There's A Girl At The Bottom Of My Glass.

There's no such thing as paranoia...

2008-08-02T17:09:00.000-07:00

Someone once told me, “Don’t worry about what people say about you; anything you imagine is going to be a hundred times worse than anything they can come up with anyway.”

They were wrong.

Paranoia is not adequate- check out this mail sent to my girlfriend. What do you say to this sort of thing?

ROFL

From: Jennifer.TURNER@deewr.gov.au [mailto:Jennifer.TURNER@deewr.gov.au]
Sent: Monday, 21 July 2008 4:47 PM
To: XXXX
Cc: Benjamin.Zeven@defence.gov.au
Subject: Issues. [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

Dear Meredith,

Hiya, hope you had a good weekend. I've been thinking about a lot of things; you know, to do with our friendship. It's been a stressful process. You have become a really close friend and I value that. We have been there for each other and it's been great. All of these complications with you and Tom have been getting in the way of things, and I don't like it.

I really wish you could see things from our point of view, and was talking about this with Ben over the weekend.

So, what if things were a little different, and after that period when you were so down after Justin you didn't meet Tom but started taking heroin. I would have tried really hard to get you help, and try make you see how bad heroin is for you and how it can ruin your life. I would have even tried to understand you choosing to take heroin when you knew from the start it wasn't quite right.

But there would have come a time when I would realise that I couldn't help you. I would have to say, 'Meredith, I don't agree with your lifestyle choice; I don't want you to shoot up in front of me or at my house, because that is sending you a message that I accept what you're doing, and I do not. I have tried to support you through this, and even tried be supportive of your choice, even though I don't agree with it. It's because I care about you that I can't stand by and watch you make decisions that I feel strongly will negatively affect your life. I can see that you don't want my help or value my opinion when it comes to your use of heroin, so there's nowhere else our friendship can go until you are ready to give it up.' It would be very hard to say that, because in saying it I would risk you not wanting to be friends at all, and withdrawing completely into your world.

I would say it though, because I am an honest and true friend. I have always been honest with you, because I believe being silent where I think there is reason for concern is not something a good friend does.

That's how both Ben and I feel about you and Tom. It sounds harsh, I have deliberately used the heroin analogy because that's how toxic I feel your relationship with him is to you. And like heroin, it doesn't just affect you, but people close to you who love you, who get to see the impact.

You are always welcome at our place, and Ben and I still hope you think of both of us as true, honest friends who only have your happiness at heart. You may not agree with that, especially after reading this, but it's true. We think of you as a dear, dear friend who we love a lot. It's hard for us to watch you with Tom. That is why he is no longer welcome at our place. Per my sentiments above, we can no longer support your choice, because we feel it is so wrong for you.

I admire the fact that you try to see the best in everyone. Listening to your intuition is not being cynical; if you feel something's up then it probably is. Tom won't tolerate us because he knows we don't believe him. The crux of the matter is this; Ben and I accept you Meredith, but we don't accept your choice to be with Tom.

You are a wonderful, giving person. I hope my being honest about the way I feel won't spell the end of our friendship.

Jennifer Turner
Access, GTTP, TIP
DEEWR SA State Office
Phone (08)8306 8816 Fax (08)8306 8822

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED

Just sitting and thinking aloud

2008-03-31T17:38:00.001-07:00

It’s funny, nowadays, people look at me the way I used to look at down and outs. Not at them, but through them, away from them, down on them; as I say, just as people look at me now.

It seems like a lifetime since I was an engineer; another world. I gave up engineering early this century because of the lines in a song, “I feed four baby brothers, and little sister’s crawling on her knees. Did the Lord say that Machines, oughta take the place of living? And what’s a substitute for bread and beans? I don’t see it, do engines get rewarded for their steam?” The song is by Johnny Cash, it’s called, “The Ballad of John Henry’s Hammer,” I’m not American, But John Henry worked the railway lines, driving steel. I was working at the time I heard the song, building software and hardware to put people out of work, to end lifestyles, to force people into a world of insecurity.

So I stopped doing that, because you can’t keep doing something you know is wrong.

Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like if I’d kept that stable income, the nice apartment and the lifestyle and all that went with it. Sometimes, but not that often.

I threw my life down hard at the rocks. I had to know who I was with nothing. It turns out, pretty much the same person, only now I dream of owning a little log cabin somewhere in the mountains, digging a little garden and writing little books for people to enjoy, maybe raising a family, playing harmonica in the summer sunsets sitting on my porch; doing a little fishing. I’d like a wood fire to keep me warm in very cold winters when you can hear snow fluttering against the glass.

That’s my dream, and this is now. I have no income to mention, I have hope matched by a sense of hunger and a will to live right. I know I’ve done a lot of bad things, I know I’ve done a lot of good things; I know there’s much more of both to come, I’m just tired. Tired of fighting, tired of being told I’m wrong, tired of being told my ideals mean nothing in this world, things are as they are and I can and should do nothing to change them.

I don’t regret the choices I’ve made, or the life I’ve lived. Although I wish that I’d been a little older, a little more secure when I began my grand dreaming- if only because my heart would have held less anger for my frightening childhood treatment at the hands of other children. I would have been more calm in my reasoning, I would know how to communicate better with people. Perhaps my behavior would have been less self destructive.

This is not so though, and I must live as I am, and grow to what I shall be. So I live, try to survive, and polish some of the rough edges off my character, heart, and soul. I’m lucky though, because I know each and everyone of use walks the same path, and despite our ages, no one is in the same place at the same time.

The race is long, and only with myself.

Synthetic realism

2008-03-16T19:50:00.000-07:00

A better type of car; television; credit cards; rooms lit by tubes of burning gases and maintained at a constant temperature to sustain people; refrigerators with internet connection and sixteen inch LCD screens; a better job for a bigger mortgage; buying, not making; never mending, always discarding; no understanding but knowing.
The real world is not like this, it can’t be.

It remains; sky and sun and moon; sweat on a hot day; walking, not sad scrambling; sleep without pills; youth, adulthood, aged; Gentle hearts; understanding, never knowing; reward consummate to effort; tender loves, burning hates; Agony and ecstasy; truth evinced by behavior, not argued; action and thought in resonance; rain, wind and sun, each and everything in its turn.

Can a synthetic reality on basis of a majority vote override this world?

Oh, what a glorious day it will be, when we finally live by manners and etiquette, rather than laws and threats.

The Semaphore Workers club

2008-02-19T17:24:00.000-08:00

I like to think of myself as a well rounded person; at times, given to devastating fits of melancholy, and at other times, possessed with a monk-like sangfroid calm, and still others, possessed by a demonic frustration that drives me on and on to write more about the things I see.

I am familiar with a particular type of layout in the bars I attend. A front bar, a lounge bar, a beer garden and a smoking area out front. Hard cold floors, tables that leave your arms smelling of bourbon after an hour, the only food in sight peanuts and chips. The music usually forces you to either yell, or lean in to speak, and until you’ve passed the six drink limit, the bar itself can be very isolating and unfriendly. Which is Very Bad; one would think when it comes to a bar. In this isolation you are forced to deal with art on the walls which is usually based around the same art you see on the walls of a $60 a night hotel room; bull fighters and bulls; clichéd sunsets; impossibly ugly flowers that leave you wondering if they were real, would their scent be rotting flesh; Heavy breasted beer posters; a4 photocopy fliers for various up coming bands.

It’s one of my perversities that I demand a little more from life than this. The first sign that I was in for a different experience was the name of the venue on the wedding invite, “The Semaphore workers club,” Odd, because usually it’s “Work mans club” and filled with slot machines. We pulled up in a cab outside a tall steel fence, around what looked like a suburban house. The beach sand littered the ground, and you could smell the surf only a handful of footsteps away. The view from the steps leading up to the verandah was stunning; blue water the color of jade, a tiny chop to the surface, just enough to stir up the waters surface; a perfect blue sky overhead.

We were standing in what was a regular front yard, short mowed grass, a couple of timber outdoor tables set up and some bench seats. There was a small crowd gathered under the verandah, the wedding party, and the soft sound of a guitar wobbling out the blues.

Inside the cool darkness was a relief from the sun, and the air was warm with the scent of timber and bodies moving. I noticed the walls were a little more interesting than anything I’d seen in a while, but soon forgot the walls as I sunk back into a comfortable conversation, leaning back in the long padded bench seat at a heavy wooden table, all polished with linseed oil, giving a warm feel to the room. The guitar in the background complimented the conversation, and drinks for the wedding party were wonderfully cheap.

It is a workers club. Above the bar, the only think my eyes could make out amongst the multitude was a sign that said, “NO TICKET, NO START,” and on closer inspection I recognized it all one of the union posters from the good old days where united we stood, before divided, we fell. The walls were heavy with photographs of Che Guverra, Ho Chi Minh, A map of Florida and Cuba, and the short expanse between them, flags with the union stars, communist party banners and a bust of Lenin.

I was fascinated. I was trawling the walls, off in my own little paradise of recognition and further learning. It was a short while before I realized my girlfriend had gone off in a different direction. She’d disappeared. She wasn’t with our friends; she wasn’t with the wedding party. Oh well, I thought, and wandered into the cleanest, brightest, biggest bathroom I’ve come across in any bar. There was room to read the paper in the bathroom, which helped me pass a necessarily distracted moment before I went back out, and saw my girlfriend sitting with an old lady. Hildy, she said her name was, in a clear voice, looked up at me and smiled. She didn’t have a single wrinkle and her grip was firm, her hand soft, but like the smoothest leather. I introduced myself and sat down on the other side of my girlfriend, thinking that a conversation was still in progress. Instead, Hildy asked me, “What do you do?” and listened carefully, asking question with a friendly smile and open, curious mind. She excused herself for a moment, and went to the bathroom.

“What a cool old lady, you’ve found,” I said to Meredith, my girlfriend, “She’s so active,” Meredith nodded,
“She was just telling me how twenty years ago she climbed 15,000 feet of Everest with her daughter,” Meredith nodded at my wide eyes, “She’s eighty, you know,”

Eighty! Christ on a rubber crutch, nearly eighty and she had less wrinkles than me. She was a glowing ball of vitality, her skin a perfect gold, aged, but not withered in any way.

This walking Buddha returned shortly and began asking me questions about the virtues of Windows Vista as compared to Windows Xp, my opinion of the “Sorry” speech, what my thoughts were on the high school generation. I came away realizing I’d met a rare individual.

Ah, but who cares about that, by four o’clock I wanted music, and the crowd was splitting in two, the crowd who wanted to stay and drink into the night, and the crowd that had to go home to rest before work the next day. I should have been in that last crowd, but chose instead to stay, hypnotized as I was by Brother T’s slowly spinning Leslie Rotating speaker, and the battered sides of the Hammond organ.

The guitarist left, and didn’t seem to like me at all when I asked him, apparently at random, “So how do you find teaching affects your playing?” it’s a good, honest question that itches at me with any artist who teaches their art, does it constantly enable them to improve? Does it cause them to sometimes need time away from the art? He was insulted by the question, and told me it had no effect at all, not effect at all, although, when he was younger…” and then clamed up and looked at the torn knee in my cargo pants as if to dismiss me on basis of torn clothing.

The vodka helped the pain of social rejection fade and I leaned on the steel scaffold fence in the warm evening sun and chatted with two of the band members, the instigates, Snooks La Vie and Brother T, and the Groom, Lain, a Top Bloke, with a union heart, a generous smile and a loving embrace on his new wife and life in general. On the short cut grass, a group of families stood talking. Guys in shirts with collars and slacks, women in their Sunday church clothes, heavy bearded bikers with uncomfortable large rings all over their fingers but a deferential courtesy, and kids chasing each other around in a crazed game of tiggy.

There was the occasional clatter and shatter of glass breaking; the air was filled more so with laughter and stories raised high in joking story. The sunset that presided over all was breathtaking in its oranges, it’s pastel tinted grays, the sapphire blue water and the clean dark silhouettes of the jetty. The wedding party specials had ended, but the bar drinks were still cheap. I found myself wondering, where all socialist clubs the epitome of good taste, relaxed vibes and cheap drinks?

When the Hiptones started playing, the night air was filled with seventies lounge funk, Snooks’ harmonica making the sound somehow more bluesy. The music was the epitome of the style, without once drifting into the clichés that are so dangerous in genre music. Brother T takes on the MC role with a calm and easy confidence, while Snooks plays the part of the lead singer perfectly, relaxed, at ease, more concerned with how his friends are doing, than the fantastic performance he’s giving. The guest guitarist works in with the guys as if this were his native territory and the small hot dance floor- it’s forty degrees Celsius outside and only fans in the dark, low roofed room- files with dancers, people moving with the crooning notes, and dancing with the funk melody. Not me though, I’m back out on the verandah, enjoying the cool breeze and the barbeque they’ve started, tickects purchased from the door entry stand next to the front door and the immaculately dressed doorman, Kim, who greets you with a friendly smile and nod, his braces whit shirt, tie and closed cuffs topped by his smiling bearded face create an impression of friendliness, hospitality and respect in the room; for he himself is the very the most courteous of gentleman and eager to meet any new face with a relaxed and easy manner.

The vodka was beginning to tell my brain the Workers club had all the qualities of every movie set of an Aussie pub I’d ever seen; fascinating individuals, low, dark ceilings, the memories and our history on the walls, two full size pool tables out back. Photographs that told stories, creaking wooden floors and a band that could entertain any Hollywood Cast.

I think I’ve found where the heart is, and thus home.

The Future

2008-02-16T17:21:00.000-08:00

Girl in the bottom of my glass, has always been flexible, if nothing else. Outspoken, bizarre and surreal at times, but always flexible. For those of you familiar with my main blog, The Anatomy of Construction, you may be aware that its is a rough draft of something of a far grander design.

The Anatomy of Construction has never been a typical blog on writing, per se. I ignore many issues that described the back bone of the mechanical craft of story. The Anatomy isn’t concerned with this; it’s about building a stronger creative background. Removing those things that limit your writing and stop you from progressing to where you really want to go. In some ways it’s like a self help book. The things that cause you to resist writing are the same things that cause you to resist mountaineering, getting the milk in the morning, and doing some of the things you’ve always dreamed of.

This is bad, but all beside the point. This time I’m trying to tie down my thoughts on the second draft of the Anatomy of Construction; the format.

The Anatomy is based around images, photos now, but earlier collages and other twists on the traditional means of presenting information. I got this idea from David Mack, having read his Kabuki series. He bound storytelling, visual imagery, and raw information together into story that both provoked and inspired the reader. I recommend the series, “The Alchemy,” it’s the most inspiration any creative person could ever need. Art has reached Zen like levels in David Mack’s work. My initial pages in The Anatomy are a poor homage to his work. The core idea was there though, marrying visual images to raw information in such a way as to be entertaining, and penetrate the mind of the reader. Check out the link, David Mack is incredible.

The graphic novel format was an obvious one to choose, but to be entertaining and intelligible would have to have a story line that bound it to the raw information in some way. Every time I thought about it, it became too contrived, and even after writing a first draft, it felt a little patronizing to the reader. So I put it in the good ideas bucket, and went back to writing other stuff, as well as my daily Anatomy page.

I never work on just one project. There’s always something part done, waiting for the impetus for the next step of the ideas gestation into its final form. The Anatomy sat on the back burner and I thought about it. Couldn’t go all Batman with the story, that’d be more camp than three china ducks on the wall. Couldn’t really go all DragonBall Z on it either, how could I write a visual story about how to overcome the obstacles between you and writing. Part of me wanted to draw a grand Robotech-esque space opera. Finally, under the pressure of deadlines, low income, impending electricity bills and gargantuan nay sayers my resolve shattered. Maybe I couldn’t write a visual storyline that went along with the words. Then, by virtue of a mind crippled by this realization, I asked myself, maybe I don’t want to write a visual story that went along with the words. Maybe they could just intersect at points, create a more dramatic visual impact by the visual story that is about something else. Like a manga where people change into marketing drones after combining the product and the intense advertising schemes in a neo Melbourne some indeterminable time in the future, ruled by a consumer caste system.

Hey, I don’t know. Why not? It’s meant to be fun, different, and striking, and I think this format will accomplish all of these things. It certainly leaves it in a category of its own. I have never written a graphic novel before. I can draw, somewhat, but have never focused my will on a dedicated series of story pages with the same cast of characters. This is not to say I can’t draw a graphic novel, it’s just saying that it’s something new for me. Which is nice, I could always do with something new.

Now it’s just a matter of gestating the final idea. I want the finished book to be 192 pages, or broken up into eight issues of 24 pages bound in one volume. All I do is write the story for the visual, break it down into storyboards and pages, align that story visually, and then craft the Anatomy into a monologue to be carried on in the speech bubbles.

In terms of art reference I’m casting a heavy eye at FLCL and Q-chan, the style is distinctive, but I need something more for the background, so I’m thinking of blending black and white photocopy outlines of the real world and a very crisp, over shot line style for the synthetic world, and then working something more graceful, black “Zen painting” type inks for the natural world to create contrast. But despite this idea I don’t want the contrast to be so visually hard as to distract from the words and the way the images reinforce their impact. So I get to develop my storyboarding skills, polish my writing, learn to work with a single set of visual characters, and create a very unique and useful piece of writing.

So something different? Yes, whether it works or not is entirely up to the efforts I put in- it’s an exciting idea.

Selah.

Sorry about the backlash...

2008-02-13T16:51:00.000-08:00

Well, we had sorry day yesterday. The Australian government came out and apologized for the way the 'Stolen generation' children were treated. This was somewhat more than a generation, spanning from 1868 to 1969. an estimated 100, 000 children were taken from their families to be raised for “their own good” in white house holds. There were many reasons for this, but often times the brutal management of the separations, the deception and the violence washed these good intentions aside. So we have apologized, and call for a new beginning as a nation with all people equal.

This is not a bad thing. I personally agree with apologizing to the displaced, degraded and devastated. I think we should apologize to everyone that’s been walked on by the successive governments. The Vietnam veterans, conscripted by their government and treated like lepers when they returned home; the Australians interred in Australian POW camps in Australia in the second world war; there are a great many groups I’d like the government to apologize for. I cannot of course articulate my will, and would not expect it articulate without knowing that it is the democratically correct thing to do.

This is my problem with the issue, I think the matter should have gone to referendum to see if that’s what the people wanted, because if it isn’t…. well, you do the math. If the majority in a democracy want one thing, and it goes in favor of the minority there is a nasty thing called backlash. Now I’m not saying that fat white politicians in Canberra with a distinct interest in maintaining the status quo would go into something like this knowing that there could be a backlash. I think they honestly believe, like me, that this is what the majority of Australians want, and that this is the right thing to do. But neither our politicians, nor I, know that it is.

It is dangerous to speak of a country as made up of different groups. Different people, yes, each of us is an individual with distinctly different characteristics, be they physical, religious, intellectual or otherwise. To highlight a difference, and perhaps inadvertently generate a backlash against a minority is to destabilize the nation and leave it that way until the dust settles, and one side comes out the victor, and the other, the victim.

Kevin Rudd delivered a finely worded speech, and I hope that each and every Australian, if not in agreement with the apologetic sentiment, is in agreement that this is a nation where all stand equal; our nation; our people; our history. Lets us stand proud of our democracy, and defend it with the same vigor as we do our hurts.

Tom

Memories come back by mail.

2008-02-12T17:23:00.000-08:00

Yesterday morning my filthy assistant flung some envelopes at my desk, missed and ran laughing from the room, “You’ve got mail,” she'd howled. Which is not unusual, my filthy assistant has a tendency that cannot be escaped to throw mail at me, swear, and generally be of no assistance what so ever. What was unusual was the mail. Amongst the bills and offers for a better home loan was a very beat up envelope, weathered, torn at the edges. The address was scrawled on it in a red felt tip pen, and was an address that was valid maybe twelve years ago. There was no stamp, or postage owing.

It was all very strange. Sniffing the envelope suspiciously and wishing I’d bought that can of envelope compromise spray on e-bay- that spray can detect the presence of anthrax or a bomb- I tore open one end.
My learners permit, from twelve years ago fell out. That little plastic card that said I was culpable enough to learn to drive a car. This was odd; because I very distinctly remember the night I lost it.

I’d finished work, stopped in at the bar and had several refreshing beverages. The beverages I had after that made me feel less fresh, and at three am, I decided that it would be a wonderful night to enjoy the evening gloaming and head home, availing myself of the pavement and the short walk. As I stepped outside the door one thought occurred to me that found its way into every retelling of the event. “I’m going to get mugged,” I thought, with some grim finality. In my mind it was so certain that I would get mugged that it didn’t matter if I caught a cab, or walked, I’d still get mugged either way.

With this in mind I started the stroll home. When the spray blast caught me in the face I thought “Cazart! I’m immune to mace, what a wonderful finding!” but found almost immediately that I wasn’t immune to the effects of star droppers. Star droppers are a Y section steel fence post that weighs about ten kilos (twenty pounds) each. Goodness knows where these scamps got the posts from. The first blow split my shoulder open and broke my right collar bone. The second blow sent my right knee cap into orbit around my right knee, causing the leg to topple beneath me. After that, it was a three on one by the numbers beating. Ah, good times.

The whole event was more comical than frightening at the time. One stood on my head and asked if I had any jewelry, crushing my newly pierced ear into the dirt. I lied, and told them, “No, no jewelry,” I didn’t think they seemed like the kind of lads to gently take the new ear ring from my ear. As they walked off with their ill gotten gain, my wallet containing twenty-seven dollars and thirty-five cents, one called at me, “If you move, we’ll come back and kill you,” which I would have laughed at in other circumstances. Surely they wanted to flee the scene of their crime? Surely that would necessitate leaving me unobserved, to move as much as I wanted?

And move I did, as soon as they were out of earshot. I groaned, I heaved, I shouted for help. Everything hurt. What I didn’t know at that time was I had nine broken ribs and a fractured sternum, along with a host of other injuries. After finding my persistent calls for help yielding no results, I dragged and fell out on to the road, and bled there for a while. It seemed like the right thing to do. After a while, one of the many cars rushing past let me heave open the passenger door at the traffic lights to bleed all over their nice interior. Kindly they drove me home where I took a well earned breather. I needed the break, breathing was hard, and smoking even harder; every time I lit up I thought I was going to have a heart attack.

I looked in the mirror, holding myself up as best I could and was immediately disappointed. It wasn’t mace I’d been sprayed with, but white spray paint. My entire right side was mangled, black with bruises and drying blood (all mine) with lumps pushing and pulling at my skin in worrying ways.

The road to recovery was painful slow, and more frightening than the mugging. The Criminals were kids, who had done something stupid and violent when drunk, The police were sympathetic, saw the case through, and eventually I was awarded twenty-seven dollar’s and thirty-five cents as “Victims of crime compensation”.

I looked down at that license sitting in my hand, looked at the photo of myself taken twelve years and a thousand kilometers away and said, “Boy, the things I could tell you,”

The mystery was complete. There was a note in the envelope, with no name, telling me that “This was found in a garden in Upper Ferntree gully,” The envelope had been in the mail, by the looks of it for at least ten years, to bring me this ghost from the past.

Selah.

O brave new world?

2008-02-10T13:08:00.000-08:00

Time is short, I’ve only fifteen minutes to get this screed together before my Filthy Assistant screams “Deadline” down the phone at me. Last night, we sat down and finally watched Sicko, the Michael Moore film. Damn, the Health care system in the US can be brutal, but this is beyond the point. Let me step back two further nights.

I’d just finished rereading “A brave new world” by Aldous Huxley, language tends to stick with me, themes tend to cling. After a rereading of Thus Spake Zarathustra I can go on year long pursuits for meaning, success and solitude. Fight club leaves me peculiar for months at an end, wearing an odd smile.

Already a person with an attitude that says, “A few dings show that you’ve seen the road,” kind of attitude, A brave new world left me contemplating the synthetic nature of many things, the actively encouraged mass consumerism and our emotional lives. Status displayed by a better neck tie or name plaque on your desk, Addictive passive entertainment that can turn an Olympic gymnast into a jabba-the-Hutt look alike in four years.

We invited Meredith’s friend to join us, and she refused, the nut of her reason being she just didn’t like watching things that make her feel bad, which is fair enough, but for her parting with, “Ignorance is bliss”

There are a great many things that make us feel uncomfortable. Taxes, pain and fines, are all unpleasant, but teach us an outcome that’s better prevented early intervention. Unsettling information can teach us the directions to avoid, and the path we should travel. I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with Michael Moore’s call for free universal health care, not knowing enough and my experience being a movie with stories told to before the camera. I do know however that this is enough to pique my curiosity; in other words raise my interest in the subject and encourage me to learn about it. This is a desired outcome from both parties, those for and against; with information you can make informed judgments and have some supporting information to them.

I do not mind this sort of discomfort; stolen generations, Australian Wheat Board trials, and documentaries on our impact in the world hold no terror for me. I want to know, I need to learn more, so I can understand the world around me, and live with the least possible negative impact. I feel very uncomfortable when I learn about white settlers in this country tearing children from their parents because of mixed heritages; I feel nausea at the sight of Japanese whalers harpooning whales en masse in the name of science; landrapers fill me with a fury that tastes of iron in my mouth. And this is good, for these are things that should be prevented, and should circumstances arise that point to this happening in my backyard, I can then act; but I can only act positively if I know what I’m dealing with.

Ignorance isn’t bliss, it’s just ignorance. We live in a world that one day we are going to leave behind us, there are going to be other people, there are going to be children and hopeful mothers and wistful fathers. We must sometimes feel uncomfortable so as to leave them something worth having, and not nuggets of lead in the saddlebags.

Selah.

O, wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world,
That has such people in't!
William Shakespeare- The Tempest 5.1

After 150 years we're sorry.

2008-02-08T22:29:00.000-08:00

Australia has been ready to say sorry for the last twenty years and now our government is finally coming around to recognizing the pain caused to Indigenous Australians through the Stolen Generation Fiasco.

The Australian government and state governments at the time (1869- 1969) had created acts of parliament to permit missionaries and other church and government agencies to remove indigenous children to white society. These children were usually of mixed heritage. The idea was that the government was giving these children “A better chance”

This better chance was generally an orphanage, an interment camp or some other form of government institution. They reasoned that half blood children where not welcome or wanted in aboriginal communities and that the girls were “At risk”; the secondary aim of the policy was to “integrate” people with indigenous backgrounds into white society. Eugenicists claimed the need existed on basis of the superiority of the “White society” over aboriginal, and the fact that white society would entirely swallow the aboriginal traditions, culture and race. It later did, and the removal of children from their parents served no benefit in preserving culture whatsoever.

Names were lost, mothers and children sundered apart, lives irrevocably changed. We can only estimate at the number of children taken, with figures up to 100,000. We will never know the full extent because the issue was deemed to be so trivial as to not warrant accurate documentation.

Now, one hundred and fifty years after the first legislation was introduced to Australia, (1860) we are finally taking a step towards admitting, not just fault but shame at what we did as a Nation to Indigenous mothers and children.

We are saying sorry.

Sorry we tore your children away from you.

So sorry we tore your lives apart.

We hope this will make it all better.

Sorry.

Our last government, lead by the Late John Howard (o? he’s not dead?) refused to apologize. Which in some ways is significant; it is ridiculous to think that one word could mend all the harm done. It is stupid to think that there is anything that can be achieved in terms of physical gains.

Nothing can repair the damage done, the lives lost, the families broken.

Nothing.

We should acknowledge it though, and finally, the Australian government is about to say “Sorry”. An apology in itself does not entail compensation, Mr Rudd has said, and nor should it. What amount of money could make this right? For all those who would accept compensation, in doing so they are tacitly agreeing that whatever sum of money equates to the replacement of that lost time with family, and the abuse incurred as a consequence of their removal.

There is no compensation adequate; there is nothing that will make it right, ever. All we can do is join together as a nation and say “Sorry” and write the lesson in letters tall and ink that will never leave our souls.

The Thirst

2008-02-07T17:42:00.000-08:00

In absence of anyhting worth writing about today I've dragged up an old story of mine- it's called "The thirst", I hope you enjoy it.

Tom

The thirst. Back in the day, when shit was real.... 300 BC China, to be exact, this was a very famous city, known all about the world, and visible, for hundreds on miles because of the shimmering glow given off by its candles, a by product of its vigorous night life and urbane environs. People came from miles around just hear the city's music when the sun went down. The food was delightful, the whole place, was the Kasbah, and it rocked.

Just outside the city, in a rude mud hut (it abused everyone who passed it , called them mean names, threw rocks and stuff) lived a small family, a husband and wife and their one young boy. They were not rich, for dinner, they'd have a small meal of soupy rice, flavoured with lentils. Their morning meal consisted of a hole of a donut cut in three pieces, and their lunch was the wind's gentle kiss.

Every night, while sitting at the dinner table, the boy would look out the window, onto the blazing lights of the city, and find his heart filled with longing for the lights that glowed such a little way away, but for all intents and purposes, may as well have been the stars the shone in the night sky, given his ability to reach them.

The family lived hard, but was happy, their days were spent digging their well that much deeper, and going into the city, to sell water as peddlers. One evening, while the boy was eating dinner, he gazed out the window and said, 'I wish I lived like those people,' His dad smacked him upside the head and said, 'Silly lad. In this life you've only ever got two things top worry about, whether you're sick, or you're well. If you're well, you've got nothing to worry about, if you're sick, you've only ever got two things to worry about, whether you're going to get better, or die. If you get better you've got nothing to worry about, if you die you've only ever got two things to worry about, whether you exceed your samasara, or end up in the halls of the dead with King Yemma. If you exceed your samasara, you've got nothing to worry about. If you end up in the halls of the dead, with King Yemma, you'll be so busy shaking hands of old friends you wont have time to worry,'

Having said that, his father went back to his soupy rice. The boy though, in the manner that all boys will, did not listen to his father, and slowly the longing grew in his chest as a deathly vine bound about his heart.

The next day, he and his father went into the city, but the boy was unusually quiet, his father walked ahead, with a massive barrel on his back, crying, 'Water, who'd like a cup of water?' and his son followed behind, with a ladle and a bunch of teacups. Noticing his son to be unusually quiet, he turned and said, 'Oi, little hippy, less silence, more selling,' and turned back to his spruiking.

The boy saw his chance, and that wretched vine that wrenched about his heart bore fruit, and he ran, thinking all the while, 'In a city this large, it will be easy, even for a boy like me, to get work, and live the high life, maybe own a genuine, 300AD model Bentley one day,' and he began to look around.

The first place he went was a fine restaurant, known across the city as the finest establishment. Going into the back, where the cooks furiously slaved over woks that spat white-hot oil, he asked, begged one of the cooks for work. The cook was a kindly man, which explains why he was later fired (we all know chefs should be moody buggers with a nasty temper and an inclination to swear like troopers), and went and fetched the manager. The manager looked the boy up and down and said, 'Sweet, our last dish pig walked out, and my customers hate paper plates. You can be the dish pig,' then pointed over to the sink with a tottering and trembling tower of plates.

The young boy saw opportunity, and leaped at it, scrubbing the plates like a man possessed with a spirit that longed to clean plates. He was fantastic at it, and became known all over the city as the boy who cleaned dishes faster and better than anyone before him.

Time passed, he couldn't stop it, and on the eve of his twelfth birthday, the manager came down, and saw the boy who had come to him wearing rags and dirt, clean and well dressed, with his sleeves rolled high as he attended to the plates that flowed from the dining room, and said, 'A boy with drive look you will go far, in this life. How would you like to become an apprentice chef?' the boy, immediately said, 'Righto,' tossed the dishcloth over his shoulder, and then proceeded to the kitchen proper.

The manager stood amazed, for all the while he'd been washing dishes, the boy had watched the cooks, and as soon as he touched knife to vegetable showed the cooks, truly, what cooking was all about.

The manager was beyond impressed and said, 'Lad, as soon as you can find someone to wash all those dishes, you're the head chef,' the boy, winked at the manager, and said, 'Righto,' and set to it.

As time passed the restaurant became all the more famous for its fine food, and because of the rate at which the boy cooked, became known as the origin of the term, 'Fast Food,' for no sooner had the guests ordered, the meal would appear before them. Under the boys lead, each of the cooks strove for their perfection, and the restaurant became better and better with every passing day.

The manager came down one night, on the eve of the boys fourteenth birthday, and saw the boy, who had come to him wearing rags and dirt, well dressed, clean, smelling good, attended by three apprentices and said, 'A boy with drive like you, will go far. How would you like to become manager, so I can sit at home all day and read "Make out Paradise" like Kakashi Hatake out of Naruto,' (and now you know when the Naruto series started) The boy whipped off his apron, and said, 'Righto,' and headed up to the office, and immediately began with some small, simple changes.

Having spent so long in the kitchen, he knew the feel and the flow of the restaurant better than any other, and the profits, overnight, doubled. The manager was impressed with the boy, who by now, had his own little house in the city, a three horse power carriage, a box set of the entire "Astroboy" series, retainers, and a hand maid, a foot maid, and well, the other maid was handy too. Out back he had a big old sack of gold and his very own fully killer sick yiros shop, just next door to a pub, and renamed the restaurant to 'the thousand candle restaurant,' because at any one time, to make it the most dazzling restaurant in the whole city, they were burning a thousand candles

In the evenings, he was in the habit of standing on the balcony and looking out over the blazing, glowing city and thinking to himself, 'What a silly old bugger my dad was. If he had of been half as industrious as me, he too, could be living large, and at his age, sitting at home reading, "Make out paradise,"'

Then one night, they opened the restaurant, and no one came. By the end of the night, he'd only had three customers, two of which did a runner on the bill. As was his habit, he walked up the balcony, wondering what could have happened and as soon as he looked out, was blinded by a blaze of light. The boy said, 'Bloody hell! What's that?' and as his eyes became accustomed, saw that the restaurant across the road was still buzzing with customers, and by the looks of it, was burning two thousand candles.

The boy said to himself, ah, so that's why it's been quiet tonight. And immediately began preparing for the next nights business, telling his servants to buy another four thousand candles, climbed up on the roof and renamed the restaurant, 'The five thousand candle restaurant,' And it was a success.

The next night, they were busy again, the boy grinned and said, ah, I'm a crafty bugger, I should run for Parliament, and ensured, that they would do the same again the next night. The next night though, the restaurant was empty again, save for the cast of 'Happy days,' (Ron Howard skipped out on the bill) and the boy, in a fit of rage, ran to the balcony to see what was going on.

Across the road, the restaurant next door, they had made a massive neon sign, out of candles, that tottered on the roof of the restaurant, declaring it as 'The ten thousand candle restaurant,' The boy called down to his servants and told them to get another fifteen thousand candles for the next night, and whipped up to the roof, and made his very own neon sign out of candles, saying to himself all the while, I'll top these buggers, as he renamed the restaurant, 'Joe's' and had guys walking the street, with sandwich boards saying, "Eat at Joe's- $6 Schnitzel" When they opened, the restaurant was busy again and the owner came in to pay a visit.

The boy and he were up on the balcony, because it was hot in the restaurant, and the owner said, 'You must be careful, all this ambition will end in tears, there's enough for both restaurants to survive,' the boy snapped, and said, 'You silly old bugger, don't be daft, we can have it all,' as he was saying this, he wildly gesticulated with his arms, and accidentally swatted a candle, and started a terrible domino run.

The restaurant was ablaze, the boy leapt from the balcony, and soon the whole city caught alight, an massive, roaring funeral pyre as everyone tried desperately to grab what they could before they skipped town- their money, their loved ones, their plasma TV's (come on, plasma TV's were hard to get, back in the day, when shit was real).

The fire raged for two weeks, and when it finally burns out, there was but one soul, left alive and burnt crispy, the boy.

He dragged himself from the burnt out ruins of his Yiros shop and pulled himself, on blistered hands, the foul stench of burnt flesh and yiros' sickening to him, he searched for a place yet unburnt, dragged himself from the city, and slowly, came to a small area, spared of the fire. He rested a while in the cool green grass, and then looked around, and saw a small hut. Knowing he'd soon perish without food and fluids, he dragged himself to the door, and knocked, and fell upon the step. Presently, the door opened, and an old man peered out and saw the burnt boy, he said,

'Would you like some water?'

Something 'bout those purple pills

2008-02-06T17:20:00.000-08:00

"We have concluded that the manner of death is accident, resulting from the abuse of prescription medications," the New York City Medical Examiner's Office said in a statement.
"Mr. Heath Ledger died as the result of acute intoxication by the combined effects of oxycodone, hydrocodone, diazepam, temazepam, alprazolam and doxylamine," the statement said.”- Reuters

Heath Ledger is dead, it’s an accident, and you shouldn’t mix your drugs.

Just a bit of background information; Hydrocodone, and oxycodone are opiates, diazepam, temazepam and alprazepam are members of the tranquillizer family. Doxylamine is a sleep aid. Fascinating stuff, really and a sign that to relax in Hollywood it’s much more effective to abuse the meds than pass the Dutch.

Ledger’s death was accidental, no doubt, but having a plethora of downers is not. These are all prescription drugs, and the New York Coroner is trying to track down the doctor(s) who issued the prescriptions.

You see, no one Doctor would issue all of these prescriptions. You might get a doctor who gives you a sleeper and an anti-anxiety med, but not the whole Valley of the Dolls play set. Which brings us to the question, What was he doing? Was he partying? Was he really having trouble sleeping and so went to the Doc for some help?

Most people when they take to a drug in private are doing it because they feel bad, sad, anxious, and they find that the drug helps- prescription drugs with a kick like Diazepam are especially bad for this because they are so effective. The drugs don’t deal with the root problem though. In fact, they make it much easier to avoid dealing with the root problem- you’ve a solution to the symptoms, and in this case the solution will take you away from most problems.

But it all only lasts so long. Where yesterday one or two vals would get you through the day in a very pleasant way, today you need three, then four, and so on.

Of course, if you’re a thinking person, you realize what’s happening, the vals aren’t cutting the mustard anymore. The pesky doctor you go to once a week is asking Questions about the amount you’re using, and you’re not quite sure if he’s going to keep serving them up to you. When pushed he puts you on something new, like Xananx, which cuts the grade, while another friendly Doctor, on repeating your symptoms, gives you another prescription for Val’s, just in case. Accidents happen, you take one too many, you mix them incorrectly, and off to the big blast furnace you go.

Let’s make no mistake of it, Heath Ledger’s death is a Tragedy, but so are the deaths of the many young person who accidentally OD on drugs, so are the countless deaths of people who OD every year on pharmaceuticals and alcohol.

The biggest tragedy is that we do nothing to try and mend the root cause of these problems; the tragedy is that we are seen in such poor light as human beings as to make these people to be too scared to come forward and tell the truth about their circumstances, what they feel, and what is happening. If you’ve got a problem, get some drugs, if you’ve got a drug problem, don’t talk to anyone about it, sort yourself out or suffer at the hands of social giants- this seems to be the logic that rules the world. This is the thing that needs to change.

Drug abuse is a nightmare, but you only get into drug abuse to escape another nightmare.

Heath Ledger didn’t suicide, it was an accident, but it was no accident that the coroner referred to his death as the product of “Acute intoxication” and a product of “Abuse of prescription medications,”

A Big Day Out (Part 4)

2008-02-05T16:49:00.000-08:00

On Bjork’s stage there was an explosion of light and “dramatic rising music” would have scrolled across the bottom of the stage if they had subtitles for the hearing impaired. The entire brass section of a small orchestra walked out, about eight women with euphoniums, tuba’s trumpets, French horns, all sorts of things. They were dressed in rainbow gowns, with a uniform pattern but a tye died appearance. Down the backs of their gowns they carried long banner flags. They filed across the stage and then Bjork walked out.

Bjork looked like a pixie; in a pink and white tunic that ended half way down her thighs, white tights and barefoot. The crowd roared the way only a big crowd can and a sea of arms juts from the surface, flashes going off in a photographic assault on the eyes, cameras are held high and she begins to sing.

There’s something incredibly sane about Bjork, which is difficult to agree with on the surface because to the unenlightened she could come across as flighty and scattershot. This is not the case. She writes fantastic songs, and uses brevity of words to focus the subject more directly by its clever personalization; it’s that old Jazz story, only you can’t help but hear the notes she doesn’t sing, and these are the ones she speaks with.

On the big screen beside the stage they’ve a camera man focused on the DJ/VJ’s mixing console- it’s a touch sensitive thing, the sliders all move with quick gestures on the glass top; he’s working like a maniac, and it turns out as the show goes on, that this is the guy that does the audience choreography.

He sets a track, a synthetic beat, and then wanders behind Bjork, clapping and bringing the crowd with him. From behind the console he’ll punch the air, and we follow with him. It’s all part of the show, and it demonstrates just how in control of this whole thing Bjork is- she has crafted not just the music, but also an art show and the necessary support to make it happen.
“It’s almost dark,” she says in clipped hard words, but with a sensual edge, and they begin playing “Army of me” The smoke machines belch and with the first lashing strike of her arm we see the lasers carve through the smoke for the first time. The brass band backing her is crazy; the lead trumpet throwing in jazzy twiddles, working into Bjork’s work as a finely made gear in a hand made watch would; the color and life of this band is incredible, they give the stage a surreal presence.

I hold my hand up, if I’m hallucinating I know the back should ripple and glow, but it does not, and I am not hallucinating. Behind the stage long banners each emblazoned with their own animal flap in the cooling evening breeze that’s taking the edge off the crowd.

I look over to the Rage Against the Machine stage and the curtain is up and the area in front of the stage is already full and jostling with drunks waiting for the band and the crush, happily elbowing anyone who moves to close.

Bjork is still singing Army of Me and the band has closed to surround her in a semicircle, playing in to her- She’s Wonder Woman commanding the Amazon’s; she’s the siren calling ship to stone and the mother singing lullaby to child all at once. The Rolling Stones have nothing on the shows Bjork puts on.

The next song she goes somewhere strange, it reminded me of Tori Amos’ Hello Mr Zebra a soft plinkety plonkety affair, and for a moment, for the song, she lost the crowd. A pink beach ball was swatted up in the air, and a great many of us watched with interest as the breeze caught it, it hung, and then fell into the crowd, the sudden strike knocking a girl to her knees and bringing us back to Bjork, who’d finished her strange interlude.

“With Raise your flag high,” her final song, Bjork launched a shower of ticker tape that fell like snow amid the smoke and flashes of the laser and gave things the hyper-reality of a movie set.

And then it was done, she thanked us, and the band filled off and we began to try and compress flesh to get closer to the stage for Rage against eh Machine.

Bear in mind this was the act I really wanted to see.

The revolution: The fire starters and the ones who call us to violence and good natured political scheming. The crowd was already shoulder to shoulder five minutes before Bjork finished. On the other side of the arena The Lords Of Lightning played with electricity, no one saw them but to say, “Hey, look,” and go back to pushing forward. With one shove the whole crowd would fall. I was standing beside a couple I knew in their thirties; he had a real nice camera with a telephoto lens and all sorts of tack, he wanted a photo. As the crush got tighter my body chose to tell me I’d been on my feet the whole day, it was very hot, and this was a very cramped space and not at all relaxing.

To make space for my friend to take his photo his partner and I were fending of drunk space-seekers with quick hand gestures and fast elbows to soft body parts.

When Rage Against the Machine started things went a little nuts. The Red Star on the back drop glowed ominously and the band could only be seen initially as silhouettes that we all slammed hard forward to try and see better. When the band started playing I made a decision, and one that I will not ever regret. I’d take the photos, and then find a perch to see the band from; some place out of the D, up high and hopefully peaceful.

Sitting at the top of the Grandstand twenty minutes later I breathed a sigh of relief and disappointment.

After all the positive statements from Billy Bragg and Tom Morello, Rage against the Machine (Despite Morello playing guitar) seemed to offer only anger and violence, but no solutions. The kids up front weren’t pushing to get closer, they were pushing and shoving and kicking and punching because that’s what they thought they were supposed to do, this was Rage against the Machine.

I wandered off to see the Converse Essential stage to see how the crowd looked for Sarah Blasko, I’ve seen her several times before, and her soothing music and Thunderbird-on-speed dancing always relaxes me. In the Big Cowshed there were about fifty people, making the space look empty, all crowded up in front of the stage- it was an intimate gig. I watched Sarah Blasko give her all for us, despite the thunder of Rage Against the Machine, and I finally knew I’d found my place at the festival, in the quiet moments when the artist spoke to you and your minds met for a moment, lingered and slipped as you came to see another aspect of the world.

A music festival is more than about the music, it teaches you about people. It shows you people are generally good-hearted and willing to help; they care and want to have fun even if they get confused sometimes. I left, having time with Sarah Blasko, for it seemed like an intimate moment not to be spoiled was the best choice, and as I wandered off into the night to my flat I could still here the music until I closed my front door.

The Big Day Out organizers know how to create fun, and by some act of Karmic equalization it’s making them very rich without selling the festival’s soul.

Selah

A Big Day Out (Part 3)

2008-02-04T16:44:00.000-08:00

Being a festival veteran had tuned my sense of timing for acts to levels not normally found in humans. I knew, that to see an act from the iron- the rail in front of the stage- that I would have to be there at least a half hour early.

Which is anti Cape Town time. I loaded up on more water, ate chips for the salt boost and headed in.

Tom Morello’s name rang a bell. It was a distant memory of something, but the idea of whoever he was, acoustic and playing under the moniker “The Night watchman,” appealed to my indie sensibilities. I was there a half hour early, but couldn’t push forward to the iron, I didn’t want to.

The crowd was in a state I’ve only seen at political rallies when $3,000 speakers turn up- reverential. Both my punk and Goth friends were there with their partners jostling happily for a little more space among the punters.

You’ve gotta remember that thirty doesn’t seem old when you’re there, you still like to think you’re sixteen, you forget that these are guys who are sixteen to nineteen, they’re kids and can sometimes act in ways that later leave them wondering just how many loose teeth they have. But everyone was happy. No anger, just a friendly character to everything.

When Tom Morello came out the crowd went Ape Shit. Which is to say they howled, they screamed, whistled and hollered. People were screaming, “Fuck!” in a promising way. People were putting blutack over the red light on their video cameras. Others were throwing cups of water at the stage.
When I saw the way he was dressed I thought, Hey, me and you, we’d get on OK. He was wearing blue chinos, working boots, braces and a blue drill cotton shirt; black aviators rested on his nose; a baseball cap concealed his crown.

When he plays it’s not blues, or is it? It’s not Irish drinking songs, but there are a few beers hidden in the high notes; Dylan crouches in the shadows and leaps out like a startled otter when the protesting becomes loudest. Unlike the folk song lyricists of the sixties, The Night Watchman seems more human and practical.

His workman like approach to his music belies what depths he does go to in terms of themes and lyricism; you forgive his “Chocolate baritone voice,” as he calls it, for the same reason you can Leonard Cohen’s.

In addition to that his sense of form for music has a common ground to everyone. The rhythms are simple, and ones we can all clap and stamp our feet to, which suits his music. He knows his politics and has us screaming when he says “And thank Christ John Howard has gone,” He sees a need for something more human from us in our everyday lives. While sometimes it seems strained and almost evangelical, he relaxes and sometimes tells stories, like what gauge of string he uses.

In his “Audioslave” days all the groupies go to the lead singer and the guitar geeks come to him, he explained,
“One day this beautiful girl came up to me on the street and said, ‘Hey, aren’t you Tom Morello from “Audioslave?” and I said, ‘Hey, actually, yeah, I am,’ ‘Oh, that’s sooo cool she says, where’s Chris Cornell?’ Ba Bah! So I said, ‘Oh, he’s back in the hotel room trying to figure out how to break up the band,’”

He’s good and I love his style. I saw in him a rebel, an anarchist who believed in people, and their dreams.

For the last song Morello said he was going to play our “Defacto national Anthem,” and called Billy Bragg and the singer and bass player from Anti-flag. Sure, they didn’t know most of the words, but we did, and seeing this group of Americans and an Englishman playing the Midnight Oil anthem, “Beds are burning” was something special; they were giving us something.
The act finished and hung out for water, drank a bottle and refilled for later, then made my way, again a half hour early to see Billy Bragg.

A Big Day Out (Part 2)

2008-02-03T16:47:00.000-08:00

The Fiends were beginning to get drunk, and had begun happily heckling us and asking fun questions- “Hey, man, I’ve got issues, I’m part of the crowd, can you help me, don’t you care? The men were loud, the three girls in the group were worried but with a short hug and a laughing punch we all parted as friends, everyone laughing when I said, “Yeah, but we don’t care that much”

Young kids and good times. Of course a few are going to get a little beer-crazy in the heat, they all just want a hug and a laugh. After seeing me greet a few of my friends; a Goth girl with purple hair, piercings and some of the best tat’s I’ve never seen; a girl with an eight-inch violet Mohawk cargo pants, a boob tube and surface piercings; a Stoned pair of hippies wandering around in a daze; my leader said,
“The really messed up people seem to like you,” I could only nod,
“I speak their language,” I said with pride.

I took longer than I expected watching Kate Nash at the Converse essential pavilion for several reasons. One of our team members had been lost.

We lost a whole human being.

Which I would like to think doesn’t reflect on the consciousness of any individual on the team; people misplace themselves, and she was only little. We couldn’t find her in a big dark shed in her high visibility jacket So I stood and enjoyed Kate Nash, figuring the group knew where I was and if I stayed in one place I could become a focal point, an anchor. A focal point and watch Kate Nash, not a bad strategy.

I’d read an interview with Kate Nash and thought she seemed interesting, with the Respect of Billy Bragg, humility and a keen understanding of the nature of mediums. She writes songs, creates music and writes little stories, claiming she has to expel them, a great credential for any artist.

Artists who are compelled to create constantly mine gold by sheer perseverance and they’ve a tenacity found rarely in a wolverine.

Hearing Kate Nash perform is eerily capturing. She’s something within her music that speaks of a finely tuned ear for story, humor and happy endings, but in everyday terms and realities. She manages the keys in the live show with an aplomb found in jazz and the passion of rock, by turns hammering and caressing them. She had all the right elements; a great stage presence, fantastic music, a fine rock sensibility and endearing sense of self came out between the songs. The one thing that made it all work was the spark of character that ran through everything she touched.

All good things come to an end, and my team found our teammate wandering about on the other side of the crowd and we had to resume our wandering and misdirection. Until my shift was finished. Six hours, a free lunch and my job was done. Free tee shirt, more food and now to set my plan in action.

A Big Day Out (Part 1)

2008-02-02T17:11:00.000-08:00

I made sure to arrive a half hour early to make up for being late for the induction.

It was only fair.

That, and I thought if I was early I would have time to do any explaining or wrangling needed to get in with my statutory declaration, key card, bank statements and lease and no Photo ID.

There were eight gates open and lines were soon to start. I went to the first opening- a young guy in bug eyed sun glasses, a nice kid I thought- and flashed him my best smile. I explained the situation, told him this is what management suggested and flashed the statutory declaration. He looked at it smiled, ticked my name of then said, “Hey, you wrote that,” I nodded,

“In my own writing,” I said. He looked about and then he asked quickly,

“Have you got anything else?” I held out my lease and a bundle of other papers and he bound a colorful cloth wristband to me and waved me through with a shudder.

I am a professional, I decided, so left anything that could be deemed contraband at home.

No alcohol hidden in loaves of bread.

No tiny squares of cardboard in the secret pocket of my wallet.

No craftily hidden joints.

And security just waved me through, he didn’t even frisk me.

Which left me disappointed, and thinking I hadn’t dressed quite low-rent enough; disappointed and filled with pride in knowing my better-groomed colleagues might be more accepting of my appearance.

The crowd care tent was empty, and so I took a rare opportunity to take a picture of the Big Day Out taking in both main stages, with no people on it anywhere.

Completely empty.

“Ha,” I thought, my only unique photo of the Big Day Out.

Crowd care turned out to be a joy. A florescent orange jacket, people only starting to come in the gate and as much free water as we could drink. A group of five of us wandered around. In the moments where you wanted to linger at an act, the whole group lingered and we told punters where the toilets and beer tokens were and enjoyed the show.

At ten-thirty we saw a punter already stricken down by the terrors of too much alcohol, passing out where she stood. We formed a contact line, I ran the St John’s guy down and he came and saved the day. It all happened in thirty seconds. I was a gear in a system of responsibility that worked and helped people.

It was a new feeling. And something I felt I could get used to.

Most of the Paramedics we saw wandering around I knew were doomed. They wore heavy green overalls; baseball saps, head phones and mics and big old backpacks full of all sorts of stuff.

Which was excellent, because their first patients would be themselves. It was expected to be thirty-one, which isn’t hot, in comparison to say the sun, but at beer fuelled, twelve and a half hour music festival it can be lethal.
I on the other hand was doing exactly what I was told, looking after myself, and being the eyes and ears of the operational center.

There wasn’t much to see.

Kids pouring in; families, Mum, Dad and their eight year old; the elderly women in sensible dresses and with a wild look in their eyes; Girls with carefully done make up and impractical shoes; everyone was along for fun.

At this stage there were only one or two drooling drug fiends roaming around early on, obvious products of week long binges that were culminating in this day, this moment that would be remembered only on long deceased brain matter. You could see them, loose lipped with hands held limply before them bouncing helplessly off the other punters as they tried to see their way straight through the crowd.

One rolling eyed fiend clung to my lanyard and dribbled on himself, trying to ask me where the toilet was. Kindly, I pointed to the farthest one I could think of and wished him luck.

It seemed the Right thing to do.

It was a tempting game to keep playing, but I refrained, and pulled the stunt on the truly destroyed that looked as though they needed an adventure to perk themselves up.

Continued Tomorrow

Down in the mud with the swine.

2008-02-01T16:29:00.000-08:00

OK, pre gig jitters as a punter- I’ve lined up my acts, but in my strange neo-humanistic pursuit of the years, I have no ID. Which wouldn’t normally be a problem, I’ve no intention of drinking. But tomorrow it might be, they need ID to verify who I am as an Official Crowd Care volunteer. Which leaves me in diabolical straits.

Let me explain how this all came about. For those of you who’ve read my previous posts, you will notice I do tend to become consumed by events, having a strange sense of right and wrong, I find my righteousness gland always pumping.

Which is nice, but does nothing to explain how I am no longer identified.
I was, once, last century sometime, working in hardware and software design- a tech junky in a heavenly job. Then my brain was twisted with a sense of pointlessness. What was It All About? To get to the very nut of the thing, I quit engineering to follow a philosophical question.

This may lead you to believe I obsess over ideals, which is the truth of the matter. For some reason, even though I’m not a Christian, and follow some unintelligible Zen-type ethos, Jesus always stuck with me. “Wow, look at Jesus,” I’d think, “He’s cool,” this was the Jesus my Dad told me about. After trying religion on three separate occasions I discovered He wasn’t likely to turn up in any church I’d ever find. So I concluded that Jesus was just a really cool guy who did his thing and wanted other people to be cool and do their thing and they wrote some books about him.

Eh? How’s that for summing up the New Testament? Certainly not something any church is going to ascribe to, or well-educated public speaker. Or Security guard on the gate, but so what? This is about my ID.

I came to think that most religious leaders were banging on about the same thing, which is unpronounceable for reasons I don’t think on. It took me ten years of accumulating strange attitudes towards Society, and Politics to learn this; in the balance I’m not sure it was worth it.

One of these peculiar attitudes came down to an interesting question I arrived at after I realized the answer. How would the government deal with someone who gave their name away, refused to be attached to a name? Like a monk, who gives up their name? I thought it would be difficult, impossible even.

Ho Ho Ho.

To make my protest I decided I no longer needed ID. The government was trying to restrict the potential of my religious practices.

Or maybe not. Either way, it didn’t sit right with me and I believe you should take any one of your rights out for exercise daily.

I didn’t drive, so I let my license expire, and hadn’t had a passport for a while. I could do without. No one ever asked for ID at the door to venues, and at the bank I could remember so many linking account numbers and match my signature that my ID was a granted thing.

It took me two years to realize I had opted out of the system.

The question “Who am I?” seems to be answered on a plastic card. No self-doubt, no questions; this is evidence; this is who I am.

Makes me want to call Thom Yorke and do a duet.

Which would be a happy ending, I think we’d all agree, but does nothing to aid my cause immediately.

I have fragments of my license, just the photo, no name- very Ugly. I have my lease. I have my bankcard and account statements. I have a statutory declaration, signed and stamped by a police officer declaring that, “I am who I identify myself as” This might sound ridiculous, but was what the kindly officer suggested.

Which all points to the sad fact I’m willing to blow out some of the idealism accumulated over the last ten years to see Rage Against the Machine.
A polite way of saying, “Selling out,”

Down in the mud with the swine again.

interesting times ahead and afoot.

2008-01-30T16:48:00.001-08:00

This is of course the dreadful thing, it could all go pear shaped, all this responsibility rush to my overworked mind and transform me into some foaming-at-the-mouth, excitement-fuelled crowd care volunteer.

It takes a particular type of mind to soothe the ravings of freaked out drug pigs on acid in the middle of a music festival, and I like to think mine is just the steel trap sharpness they need. It’s either that or I filled out the last random place by some act of gmail magic.

In either case, I fear that the memories of last years Big Day Out might fuel me with some partying frenzy, which Cannot Happen until I’ve completed my shift. I have prohibited alcohol from myself, and refuse to carve out a loaf of bread to hide a bottle of gin. I’ve no longer the stomach for gin anyway.

Instead, this year I want to remember the event itself, for I fear this is my last Big Day Out.
Or not, but time will tell. I will stay way from the boozing on principal, and only for medical uses, or temporary cooling purposes will I stray to the bar- I am, after all, a Professional.

There is a two pronged reasoning to my angle: There are some great bands, Rage against the Machine, Bjork, and Paul Kelly; amongst the DJ’s, Carl Cox and one of my favorite local Adelaide DJ’s, Bexta, and these things I would like to see, enjoy and remember. I still wish Abdominal had been signed up for the tour. For sheer purposes of managing to get to the iron work, front and center on the D barrier for Rage Against The Machine I must stay sober.

The list of desired supplies for this to occur, in no particular order are: Mace, at lest three canisters, sometimes a man needs space; A taser, just like Garth’s in Wayne’s World; a Kevlar stab jacket, for all those driving elbows to the ribs; Covered shoes to protect the feet (preferably steel capped hiking boots to make it easier walking over all the plastic bottles at the end of the night); Cargo pants, for all the pocket space; at least six No-Doz pills; one dozen cable ties (fourteen inch variety for quick hog ties); Theft proof wallet (there will be thieving bastards in the crowd and on realizing the wallet they’ve just lifted is attached to the owner by fourteen inch chainsaw chain can soon change their priorities); possibly a shaved head and a list of twenty other items I wish I could submit to a publisher as expenses.

This is not to be, and is also another reason why I will endeavor to stay away from the bar, it’s not as much fun unless someone else is picking up the tab. Seven hours can be a long time at a music festival, especially if you’re in the arena, can hear it, but can’t see it. In some countries this is regarded as a Crime and is punishable with an array of interesting but mostly painful punishments.

Ah, just walking past the front window now were two young guys, nineteen maybe, tee shirts, thongs and talking about how they were going to get through the sewers and get into the Big Day Out for free. This is now officially an Urban Myth; get into the Adelaide Big Day Out for free buy going through the sewers. Number one; the official’s know where all these sewers are, they watch them. Number two; they’re sewers fercrissakes! Who wants to hang out at a music festival for eight hours after crawling through the sewers?

Abruptly swinging back on subject, seven hours, yes it can be a long time. The staff though, seem to want it relaxed, we seem just to be asked to help out anyone we can, and we are treated better than I have ever been in any company I worked for, these guys know how to look after their volunteers; free food and rink, free entry and a tee shirt. Our seven hours adds up to about one-hundred and forty dollars worth of ticket, getting a whole new view of The Big Day Out, a tee shirt, and a memory of being part of the event. To see Rage Against the Machine- crawling through a sewer would have been worth it; this is promising to be a Good Time.

Crowded Volunteers (Part I)

2008-01-29T17:04:00.000-08:00

I’m a Big Day Out Crowd care volunteer, a position of responsibility I’m sure was misplaced. The Big Day Out started in 1992; it’s an annual music festival that covers Auckland, and most capital cities in Australia, similar to Lollapalooza. This year there are seventy bands, and Adelaide, this little town in which I live is set for a capacity of 35,000.

A crowd care volunteer apparently helps punters. Directions, assistance, advice, sunscreen, water, drug freak outs, alcohol fuelled fights and the possibility of buildings bursting into flames and thousands being immolated in seconds.

There was a compulsory meeting to attend, to fill us in on the detail- I arrived fifteen minutes late. Late enough to scope out the room and realize these people were not what I expected to be working with.

Most were over thirty, still dressed from their day jobs that had them wearing ties and jackets. A few were younger, but had the serious air of a youth group and were dressed in trendy casual clothes. I feel I stood out in my black tee-shirt and jeans, and wasted no time on sitting down and making myself feel odder by inadvertently insulting an aged couple beside me.

The language of the hosts had the tones of a well organized press conference- the young guy running the event was dressed in a pastel green tee-shirt and torn off designer jeans and spoke with an air of confidence. He defined the areas, both geographically and functional, and introduced the two emphases that were with us through this little soiree.

We were to take care of ourselves, and drink plenty of water- our task was to be the eyes and ears of the Operational center, we weren’t security, we weren’t medics, we were there to help across the board.

The first speaker filled us in on first aid, told us to provide the medics with all information we could on punters who, “Looked lost, had a little to much to drink or didn’t look well,” Hot damn, I thought, that’s me, rescuing the ill from drug freak outs with my considerable experience in the world of misuse and abuse. When he finished by telling us to use whatever meager resources we had to help I made a note to bring my Swiss army knife to expand the realms of possibility.

At the end of the speeches we clapped, I’m not sure what that was about.
Something caused me to take a nap when the Site venue safety manager spoke, but I did hear him explain they would evacuate the area if a grandstand collapsed or a building caught fire. This comment alone kept me so enthralled I nearly missed him speaking about people affected by drugs and what we should do to help them. Most people I know when visibly affected by drugs in these circumstances don’t need any help at all. They’re having a great time.

Most festivals have an attitude to drug use that does not condone, but does accept the inevitability of people getting on the gear and going to the gig, or bringing the gear with them, despite the efforts of security.

There is of course bound to be the occasional freak out, where someone has too much, like a greedy drug pig can, and goes to pieces. The worst experiences with drugs come from their psychotropic effects, and if you’re on a paranoid bend you don’t need figures of authority in your space, even if they are trying to help.

The next speaker, from one of the “Youth friendly” organizations, explained that they had a chill out area and a place you could get information on drug services, free condoms, Sexual healthy advice, and a person the same age to talk to, who’s been there and done that if you’re freaking out. Intelligent proactive behavior.

About this time my mind began to wander, but soon snapped back to the scene when a big burly guy with no neck and a relaxed way of speaking stood and delivered his address, he was head of security. He was the one to drop the bomb that marked him as a Truth Speaker, when he said, “If you see someone on a drug overdose just call for help straight away,”

At the “O” word the room is serious.

“Whatever you do, don’t get in the crowd,” he said, “Especially when the main act, rage against…” he looked to his fellow officials for help before going on, “Rage against the machine is playing. You’ll be wearing a high visibility jacket and they might target you as a figure of authority. You don’t want to get in trouble out there, and they could direct it at you,” One woman asked, “Who is Rage against the machine?” The security guard didn’t say, “Some of their songs could start trouble, I mean they’ve got that song…. Rage against…. The machine?” he lost himself for a moment, “Just be carefully, they’ve got some really violent fans,”

I am one of those fans, and understood what he meant. He didn’t mean violent as in willful, he meant violent as in exuberant and passionate, the fans who get into the spirit of the music.

Every aspect of the organization is perfectly coordinated; we walked about the grounds, saw the workers setting up the stands and the lily pad stage, and walked through the back area of the main stages. The group strung out as we walked with our guide offering information and asking last years volunteers for their input. Amongst all these straight, serious people I realized that I was the trouble making rabble rouser who comes in late, supports the violent music and plans to be both unobtrusive and completely helpful. I just want to have a good time. These guys take it serious, perfect in volunteers.

We came back to waiting pizza and free drinks and this is when the table I’m sitting with tells me the news, “Oh, you lucked out, you’re on the morning team,”

Which means Bjork, Rage Against the Machine, and Paul Kelly.
Just the very things I wanted to see, for the small price of seven hours of my time at the biggest festival in Australia, helping out people with desperate situations, toilets, drinks and ATM’s while listening to some of the finest music in the world all gathered in one spot.

I will be that crowd others are warned to stay out of; I will see Rage Against the machine, the result of what would happen if Che Guevara had discovered heavy metal-indie-neopunk; I will be getting in for free; I will be having the best time ever; and I will bring you the results, however mangled and twisted.

We are on a mission to find the very essence of happiness.

Tom

Bad credit risk

2008-01-26T16:53:00.000-08:00

Heath Ledger, having gone the way of Disco, is in the news for all the wrong reasons; the new Batman film takes on the mythos of The Crow, and anything dire about his performance will be washed away in reviews by column inches remarking on the great loss to the acting community. But so what? We’ve got bigger fish to fry today- like my relationship with The Lord.

The agents of The Lord have never been the best clients for me- every quarter I submit to the tax office those who owe me money that cannot be retrieved, and last quarter, not for the first time, every one of them spoke heavily to me about their relationship with The Lord, who I now find is a bad credit reference.

He- and I’ve always thought of The Lord as a he, if only for all the smiting and violence and debauchery that litters the Bible similar to an end of season football trip fuelled by cheap rum and animal stimulants- is not to be trusted when it comes to monies owed. Great with rules, bad with debts, that’s what I’ve learned.

Today was marked by such a client. He came to me wheezing, and hacking, explaining that he wanted no further work done on his website, he’d come to realize that it wouldn’t make him a fast million. Which was fine. Inwardly I breathed a sigh of relief- it wasn’t the worst news I’d had this week.

So far he’d hadn’t paid a red cent and wanted a Radiohead In Rainbows style website to sell his music from. I said, “Fine,” but lost my mind when he told me he only expected to make five to fifteen thousand a year. I said, “Good for you, but you know I can only guarantee you’ll make nothing out of the Internet,” The words evaporated like a mist in a summer's morning every repetition. He didn’t hear a thing. He, like some evil-bent politician, tried to hypnotize me by smiling and staring into my eyes. Fortunately, in a past life I was Timeshare salesman and had become immune to such cheap trickery.

"You won’t get any money out of it unless you market it every day,” I repeated,

“We’ll put it on Google, then everyone will see it” he told me with the abandon of a drunken cowboy.

We did the best I could- the only change on the final version was the text.

It became a tract thanking The Lord.

Enthusiasm has never eluded me as anything but what it is, a glorious thing to see. Just not on the front page of a website hocking off mp3’s.

After three weeks of thankless work I was grateful to be done with the job.

I said, “That’s fine, I can see where you’re coming from. About the payments due…”

“Payments due? I know of no payments due, monies owing or promises made. Never mind the money, be born again, let The Lord cure you of your avarice” he said, thick spit flying from his florid lips,
Forget my avarice, Lord; bring me a regular paycheck and a kilo beefsteak done medium rare.

Don’t get me wrong, Jesus and I would have got along fine. He made sure his friends had enough wine, got stoned off his ass, liked fishing, and would spend his Saturdays running through the temple with a bull whip. He was my kind of guy, an anarchist, a great story teller and an underdog; just a pity about some of his supporters.

Yes, Jesus was way cool and the Lord had a way with words. Look no further than Revelations for that: Not every street preacher yelling chaotic drivel can come up with that sort of lightning in a bottle. Lakes of fire, beasts with many heads and The Great Whore- No wonder Ronald Reagan placed such credence in the thing.

Nowadays though, it doesn’t rattle my cage so much. I look up with a cynical eye and figure that if The Lord is anything like his followers the time of reckoning is about five letters and three crafty debt collectors away from coming through.

How to make a cheese cake...

2008-01-16T17:08:00.001-08:00

The Gunners- Jade monkey 7/11/07

2008-01-09T16:10:00.001-08:00

Darren sits tuning his Stratocaster, while Corey looks down at the set list, Pete , the engineer talks back and forth with them through hand signals and quick words. It’s just another Thursday night at the Jade Monkey; Corey Stewart and Darren Zaza are playing as “The Gunners.”

The back wall is matte black; the adjacent, half hung in red paper where stage lights flash and dance like guttering stars. There’s something about the way the air moves, makes me think I’m somewhere else; Sydney, Madrid, Germany, on a summers night with tender shadows.

A couple of guys, a couple of guitars. Behind, a drum kit and keyboard sit still and silent, the stage dominated by a single red glowing LED from the amplifier. Above hangs a glass chandelier that looks as though it came from a millionaires bathroom- and here's me in my torn cargo pants and lucky black tee-shirt.

The house music fades and Corey says, “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Jade monkey…’ Buddha gazes down from a wall beside me. Corey starts with “Back of my mind,” His voice seems brassy- no, the PA is brassy. Pete makes a quick adjustment, and warm tones fill the room. Those who’ve come to listen to the band get a great deal- Pete Mundy has an incredible ear.

Corey’s lyrics are deep but his words flow deeper, a man passed through sullen storm clouds and shriven by the tears he’s cried. “…Indecision, wasting time…” The lyric sticks with me, and hell, even the PA tilts to listen a little better.

Finger signs back and forth between the songs, quick and clear. “A bit more of this in the fold back please mate,” Corey asks Pete. Then in his best Elvis voice, “Why thank you,” Laughter ripples across the room.

Corey's having fun, “This is a song called, ‘A girl like you' it’s pretty self explanatory,’ Darren speaks for the first time, adding,
“It’s about a boy,”

More fold-back and Corey has stopped punching out; his voice is the sound of mallee root crackling in a hearth on a cold night when you’ve a belly full of food and half a bed. As they're playing I realise it's not Buddha looking down. It’s Kuan Yin, the Bodhisattva of mercy. It's Kuan Yin and she's eyeing off a table and the lonely beer bottle.

Corey sits, one foot hanging, the other grounded while, Pete moves back and forth between the sound desk and the PA, a tweak here, an adjustment there. Darren starts playing confident licks, his guitar laughing like a gleeful child. Corey looks at Darren as the Strat cuts in, saying one word that sums it up,
“Cool,”

“This is a song about a groupie we used to have when I was in a band called Funkstar…” Darren plays while Corey tells how they attended the Dance Music Awards, where she explained she’d met someone the night before and she was trying to decide between Corey and the other guy.
“She chose him,” says Corey. Darren’s guitar moans. “But that’s OK too,” Darren moves with the mood, “Because the girl I have is much more special- she said yes,” The room chuckles.
“Sweet anticipation, your lips next to mine/ I been waiting for this moment…/ for the rest of my life,”
Darren’s guitar sounds like rain on flower petals.

Corey finishes with “Seeing stars”. The buzz of conversation becomes faint, individuality is swallowed in a shared moment, the lyrics become more than the sum of their parts. Corey has reached that place where few tread; he’s communicating the essence; he's reaching people's higher selves.

Then it's done. The house music comes up and like they’re stepping from shadow into sunlight, people blink into the world, reassert their identities. Cigarette smoke from the beer garden wafts in through the back door, the stage gets busy and I'm off home.

Adelaide has balls; I’m just near them as the bells toll the hour and the fountain stops spitting and splashing. Somewhere a lonely busker is playing “The Rainbow connection” on saxophone….

Why are there so many songs about rainbows
And what's on the other side?
Rainbows are visions, but only illusions,
And rainbows have nothing to hide.
So we've been told and some choose to believe it
I know they're wrong, wait and see.
Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection,
The lovers, the dreamers and me…

You know, Kermit, I think Corey Stewart could answer that question for you.