybody supposed she would pack a small suitcase and be driven across the horizon to the farm but she stayed where she was with that salt wind at her place where she watches the kangaroos graze by the sea. She said she never sees them hop on the sand, they stay clear of the sand like she does.
On Monday there'll be three of them standing hot on the inland blustering dust at the side of his open grave. They'll wear black and swat flies with their funeral programs. The middle child will sob the hardest, shaking her shoulders and frightening her children. The oldest son will be the star of the speeches and the youngest will evoke sympathy with the silent grit-tooth bowing of his head. Three hours north of where she'll be sitting by her sea I'll be swallowed in a building and thinking of her.
He died last Wednesday, curled up and snuffed out but it wasn't entirely unexpected. I didn't see him crawling towards the long night like some of the others did but I heard the change in the light some years ago. Everybody supposed that she would nurse him down gently until the breathing stopped. Everybody supposed she would pack a small suitcase and be driven across the horizon to the farm but she stayed where she was with that salt wind at her place where she watches the kangaroos graze by the sea. She said she never sees them hop on the sand, they stay clear of the sand like she does.
On Monday there'll be three of them standing hot on the inland blustering dust at the side of his open grave. They'll wear black and swat flies with their funeral programs. The middle child will sob the hardest, shaking her shoulders and frightening her children. The oldest son will be the star of the speeches and the youngest will evoke sympathy with the silent grit-tooth bowing of his head. Three hours north of where she'll be sitting by her sea I'll be swallowed in a building and thinking of her.
Ye gods and far out I was sitting next to a former Rolling Stones tour manager
I was having a relatively normal conversation with the excellent Mr Fenton when I noticed that his shoes were quite shiny. I had a scope around and confirmed that his were the shiniest shoes in the outside area at The Annandale so I asked him if he shined his shoes. You should have seen the look Spencer gave me. Mr Fenton was drinking a beer and looking at me in that quiet and quizzical way he has then gently shook his head. He'd just come offstage after playing a Billy Thorpe tribute for a book launch* where I was plagued by ghosts from the literary set but soothed, after a fashion, by live music. Mr Fenton said his shoes were shiny from use, beer swill and dropped cigarette ash. When I think about it that is the most rock'n'roll way to shine your shoes.
*"Billy Thorpe's Time On Earth" by Jason Walker
*"Billy Thorpe's Time On Earth" by Jason Walker
Change your own light bulb
It is clear to me that he desires very strongly to live. The way he watched people dancing is enough to fold you to the floor but people don't seem to watch him properly. Their eyes slide over him slowly taking measurements for memory.
I suppose he is my polar opposite. I am plagued with rude health and stubborn life yet I feel I would throw off the shackles of this life if I could, just shrug out of it like an unwanted cardigan. A situation like this is enough to make me want to change my own light bulb.
I suppose he is my polar opposite. I am plagued with rude health and stubborn life yet I feel I would throw off the shackles of this life if I could, just shrug out of it like an unwanted cardigan. A situation like this is enough to make me want to change my own light bulb.
Bogans love You Am I
I suppose I am quite lucky that the first time I ever laid eyes on Tim Rogers was upstairs in the band room at The Annandale. He was walking around doing vocal warm up exercises then unexpectedly broke into a fair rendition of I Will Always Love You. I was sitting on one of those Fender stools that allow you to rotate all the way around quite rapidly. Spencer was standing behind the bar fishing beer out of the ice bucket. I don't know why they have to put beer in an ice bucket when there is a perfectly good fridge. Tim Rogers is taller than me, I always thought he was a very short man but as it turns out he is not. Also his guitar tech smells like coconut and his tour manager has a tendency towards rudeness but then offers copious apologies after the rudeness has occurred. I believe she would benefit from swallowing the Little Book of Calm.
The Annandale is a bit shit really, the floor is never not sticky, the back stairs up to the band room are strange and I always run my arm across the exposed hot water pipe and jump at the shock. The sound tonight was, in places, shocking. I'm going to recommend they stop enticing the Sydney Morning Herald to write stupid articles about their fight with local council and start worrying about being a good venue again.
The Annandale is a bit shit really, the floor is never not sticky, the back stairs up to the band room are strange and I always run my arm across the exposed hot water pipe and jump at the shock. The sound tonight was, in places, shocking. I'm going to recommend they stop enticing the Sydney Morning Herald to write stupid articles about their fight with local council and start worrying about being a good venue again.
Confess now old friend, you were standing in a magazine shop imagining your cat playing drums while the ghosts of soliders screamed past the window
So I did forget to remember them. It's fine, they're all dead anyway.
Flapping at my kitchen wall
I thought if this lament is unending then lord let us cry. I was curled like an old plastic chip packet heated in the oven, inelegantly wetting the front of my shirt with an unrelenting flow of tears when a crow hit The Peach windows with a powerful thud and crumpling of feathers. Some days are wet with soup, tea and tears. Some days demand you walk up and down the hallway or follow the movement of light across the floor. This day I needed nothing more than to have freedom enough to feel.
The bird flew away but I was left stunned with my hands on the kitchen sink, immobile and staring at the place where the bird collided with my glass wall. The phone rang, it was Artboy, I made a silent dash and scramble to pause The Way We Were and shake off my crow-weirdness. Hubbell stood frozen at the end of Katie's hospital bed staring at her as his wife for the last time. I don't know how she stood it. I can see why everybody was going crazy for Barbara Streisand, her hands are entirely elegant and there is something about the way she stands and delivers a line. I talked to Artboy for hours while I stared at the frozen Hubbell in his Hollywood jacket and Cobra Kai haircut. I suppose the bad man from The Karate Kid was trying to look like Robert Redford but it took until today to work that out. I've never seen The Way We Were before.
A submerged and profound grief rolled in me like a whale in a pool as I spoke to Artboy today. Talking to anyone else feels like a waste of words but then I catch myself and remember I have my own life now. I have this freedom and joy. I have a house in the city and a media pass. I have friends and a magazine and a small but respectable stack of published work. I have my cat and my desk and I can tell people at parties that I am a Rock Journalist and it is not a lie. I told Artboy nobody ever thinks of Ted Hughes, what it must have been like to live with Sylvia Plath as her illness consumed every corner of his life. I don't know how he stood it.
After Artboy and the close of one of those conversations that jump syllable to syllable like synapses I finished The Way We Were and moved on Into The Wild. It was one of those stories that Loene Carmen sums up best by saying 'trying to romanticise what a cunt you are'.* He had a kind of Superman syndrome where he took the ordinary troubles of life and wound them so tight around his heart and fists that he was punching everyone, including himself, without feeling the blows. Stopped the beat of his heart because he thought he was only one who heard the noise of it. I didn't notice this about Superman until it was too late and I was interstate and trapped inside a house with his family's Christmas leftovers.
I didn't weep for the man who fled like a child into the wild but I did weep. I wept great heaving soundless sobs while I knelt down to choose movies, I wept as I washed dishes in the sink, spread marmalade on my toast, poured tea from the pot. There was no great sorrow, my mind was on ordinary matters much as it always is. I formatted my new hard drive sitting on the lounge room floor taking care not to tip tears into the keyboard of my laptop. My need for unfettered expression was profound, solid as the foundations of the earth. I suppose it as simple as this, monsoons sometimes happen as far south as Sydney.
* From the album Rock'n'Roll Tears - listen to it.
The bird flew away but I was left stunned with my hands on the kitchen sink, immobile and staring at the place where the bird collided with my glass wall. The phone rang, it was Artboy, I made a silent dash and scramble to pause The Way We Were and shake off my crow-weirdness. Hubbell stood frozen at the end of Katie's hospital bed staring at her as his wife for the last time. I don't know how she stood it. I can see why everybody was going crazy for Barbara Streisand, her hands are entirely elegant and there is something about the way she stands and delivers a line. I talked to Artboy for hours while I stared at the frozen Hubbell in his Hollywood jacket and Cobra Kai haircut. I suppose the bad man from The Karate Kid was trying to look like Robert Redford but it took until today to work that out. I've never seen The Way We Were before.
A submerged and profound grief rolled in me like a whale in a pool as I spoke to Artboy today. Talking to anyone else feels like a waste of words but then I catch myself and remember I have my own life now. I have this freedom and joy. I have a house in the city and a media pass. I have friends and a magazine and a small but respectable stack of published work. I have my cat and my desk and I can tell people at parties that I am a Rock Journalist and it is not a lie. I told Artboy nobody ever thinks of Ted Hughes, what it must have been like to live with Sylvia Plath as her illness consumed every corner of his life. I don't know how he stood it.
After Artboy and the close of one of those conversations that jump syllable to syllable like synapses I finished The Way We Were and moved on Into The Wild. It was one of those stories that Loene Carmen sums up best by saying 'trying to romanticise what a cunt you are'.* He had a kind of Superman syndrome where he took the ordinary troubles of life and wound them so tight around his heart and fists that he was punching everyone, including himself, without feeling the blows. Stopped the beat of his heart because he thought he was only one who heard the noise of it. I didn't notice this about Superman until it was too late and I was interstate and trapped inside a house with his family's Christmas leftovers.
I didn't weep for the man who fled like a child into the wild but I did weep. I wept great heaving soundless sobs while I knelt down to choose movies, I wept as I washed dishes in the sink, spread marmalade on my toast, poured tea from the pot. There was no great sorrow, my mind was on ordinary matters much as it always is. I formatted my new hard drive sitting on the lounge room floor taking care not to tip tears into the keyboard of my laptop. My need for unfettered expression was profound, solid as the foundations of the earth. I suppose it as simple as this, monsoons sometimes happen as far south as Sydney.
* From the album Rock'n'Roll Tears - listen to it.
Soundcheck City
Everyone was checking sound this afternoon as I walked home to The Peach. Notes, the Greek restaurant with surprising concrete walls and the unnaturally shiny counter, were broadcasting broken horn lines and and an arrhythmic sequential tapping of drums. Buskers were unfolding themselves from hardcases, tuning up their old guitars and getting ready for the public disappearance of self into the appearance of sound. The Enmore emitted the classic 'one two tchoo two tchoo' and lost another battle in it's fifty year war to reach the number three.
I was laughing about the preparation of noise as I collected my drumsticks and began another assault on rhythm coordination and purpose. I was thinking of Spencer and how he can make music without notice, music enough to kickstart your heart or bend your neck in rememberance of something you haven't lived through yet. I was laughing at preparation with my joyful anarchic heart until I decided to water the front garden and the door knob came off in my hand. I am trapped in The Peach.
The Peachettes are out of town this weekend. Spencer has gone on tour and just about everybody I know is somewhere else today. I thought about panicking but instead I attended an interstate party at The Hive by telephone. I was passed around the guests like a favour and I believe that I had a grand old time. Gemma was lamenting her yesterdays' drinking as she cooked for the party tonight. Retro was feeling drunk and generous and the whole thing sounded all right.
I was tempted to panic but instead I persisted in telephoning Madam Squeeze. Luckily for me Madam Squeeze decided to sit this leg of the tour out and I knew if I kept calling that I'd eventually catch her between songs in her busking set on King St tonight. She's on her way now to rescue me and I suppose this fact has put one more fear to rest. It seems that when I am locked and alone in my house I will not die and be eaten very slowly by the cat but attend interstate parties by telephone and make pots of peppermint tea.
I was laughing about the preparation of noise as I collected my drumsticks and began another assault on rhythm coordination and purpose. I was thinking of Spencer and how he can make music without notice, music enough to kickstart your heart or bend your neck in rememberance of something you haven't lived through yet. I was laughing at preparation with my joyful anarchic heart until I decided to water the front garden and the door knob came off in my hand. I am trapped in The Peach.
The Peachettes are out of town this weekend. Spencer has gone on tour and just about everybody I know is somewhere else today. I thought about panicking but instead I attended an interstate party at The Hive by telephone. I was passed around the guests like a favour and I believe that I had a grand old time. Gemma was lamenting her yesterdays' drinking as she cooked for the party tonight. Retro was feeling drunk and generous and the whole thing sounded all right.
I was tempted to panic but instead I persisted in telephoning Madam Squeeze. Luckily for me Madam Squeeze decided to sit this leg of the tour out and I knew if I kept calling that I'd eventually catch her between songs in her busking set on King St tonight. She's on her way now to rescue me and I suppose this fact has put one more fear to rest. It seems that when I am locked and alone in my house I will not die and be eaten very slowly by the cat but attend interstate parties by telephone and make pots of peppermint tea.
Screw you German Idealist architecture
I've just washed the last of the dull silver and gold smears from the end of my fingers. I was talking to a person or two while I ran my fingers along the circuit lines. Anne Finnegan grinned at me as my left ring finger made enough noise to pause a gallery's worth of conversation. I don't know how Joyce Hinterding did it but her drawings were circuit boards that made sound when you touched them.
I've been largely avoiding galleries smaller than the MCA for the last few years. I think it's time the stupid art world got ready for me to make a come back.
I've been largely avoiding galleries smaller than the MCA for the last few years. I think it's time the stupid art world got ready for me to make a come back.
Aleksandr Hearst is an interesting young man
I happen to agree with him on this issue though of course I might word it a little differently. I've said it before and I'll say it again:
'This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast and if you cut them down d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?'
Yes Robert Bolt said it first. I am aware of that.
'This country's planted thick with laws from coast to coast and if you cut them down d'you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?'
Yes Robert Bolt said it first. I am aware of that.
Oh honey last night I saw you at Wu-Tang
I love prints. I can afford prints. I will be very happy with my print. I will frame it and hang it on the wall here in The Peach where I will make The Peachettes stand and admire it with teacups in their hands.
In other news last night Wu-Tang Clan performed live at the end of my street. Three underage drinkers were arrested approximately 20cm from my face. One man tried to kiss me and another man said he was going to punch me in the face but then the crowd went inside, Spencer arrived and everything was fine. Wu-Tang Clan aint nothing to fuck with.
We Buy Your Kids
I ran into Sonny Day on my way home from Mag Nation, I'm visiting that place daily until the new issue of Apartamento comes in. Sonny was opening a taxi door then closing it again after his friend climbed inside, makes sense when you stop to consider the basic physics of doors, Australia and taxis.
I've been talking to Sonny on the phone lately, sent the odd email or two, it was good to run into him and reconfirm that he is a real person and not a distinct set of telephone broadcast tones or a particular arrangement of the alphabet displayed in my inbox. Sonny is in fact kind of sunny despite the beard that can only be described as biker.
I've been talking to Sonny and Biddy about logos* for PAN magazine. They had said they were keen but needed to consider their schedule, which is unbelievably full. I anticipated a lovely but negative answer to the question of making me a logo but as it turns out I was wrong. You could have knocked me over with a dumbo feather as the taxi drove away and Sonny was standing on the street telling me yes, yes We Buy Your Kids would love to work with PAN magazine.
* Please note that We Buy Your Kids will be designing a logo very late this year, they are not responsible for any of the plain things that are up on the PAN website at the moment.
I've been talking to Sonny on the phone lately, sent the odd email or two, it was good to run into him and reconfirm that he is a real person and not a distinct set of telephone broadcast tones or a particular arrangement of the alphabet displayed in my inbox. Sonny is in fact kind of sunny despite the beard that can only be described as biker.
I've been talking to Sonny and Biddy about logos* for PAN magazine. They had said they were keen but needed to consider their schedule, which is unbelievably full. I anticipated a lovely but negative answer to the question of making me a logo but as it turns out I was wrong. You could have knocked me over with a dumbo feather as the taxi drove away and Sonny was standing on the street telling me yes, yes We Buy Your Kids would love to work with PAN magazine.
* Please note that We Buy Your Kids will be designing a logo very late this year, they are not responsible for any of the plain things that are up on the PAN website at the moment.
Amazeballs
Today Slammaland intersected with PANland when I met Raging Yoghurt for the first time. She ordered the chocolate soup, I had two identical biscuits. If I wasn't so tired I'd tell you all about how smart, stylish and charming she is. I suppose that kind of information will have to wait for another day.
She thought she was chained up, she wasn't chained up but she was definitely dying
I thought well this is just about the worst situation a person can witness so I got out my sketchbook and made a picture.
Sometimes being alive for 100 days is reason enough to celebrate
Since she was born I drew a picture of a teapot and paid somebody to tattoo it on my shoulder in white ink. My life has turned on a sixpence and sped directly into the unknown realms of overwhelming joy, fulfillment and optimism. I'm not saying it's because of her, not even because of the teapot but something is markedly different around here. I have a new and lovely regret founded in the discovery of the 352 bus.
Official capacity
I like surprises that are good. I like editing magazines and writing sentences like "I am putting my fingers in all your pies". I also like being approached by a ski company to write their tweets for them. In the meeting I had to repress the urge to yell about snow and also that I find twitter quite annoying.
The idea of snow excites me. I've seen snow twice now, once I saw a little patch by the side of a road and one cold day it snowed at my Mum's house in Katoomba. It looked like floaty rain or evidence of a malfunction in my brain. I had no idea what was happening and for several long seconds stood at the window unable to comprehend what I was seeing. I think I said to my mother 'there is something wrong with outside, better come and have a look'. We stood in silence for a moment then Mum told me it was snow. I don't suppose that is the kind of thing that a ski company should know about. A person being paid to write for a ski company should have the ability to comprehend snow.
The idea of snow excites me. I've seen snow twice now, once I saw a little patch by the side of a road and one cold day it snowed at my Mum's house in Katoomba. It looked like floaty rain or evidence of a malfunction in my brain. I had no idea what was happening and for several long seconds stood at the window unable to comprehend what I was seeing. I think I said to my mother 'there is something wrong with outside, better come and have a look'. We stood in silence for a moment then Mum told me it was snow. I don't suppose that is the kind of thing that a ski company should know about. A person being paid to write for a ski company should have the ability to comprehend snow.
More surprising than propelling high speed air into your naked armpit
I walked into yet another promising looking boutique in my neverending search to source clothes for PAN magazine's first ever editorial fashion shoot. The woman behind the counter informed me that their lending policy was 'We don't lend', but then she hesitated and asked which magazine I was from. I told her PAN magazine expecting a blank look but she smiled and asked me what PAN stood for. I said "ponies are necessary but nobody is supposed to know about that". She said "I know about it and I love it". Seems that word is beginning to spread.
Oh and she might be changing her mind about the lending policy. We'll find out tomorrow.
Oh and she might be changing her mind about the lending policy. We'll find out tomorrow.
Deodorant that makes you smell
I went to Penguin and was pointed at by Pip Smith which was nice. I was going to talk about PAN magazine but what seems more important right now is my deodorant. I have not always been a fan of the spray-on kind of deodorant, I found propelling air into my armpits too much of a shocking experience and ended up jumping around like a lunatic. I still jump around but there has been a fundamental shift in my thinking. My new and experimental tin of spray-on deodorant increases my naturally occurring body odour in the same way that an amplifier transmits the sound of a guitar. And I like it. I am going to spray again tomorrow and become one of those people that smells just precisely like themselves.
Fine then let's make a deal - I'll give you ten for your eleven
Tomorrow we might talk about the magazine and just why it is called PAN.
Generally my preferred Elvis is Costello not Presley
Well Elvis is something else. He was wearing an expensive suit two sizes too large. He was shambolic yet dapper and he occasionally danced across the stage. Elvis likes stepping away from his microphone, not afraid to strum his guitar and just sing, really let rip like they used to before somebody stuck a cord into a black box and discovered amplification. Once or twice he got a little experimental and made some art noise with his loop machine and pedals. I feel like I'm being haunted by loops at the moment. Everybody wants to stand on stage with a loop machine and make a band of themselves. I think its because we've forgotten how to go solo, almost everyone's plugged into someone else all the time. I suppose it's only natural that they take this to the stage where traditionally it has been lonely or it was until somebody figured out how to multiply one person into the sound of many.
Daisy from Bridezilla played a solo set at Oxford Arts Factory on Friday night, before Spencer's band and then The Mess Hall. I like Daisy, she's grand because she stands like she means it and just fucking sings. The Holy Soul were, as they almost always are these days, better than the audience deserved. I didn't stay to hear The Mess Hall play, I managed to not call Jed Dan and that was enough for me. Radio Man was buying me drinks, I should have thought to drink something a little more expensive than water but it didn't occur to me at the time. I'm sure I had something else to say but I've forgotten what it might have been.
I've been saving my words lately. I've been holding back all effort that doesn't further the future of PAN magazine. I'll stop doing that eventually or maybe tomorrow but right now I'm riding that first wave of excitement just as far as it can take me. I'm hiding pens and notepads under my pillows in case I think of something in the night, I'm carrying two kinds of briefcase, working on three computers and tuning my footsteps to the sounds to the triple tap of magazine. I'll kick this habit at the launch party but for right now please don't wake me from this magazine dream.
Daisy from Bridezilla played a solo set at Oxford Arts Factory on Friday night, before Spencer's band and then The Mess Hall. I like Daisy, she's grand because she stands like she means it and just fucking sings. The Holy Soul were, as they almost always are these days, better than the audience deserved. I didn't stay to hear The Mess Hall play, I managed to not call Jed Dan and that was enough for me. Radio Man was buying me drinks, I should have thought to drink something a little more expensive than water but it didn't occur to me at the time. I'm sure I had something else to say but I've forgotten what it might have been.
I've been saving my words lately. I've been holding back all effort that doesn't further the future of PAN magazine. I'll stop doing that eventually or maybe tomorrow but right now I'm riding that first wave of excitement just as far as it can take me. I'm hiding pens and notepads under my pillows in case I think of something in the night, I'm carrying two kinds of briefcase, working on three computers and tuning my footsteps to the sounds to the triple tap of magazine. I'll kick this habit at the launch party but for right now please don't wake me from this magazine dream.
In the morning it would be better if you've gone
Sometimes the very best way to spend a Saturday morning is sitting in bed with a nice cup of tea listening to Bob Dylan's Christmas album and reading Nylon magazine. It helps to make a tiny bubble to stop in for a moment, even if the bubble doesn't really make sense.
Lacquer my tunnel
In case you were wondering why the pictures of trains in the tunnel at Central are so shiny. It is because they clean then lacquer them every Monday night.
I suppose I should have suspected this
Editing a magazine is a little like herding kittens into a volcano of doom.
[disclaimer: neither the contributors nor the magazine are like a volcano of doom, the magnitude of my mission is like a volcano of doom.... sort of]
[disclaimer: neither the contributors nor the magazine are like a volcano of doom, the magnitude of my mission is like a volcano of doom.... sort of]
Salami shower (instead of two kinds of classy)
I was feeling kind of pleased with myself because I was planning on having a bubble bath with the bathroom window wide open. I was going to lie back in hot water and watch the rain. I was thinking of smoking one of those long thin cigars and pouring the smoke from my lungs out the window but then I remembered that cigars are made of tobacco and I quit smoking three months ago.
I changed plans and went with a shower in order to avoid not smoking but I must have made a pit stop at the refrigerator. It was one of those thin flat pieces of salami, the kind large enough to cover a piece of bread. I was holding it curled like a cigar in my teeth while I peeled off my clothes. It was freezing in The Peach bathroom this afternoon, cold enough to hurry me straight into the shower with less than three seconds passing from the removal of my last sock until the hot water hit my face. I turned around to let the water warm my back when I realised the rolled up slice of salami was still sitting in place like a meat cigar hanging out of the left side of my mouth. Today is the day that I ate salami in the shower and I loved it. I'm doing it again tomorrow.
I changed plans and went with a shower in order to avoid not smoking but I must have made a pit stop at the refrigerator. It was one of those thin flat pieces of salami, the kind large enough to cover a piece of bread. I was holding it curled like a cigar in my teeth while I peeled off my clothes. It was freezing in The Peach bathroom this afternoon, cold enough to hurry me straight into the shower with less than three seconds passing from the removal of my last sock until the hot water hit my face. I turned around to let the water warm my back when I realised the rolled up slice of salami was still sitting in place like a meat cigar hanging out of the left side of my mouth. Today is the day that I ate salami in the shower and I loved it. I'm doing it again tomorrow.
Kind of like a hoppy sort of sideways moonwalk combined with a running man and also some kicking?
This morning I woke up, only very moderately hungover, and decided that today is the day I learn how to do the Melbourne Shuffle. Clearly the music is horrid and the shufflers seem mostly to be men but what the hell it's about time I developed a new hobby. I briefly considered converting my black pyjama pants with yellow electrical tape and downloading horrible music but on reflection have decided to simply perform Slamma style shuffle to Talking Heads wearing my pony dress.
It seems to me like this might be the place
Yesterday of course I had twelve tantrums in the rain but everyone arrived at all of the meetings and I believe what I experienced was progress with umbrellas, boots and a magazine. Newtown will in the end deliver what you need whether it's a poetry editor, seven and a half burritos or a permission to reprint something already delivered.
I had thought to sit quietly in a bookshop and lay down one convincing argument after another but as usual I ended pretending to tap dance in the doorway of a Mexican takeaway waving my umbrella and shouting at the rain.
I had thought to sit quietly in a bookshop and lay down one convincing argument after another but as usual I ended pretending to tap dance in the doorway of a Mexican takeaway waving my umbrella and shouting at the rain.
Peter, Paul and Mary seemed to have each other
Everyone knows they've been fucking but not everybody knows that he doesn't know her name. I decided to call her Mary. Last week I heard somebody say 'we lost Mary' and there's not one person in Newtown who looks more lost than her. I was clutching ten records to my chest and walking in the rain when she rolled past me on a bus staring at nothing, not even blank space. I imagine she lets her handbag sag in her lap.
There's no one taller, she's got those toothpick legs hooked on to the end of a floating bone pelvis. Black hair hanging clean and straight. I feel like setting obstacles in her path just to see exactly how much those long legs can step over with breaking their elegant stride. I suppose she looks like a model or something but when you see her in a crowd she seems planted from outer space. I've seen her almost everywhere in Newtown, on buses, street corners, bars, pubs, shops and supermarkets. She is always alone. Last month I saw her picking up teaspoons in Vinnies. She would hold one close to her face, turn it over then put it down again. I never picked her as the type to make off with the silver.
I would have assumed that I had imagined her, conjured out of the viable air space in my head but people talk about her. I'm not the only one that sees in corners and out on the street. I'm going to keep calling her Mary but I think I've decided that instead of watching stand hollow and decorative as a crystal vase I might just walk up to her and say hello.
There's no one taller, she's got those toothpick legs hooked on to the end of a floating bone pelvis. Black hair hanging clean and straight. I feel like setting obstacles in her path just to see exactly how much those long legs can step over with breaking their elegant stride. I suppose she looks like a model or something but when you see her in a crowd she seems planted from outer space. I've seen her almost everywhere in Newtown, on buses, street corners, bars, pubs, shops and supermarkets. She is always alone. Last month I saw her picking up teaspoons in Vinnies. She would hold one close to her face, turn it over then put it down again. I never picked her as the type to make off with the silver.
I would have assumed that I had imagined her, conjured out of the viable air space in my head but people talk about her. I'm not the only one that sees in corners and out on the street. I'm going to keep calling her Mary but I think I've decided that instead of watching stand hollow and decorative as a crystal vase I might just walk up to her and say hello.
I've lost that and now it's gone
Newtown can turn on you, offer one of those knife-edge shoulder blades poking out of the backs of things. I knew this but I don't think Newtown knew that I would turn on her. I saw Gemma today and she said she thought I'd been turning on Newtown for a while now, figured out the code while I slept by night.
He started out speaking words and those stupid proclamations people utter before they realise what the worst is and that it sometimes happens to you, it made more sense than I'd care to admit. He rotated a hung apple until the worm hole hit the light.
He started out speaking words and those stupid proclamations people utter before they realise what the worst is and that it sometimes happens to you, it made more sense than I'd care to admit. He rotated a hung apple until the worm hole hit the light.
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