Friday, November 14, 2008
Year 8 camp
Went down to the year 8 camp last night, partly as work and partly to see Sean playing at the talent night. Got home about midnight. Rather tired this morning. Did some mixes of some psycho wombat stuff. Buskers’ festival tomorrow.
Here’s a few photos from last night.
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Lapdog of the ruling classes
…or so I felt when I played a song or two at the opening of the drill hall in Korumburra with Gavin. Councilor Jenny Dean, Liberal Federal MP (and champion of the orange bellied parrot Russell Broadbent and lawyer Trevor Rickard all spoke movingly about Korumburra’s need to be thankful to the ruling elite (who certainly don’t live in this town) for spending the money from land the council virtually gave away to save and provide a basic refurbishment of a local hall. Thanks local tradies for doing all the work.
Saturday mixed some recordings and did some drinks with Gavin and Shane. Sunday I went to Wonthaggi and bought
-speakers for my beautiful crappy new/old PC which is now running Debian Etch
-headphones, computer keyboard and socks/jocks for Sean, who is on camp next week
-food bowl for cats
-mower blades (had to saw through the bolt holding on one of the old ones… mower now works like a dream)
Made curry for tea, added Gnome desktop to PC (was running XFCE) and looked for some multimedia codecs.
Must be time to put the chickens away … it’s getting dark.
Monday, November 3, 2008
The Replacements
I’ve been listening to the Replacements so I’m probably intoxicated. Right now I’m nibbling on a litte blue cheese on rye and sipping some shiraz, so perhaps it’s your Nightclub Jitters style of intoxication. Then again, I had a hot bath and listened to Pleased To Meet Me, then the Tim version of I can’t Hardly Wait (about eight times) very loud on my iPod, so perhaps it’s the Red Red Wine version of intoxication.
As a band they were never the same without Bob Stinson, as the versions of “Can’t hardly wait” make pretty clear. But, maybe because I’m an uptight swollen-egod songwriter, I have to say that the Bobless albums seem to have a higher proportion of Great Songs, even if they seem to have less Ins[pired Performances. Personally I LIke All Shook Down just fine. I don’t like the idea of uptight singers replacing bands with session musos. But I’ve always loved the record, and I don’t think it could have come out of an evenly empowered collective.
I still remember this interview as one of the highlghts of the rock jounalism I’ve read. Breaks your heart. Rock and roll just sucks them up and spits the out, doesn’t it? Bob Stinson died in 1995. See (for example) here.
Meanwhile, keep on listening to the music, beacuse it has a lot to say.
‘Either take a drink, motherfucker, or get off my stage.’
P.S. This is interesting.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Korumburra art
I’d said I’d watch a local group exhibition on Friday. I’d figured it’d be relaxing, and I could always play some guitar. That’s pretty much how it turned out. I liked some of the work and didn’t think much of some. Hardly anybody came in.
Here are a few of my favourite pieces that I sneakily snapped with my camera phone:
Jaci Williams: within our space
Tracey Lewis: on the way to Gatha
Gunter Binder: vicissitude.
Yes, it’s naughty to take photographs of art and post them on your blog. Images will be removed on application.
That evening Georgia had her 11th birthday. We had a Halloween theme party. We went to Coal Creek, where there was a sort of public celebration of the day. Everybody was in costume. It was pretty cool. Then we came home and watched movies, and ate and drank too much.
Today I did a lot of gardening. I did a little bit of paving and put in some plants. I made pizza and now I’m doing my blog, while listening to Black Sea by XTC.
Early tomorrow I need to feed Shane’s dog then we drive to Ballarat for the night.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Big weekend of something like rock
Friday I was tired. Went to Jo’s to eat pizza, watch Star Wars 4 through 6. Got home about 2.
Got up about 8:30 Saturday. Somebody noticed that I had a gig. Went to Bair Music with Sean and Georgia. Sean bought an Ibanez electric. Heavy body, humbuckers at neck and bridge, single coil in the middle position. Sort of midnight blue. Quite a funky guitar, paid $280, Sean paying a little more than half. He’s been playing it nonstop ever since.
Then we went out to a land auction at Leongatha. We played a few sets of acoustic stuff with Sean on snare and cymbal. Sounded pretty good. Had a couple of beers afterwards. Went to an art opening in Korumburra that Gavin had some pictures in.
Went to bed reasonably early.
Sunday, got up about 7 and put an out of phase strat on a version of “Daddy held a gun” by Psycho Wombat. We played the Railway Hotel in Brunswick in the afternoon, supporting Blue Panther. I nearly had an accident on the way down due to my stupidity. We did a pretty good set and apparently the sound was ok. Drank beer in Gavin’s car on the way back. Went to bed fairly early (by 11) but had a very poor night’s sleep.