22 Dreams

Ever had the wish that when some prick does something mean to you on the road, that you'd drive past them and witness some imagined misfortune of theirs and you'll be able to stick your tongue out at them?? I've had that fantasy and I suppose everyone has. Well in Tasmania this actually came true. We were leaving Port Arthur late, at about 9:30pm. The speed limit was 80 kilometres per hour although my instinct was to drive slower at 60ks. It was very dark and the roads were windy. All of a sudden Sarah and I witnessed a menagerie of animals by the side of the road upon which Sarah insisted with a shriek that I slow down to 40ks. I obliged almost begrudgingly, yet my irateness quickly turned to eager compliance as I realised that if I had been driving faster I would have easily knocked over one of these sweet creatures. For example, a small wallaby by the side of the road began hopping in front of the car as soon as it saw our headlights. If I was driving faster than...

I'd only been away from Sydney a little less than two weeks. We've seen some lovely places, particularly throughout Tasmania, of which we visited the giant Huon Pines & eucalypts and the Port Arthur historical site. The hotel in Hobart was particularly fabulous as it encompassed a wide view of the charming city. Everywhere I went I wondered if "I could live here". Sarah & I had this discussion everywhere we went. With Melbourne we both decided, well, not really. Perhaps the city takes some getting used to. It's difficult to find your centre in Melbourne, it's sprawling and flat and I couldn't quite grasp my sense of place or direction while I was down there. When I was driving out to Box Hill for example I felt like my car was stationary whilst the scenery in front of me moved through me, like a 3-D film, hardly changing for 40 minutes. The nicest thing about Melbourne for me was driving into it at night. As we were encroaching the city w...

On the Thursday morning of 4 June, while passing through Melbourne, I had a chance to take a little excursion out to the Maton Factory in the eastern suburb of Box Hill and attend one of their fortnightly tours. While Maton build both quality acoustic and electric guitars, it’s their acoustic guitars that they are mainly known for. The tours last for 90 minutes though unfortunately I was half-an-hour late to my tour, my lateness being due to my inability to recognise the distance from Fitzroy to Box Hill on the map. I thought it might only take me five minutes to get there, instead it was a 40 minute drive! The eastern suburbs of Melbourne are a little reminiscent of Sydney’s north shore although the streets seem to be gridded in squares and it’s all relatively flat. I hadn’t missed much of the tour. I found out subsequently that the first 30 minutes consisted of a tour of the de-humidifier room and the loading in of the woods. I appeared at the point in the tour where we were...

I've finished reading Augusten Burroughs' Dry last night, his second memoir written after his runaway hit Running with Scissors . I loved both books instantly. I loved reading Dry and wished it didn't end. I have ZaraMeow to thank for putting me onto Augusten because he is without a doubt one of my favourite writers. (And people). One of my other favourite books is by another of my favourite authors and that's Last Drinks by Andrew McGahan. I seem to have a fascination and a seemingly inexplicable attraction to reading about alcoholics; inexplicable because I'm not much of a drinker myself. Besides, I've suddenly developed this romantic notion of going teetotal for a while, the influence of Dry no doubt. No more beers at the pub, no more sharing bottles of wine, just soda and lime thanks, or plain godly water. I'll be able to say to people ~ no thanks, I don't drink. Then I'll feel like Augusten Burroughs whose books I love and who's writing...

I listened to Sade's Diamond Life last night. I'm not sure why, but there's something in this music that highly evokes my senses and feelings. It kind of takes me away to this kind of neon blue spaceship bar where it's permanently 1984. I feel like I'm trailing the galaxies when I listen to this album. Granted, it is very much 80's r&b, it sounds great and the songs are very well crafted. Songs that hit at the heart and at the feeling centre of body. 'Frankie', 'Your love is king', 'Sally', 'Smooth operator' etc do the whole cruisy Major 7th thing over pleasant beats that slide under sinewy sax lines that ooze a kind of snaky sexuality. I have this thing about the eighties. When I was in it - from age 10 to 20 - the decade felt like it could never end. It felt like the "right" decade. The music was poppy, the images were glam yet clean and despite what's often said, great music did come out of that dec...

Society member Pennie Lennon , along with her partner Bruno Koenig , run a singer-songwriter night right up at the heart of the Blue Mountains, at the old Imperial Hotel in Mount Victoria.   You can’t miss the Imperial, it’s a foreboding white pub/hotel to the right as you’re coming up from the east into Mount Victoria.    More information about the gig and the pub, and contacts, are in Pennie’s words at the bottom of this article.   Mount Victoria is about a fifteen minute drive west of Katoomba and sits at a regal 1000 plus metres above sea level, or 3,500 feet.   Pennie and Bruno, of the duo My Hearts Dezire, run this gig every Tuesday night.   It invariably features a full night of performers and 3 songs are given to each act with more songs given to a feature act for the night.   Most of the performers are local singer-songwriters although occasionally Sydney people come up for the gig, which in this instance, comprised of ZaraMeow and myse...

I feel this need to qualify my standing as far as spiritualism goes. You see, I consider myself a very spiritualistic man although I am as far away from dogma and religion as the ends of the earth are (although where i live it happens to be close to the ends of the earth..) In my opinion there is no spiritual 'life'. There is only, ever, Life. And if life is an experience of spirit then the encompassing moment-to-moment experience of life must be all spiritual and this includes the death, the torture, the agony, starvation and misery that is the trodden, unmovable fingerprint on this earth of ours for our times. It also includes the beauty of the natural earth and all that is on it. Nature, animals and humans, when they are true and being what they are rather than acting out the infestation and stench of unhappiness and greed. Religionists believe in God in some form or other. Not only is "belief in God" a pointless pursuit, it is also responsible for the untold ...

I've uploaded a freshly recorded track onto MySpace, a song called Secrets that I'd written some six years ago. It's the last of my "production" songs that didn't make my Sea in June album of 2006, partly because I felt that it was too much of a musical and thematic departure from the songs that comprised that album. The other reason for not including Secrets on that album is that it's quite a "big" song, ie quite linear and almost complex, thus deserving in my mind a standing on its own. I plan to put this out on an EP with some other recordings that are subsequent to the album. Pleasingly it only took us about 2 1/2 - 3 days to record this song. I was expecting the recording to take a little longer. I teamed up again with Stewart Havill who recorded and engineered the track at his Sound Dog Recording Studios in Lane Cove. Stewart created the drum track with my assistance, otherwise the track is totally my performance. Stewart again a...