Once I Loved The Torn Ocean's Roar - 80s/90s demos Vol. 2

Once I Loved The Torn Ocean's Roar - 80s/90s demos Vol. 2

This album is at Bandcamp and itunes now. Demo versions of songs recorded to four track cassette in the late 80s to early 90s. Mostly acoustic guitar and vocals.



Once I Loved the Torn Ocean’s Roar is a collection of demo recordings from 1987 to the early 90s. We came out of the underworld in 1993 with Night Of The Wolverine and I went on a tv show and in response to a question about what I was to do next boasted that I didn’t need to write any more songs and that I had a drawer full of them. It was true! I had stuff to burn for a decade.

These songs are raw and rough. Mostly the first time I’d ever sung any of them. I never wanted to be a guitar playing songwriter. I wanted to stand there with a band and sing.

I was impatient for shit to happen. I needed someone to find me. We made the White Buffaloes album in Melbourne, while saving up all the songs we'd gotten together with our original, London based Coral Snakes in 87/88. We eventually got it together to make this album, which then took two years to come out. I kept writing stuff and tinkering.

The title of the collection comes from a line in Byrons “Childe Harolds Pilgrimage". I read a lot of Byron in 1991. I loved it.

2015 has been a  very retrospective year. Shows with  the Coral Snakes around Australia, The idea to release these demos came when I uncovered them while looking for some tracks for a CREATION records collection that was going to include some Moodists songs. I found these songs I’d written and recorded just after that time. It seemed to tell an interesting story.

 

photo taken by Kristyn Jones in Mt Gambier 2011

Once I Loved the Torn Ocean’s Roar’ 

TRACK BY TRACK

1 We're Here to Go (90s demo)
A song that was eventually recorded and released in 1994. Title taken from a quote  from the BEAT writer Brion Gysin “ what are we here for? We are here to go!”
2 I'm Gonna Release Your Soul  (90s demo)
Acoustic guitar and vocal demo for a song that was eventually released in 1994. The chords were really meant for an Al Green type of groove. The lyric was inspired by a  line from an old cowboy song called “Wild Bill Jones”. It said “I pulled the trigger of my gun and I released Wild Bills soul…”
3 A New Life in a New Town (87 demo)
After the Moodists finished in late ’86 or early ’87 I started to breathe in a  lot more music and demoed some songs with a friend in London. Playing acoustic guitar which I had bought from Robert Forster for 20 quid and enjoying the freedom of life outside a band.
4 I Want You Back (90s demo)  
The chords of this eventually ended up in a song called “Villainy” which was released in 1999.
5 You Wanna Be Loved (90s demo)
Acoustic guitar and vocal, recorded and released with the Coral Snakes later in 1994. My songs were always pretty complete, I had a lot of ideas banked up.
6 I'm Not Afraid to Be Heavy (90s demo)
Major sevenths to the fore! Later recorded in 1995 for the Soft ’n’ Sexy Sound.
7 You Ain't No Country Song (90s demo)
Re-recorded and released as more of a duet with Clare Moore as an extra track on a single in 1995.
8 Dandies Are Never Unbuttoned (90s demo)
The original conception of the song that appeared on The Soft ’n’ Sexy Sound in 1995. Not much changed.
9 You Wanna Be There but You don’t wanna travel  (90s demo)
A very early demo – guitar and vocal sung to a cassette player.
10 Deep Inside a Song (90s demo)
This was demoed a couple of times and later appeared on The Soft ’n’ Sexy Sound in 1995.
11 The Dolphins (87 demo) 
After the Moodists finished I sat around and took in a lot of music. Fred Neil and his electric, East Coast, folk rock sound gave me some sparks of direction. Seemed more abstract, urban and blue collar than the West Coast James Taylor style.
12 The Birds and the Goats (90s demo)
The demo of song that later appeared on The Soft ’n’ Sexy Sound in 1995. Not much changed, down to the low note at the beginning. I was thinking of the bent note at the start of the “Happy Trails” album by The Quicksilver Messenger Service.
13 The Pre Revolutionary Scene (90s demo)
Demo of  the song that appeared on The Soft ’n’ Sexy Sound in 1995. Seventh chords and a lyric about working people in jobs that paid the bills but not the spirit.
14 The Extraordinary (90s demo)
Unreleased. An instrumental, just starting to bust out of the major seventh chords into sixths and 9ths and flat 5s. There was a dopey “Ripleys or Not” style show on tv at the time called THE EXTRAORDINARY!.
15 World Full of Daughters  (87 demo)
This was recorded and reappeared on the first recordings with the Coral Snakes on Fire Records in the UK  in 1988. Very JG Ballard influenced. I loved minor seventh chords for their shimmering open qualities.
16 Daddy Was a Clown (90s demo)
Demo song for a female singer. I saw my future as a songwriter more than a performer. #### Only on the itunes version.
17 It's Between Times (87 demo)
The first demo of this song. On a four track tape machine in London in 1987, could have been earlier. Mark Fitzgibbon helped, I’m sure but there’s not much keyboards going on. The lyric was an attempt to put James M Cains “the Postman Always Rings Twice” into a song.

Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes shows 2015 - Adelaide Shows report

We finished our run of 2015 Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes shows with two nights in Adelaide at the Crown and Anchor. It was a tight fit in there both nights (very hot , early summer temperatures too) and the shows were compressed and powerful. Loud and high energy.
I had to spend the day after the first night in silence with the sounds still ringing in my ears and my throat all tore up.

We had the same game plan as Sydney, Melbourne and Newcastle.  The first set was Night Of The Wolverine and the second consisted of songs before and after that album. I stood there and sang, no guitar. (Well I threw a few shapes here and there and got involved in selling the songs a bit).

I wrote a story for the Adelaide Review about the kinds of cousins I run into in South Australia. I thought it might stem the flow but there were more at these shows.
They do say the damndest things, such as "Oh I can see old Tom in you!" and "you reminded me so much of Uncle Leo...." . Uncle Leo never sang in my experience, or wrote a song, or did a high kick in a  jump suit. Just sayin'....

There were also all kinds of freaks at the shows (in a good way) as well as people who hadn't been to the venue or to a show in a decade or more.

Its funny how you remember negative things but after the gig a little thug made a point of coming up to me and saying " I fucking hate you and everything you stand for". I watched him walk away in triumph, thinking that was a bit uncalled for...

Otherwise it was great meeting and chatting with people. All kinds, young and old, from all around the city and the state.

It was a real treat playing with Rod Hayward on guitar and Robin Casinader on keys again. Lovely people and amazing players. The music was tightly focussed and had real precision and power.

We hope to do more dates in the future.

CREATION RECORDS - ARTIFACT - rare Moodists tracks and the next DEMO album collection at itunes next week.

The Moodists were a Melbourne band who’d come to London in 1983 to make records with Dave Kitson at his indie label Red Flame. We were lucky to run into him and he put us into a great studio and left us to do what we liked. To be ourselves. Like a lot of  labels in that era and scene he eventually sided up with a bigger label (Virgin) for distribution and pr clout. They were interested in one of his acts. Things came to a head – in that backroom business sense- while we were back in Australia, opening for PIL on a  tour of capital cities-places we’d never been to before like Brisbane and Canberra. Dave was getting squeezed by the bigger partner he’d attached himself to. Conversations on the phone went bad and we left Red Flame but  soon returned to London as we loved the drama and fizz of the music scene there. (Our guitarist Mick Turner  elected to stay in Melbourne)

Whilst we’d been at Red Flame, Alan McGhee had been a name we’d often heard as he’d been running some nights at a venue called the Moonlight Club and also had a fanzine called the LIVING ROOM. I’d heard the Jesus and Mary Chain while we were back in Melbourne and looked him up when we got back to London. We met in a café in Kings Cross, just near the Scala Cinema. Alan and Slaughter Joe. Alan said something along the lines of “you’ve been wearing leather pants for ages haven’t you?”. I was fond of those trousers at the time and that seemed to be enough to forge some sort of crude understanding with Alan. We agreed to make a recording for his label, Creation. A single and then an album. One night we got a call that there was studio time the next day at a place in Waterloo called ALASKA. We rang around everybody in the band, some being out on the turps at a  gig , and got to the studio in some sort of shape the next day. Despite its name, ALASKA  was a hideously hot and airless underground bunker. It was a bit of a shock to us after our last experience at the much more spacious Livingstone Studios in Wood Green. We made show and put down three tracks. Mick Harvey came in to play some piano. The heat played havoc with the tuning so it had a quite authentic saloon bar wonkiness to it. We also had Adam Peters come in to play some cello. He was a friend of a friend. We were quite a band of chancers and trusted in the world to let us happen.

Creation Records had an office in Clerkenwell, a quiet area off of Farringdon station and quite near the remnant rump of Fleet st which was still dealing with Rupert Murdochs pulling his army of drunken pen pushers from the vicinity 

I enjoyed the London scene. Everybody at Creation was into playing roles and always referring to myths and stories from Rock Music Lore. Slaughter Joe was comically grim and serious. He always carried a brief case and somebody looked in it one day only to see a half a packet of chewing gum and a pencil. Alan talked fast and volubly. His bottom lip was always slick with spittle. You could sense there was a lot of drama within the circle as some had been old friends for a long time and now were feeling the pressure of a watching and waiting business and now they had to come up with stuff to fit the play they’d set in motion. They had to come up with the goods and sometimes, well, old friends just don’t make it. I say I sensed this because we were outsiders, always. Australians with dumb guts and tin ears for the accents and class stresses going off in the casual conversations all around us. The Weather Prophets were the band I most felt akin with. If only for the fact they were nice guys and talked to us! I loved their T Rex like grooves they’d get to when they played Chuck Berrys “Down bound train”.  The Jesus and Mary Chain were hilariously real. We went to the show they did at the Electric Ballroom and found it to be a bit silly. The way everybody had to take their belts off at the door and the like. The sound was horrible and they were on late and for what seemed to be a very short time. It seemed kind of predictable. All just to stir up some shit. Still, it was funny to see them turn up, all together like a moody gang, at a Clarendon Ballroom gig by the Butthole Surfers. They’d just mooch around like a four headed thing , all in black and huddled around a pint. Yeah, they were for real. There always seemed to be someone at Creation sidling up to say that they’d actually recorded the Jesus and Mary Chains first records. It was a funny scene, full of drama and ambition, yet kind of tight and all too human as well. Like any music business happening – luck was the big thing that happened in there somewhere, somehow. 

Our band was kind of flying apart (our bass player Chris Walsh left after a European tour to return to Australia) and we didn’t really gel that much with the Creation mythology. It was a very London, or at least British move they were making. The record we made was strong but didn’t catch or touch anybody. I spoke with Alan and he suggested we do some demos for the album. I was silly with representing our group pride and sulking, brooding (though very much unspoken) ethos and refused. We had never done demos. That was the end of that. We went on to record more in 1986 and 1987 for another label. Then I started to write and record as a singer songwriter with a band rather than a lead singer of a band. I didn't think I ever did many  demos but the idea must have gotten into me because I found a lot. 

While going through the tracks for this set , I was asked for  any rarities and came across some tracks we somehow recorded in the period after Chris Walsh left. 

There is a version of THE SHANGRI LAS "Train from Kansas City" sung by Clare Moore and also a version of the (then very rare) Brian Wilson/ Glen Campbell track "I guess I'm dumb" sung (badly) by me.  There is no bass on either track.

There is also a  song called "The Day They all Woke Up" from some time in 1985/86.

Also four songs from the second John Peel session we did .

"Bullet Train' - pretty lugubrious , slow and long track. I don't really like it.

"Take the Red Carpet Out of Town"

"Other Man"

"Justice and money too"

The other tracks are the three we released on CREATION.

"Justice and Money too"

"You've got your story"

"Take us all home"

It was while looking for these songs that I came across the Coral Snakes / WOLVERINE era demos we've been releasing at itunes and Bandcamp. 

The second volume is coming to itunes next week. "Once I Loved the Torn Oceans Roar - 80s/90s demos Vol. 2" 

Early 90s songwriter-Night Of The Wolverine demo album at Bandcamp and also at itunes. The story behind the songs and the times.

This is a digital only album thats available at Bandcamp.

Seven songs recorded in 1991 on a 4 track cassette that eventually ended up on the album, Night Of The Wolverine, which was recorded in a weekend late in December 1992 and four others that were intended for other artists to sing.

(Night Of the Wolverine itself  is available in an expanded edition at itunes. It includes these seven demos of songs from the album.)

The other songs were recorded around the same time. I felt hollowed out after the failure to get the album I Was The Hunter and I Was The Prey out. (Recorded in London with the original Coral Snakes in 1990. It eventually came out in 1992 on Fire Records in the UK).
The idea of gathering another head of steam or bunch of songs as strong as that seemed impossible and I  thought my future lay in being a songwriter for other artists.

There was also a plan – or more of a wish on my part - to do the title track with Andrew Duffield on his keyboards setup. I thought it would be good make a  SUICIDE type electro album. I lived in Sth Melbourne and often dropped into Andrews studio which was in a far corner of Metropolis Audio – which was also in Sth Melbourne. (Also home to the main the studio where we would mix the actual album in early 1993 as well as record amd mix the next two.)
Andrew and his business partner Phil Kenihan did advertising songs and stings and some tv soundtrack work. Billy Miller was part of their studio crew. I did a few jobs as a voiceover man but my range either wasn’t versatile or narrow enough. One of the two. 

I'd been long haired and into velvets, cowboy heeled boots  and suedes. I got my hair cut and gave up smoking. (I drank a lot more at first, as you do when you give up the fags but eventually got my balance). It all just seemed the right thing to do. We lived across the road from a gym and by the time we were touring a lot all through 1993, I wasn't drinking at all. I was so straight looking during all that grunge music period. I was really into summery, light coloured clothes and batik shirts. I remember turning up at a hotel in Perth in 1993 and Blixa Bargled from the Bad Seeds stopping to laugh at how much I looked like a  golf player or tourist. I took that as him giving me mad props. I certainly wasn't trying to look like a roughed up rocker. I was bored with that scene.

Stephen Cummings was also a great support around this time. He had a  clause in his contract with Polygram that he could produce another artist and get it released. Very generous of him. Went to Stephens place to kind of go over some of my songs. We collaborated on the song "three dead passengers in a stolen second hand Ford". I had all the verses and the chords, He came up with the chorus.

The last of these songs were intended to be sung by a female. "I walked with a Saint" and "I'm gonna live my life" which was eventually covered by Lisa Miller.
"Somewhere in the world" was recorded by Tex Perkins for his debut solo album, "Far be it from me" in 1996.

credits

Dave Graney, acoustic guitar and vocals. Clare Moore, vibes on "I'm gonna live my life". Matt Heydon, keys on "Mogambo" "I walked with a saint" and "thats the way it's gonna be".
Mostly recorded on a 4 track cassette recorder at live sound engineer Ted Hamilton's house in Richmond, Victoria.

Cover image is a shot taken by Tony Mahony at his East St Kilda flat around the time the Night Of The Wolverine album cover was shot.

night of the wolverine (91 demo)

I came up with the chords first. I’d started using the major sevenths a lot on “I was the Hunter and I was the prey”. People thought them “cheesy” but I thought they had power. I wasn’t into distortion- which was the wrong attitude two years before grunge rock took off. I Iiked clean sounds. I guess a big album for me around that time was KD Langs “Ingenue”. Incredible songwriting and arrangements. All the textures were incredible.

I had been deep into American Western fame – guys like Custer and Buffalo Bill and Hickock. the beginnings of their celebrity culture. Custer always yelled “ride you wolverines!” to his cavalry. I also read a James Ellroy novel about a guy who killed women and chewed on them with a pair of wolverine teeth in his mouth.

you need to suffer (91 demo)

This is one of my most freshest and simple tunes ever. Hank Williams could’ve written this and John Lee Hooker could’ve sung it. But I did!

That’s the way it’s gonna be (91 demo)

This song and the previous one are simple and powerful. Rough and raw pieces. Matthew Heydon plays piano on it. he lived in the house with Ted and played keys with Nick Barker and the Reptiles. A lovely, sweet young bloke.
This song is very Dave Graney. Weird and kinky. I cough up some confession and talk very personally in the first two verses and then turn on the listener in the third. That’s me! Country!

You’re just too hip, baby (91 demo)

I was right into songwriting for other people and had a mad idea to get a song to the guitar player of Cold Chisel, Ian Moss, my only connection being that Rod Hayward, our guitarist had had his car used in the video for Tuckers Daughter. Yeah I was a fantasist.

Then I took this song title from a Terry Southern story and took the groove back from Rod, who I’d left it with to write a Mossy hit. Too good!

I remember you – you’re the girl I love (91 demo)

This song was recorded pretty much exactly like this, solo guitar and vocal. I played the guitar on the actual recording because nobody could get my weird timing right.

Night of the Wolverine – (Moss Side demo)

I wanted this song to have all kinds of movements and lyrics. Reprises and false endings. This lyric was a story I’d written for the liner notes of Barry Adamsons first album in 1988. Don’t know why he trusted me to write words for an instrumental album – hi first- but he was very encouraging for me as an artist. Just to accept or trust that I could do that. A big deal for me.

I’m gonna live my life (’91 demo)

Eventually covered by Lisa Miller. I imagined a 60s Italian village with Sophia Loren being judged harshly by all the other women in the village – and she sings this song to them.

Daddy was a clown (91 demo)

I offered this to Lisa but she thought it might be interpreted badly by friends and family – I understood! A song sung by a girl in a circus- singing about her drunken clown of a father.

I walked with a saint (91 demo)

A song sung by a woman who has spent her life with a much loved public figure. Oh what a bummer!

There was another song for a female singer that couldn’t really be released due to tape deterioration. It was called “ I can’t believe you sang that song “and it was a companion piece to the previous one about the consort of the saint. This song was sung from the back of a packed room by a woman whose much adored singer/partner tells the room about their intimate lives. Clare Moore sang it on the demo.

Somewhere in the world.

Recorded at a show in Melbourne in 1991. No bass, just acoustic guitar, violin and drums. We played a lot like this and got the whole album together – learning how to play quietly and dramatically. For some reason I thought it to be too much for the eventual album and it never got recorded by us. Tex Perkins recorded it for his debut album “Far Be It From Me”. 

THIS IS VOL 1.
Vol 2 is ready to go and will be out soon. It has acoustic demos of songs that later appeared on the albums after Wolverine as well as songs from back in late 88 that were recorded in London.

Pulp confessions- Extra show in Adelaide at the Crown and Anchor Friday 23rd October.

Maybe I haven't talked enough about these Coral Snakes 2015 shows. I wrote a story for the Adelaide Review about GETTING THE BAND BACK TOGETHER.

The Melbourne Shows were pretty epic, as I wrote a couple of weeks ago.

pic - barry douglas

Then Clare and I went to do a couple of duos shows deep in the forests of South East Sth Australia. One of them being at the Tantanoola Hotel! Hey this was the exterior that greeted us. Plenty woulda driven right on....Oh it was fierce!

A couple of weeks later we did several shows in NSW. the first was at a sold out Newtown Social Club. Formerly known as the SANDRINGHAM (which we'd played at and hated back in the early 90s). Now its been scrubbed up and refurbished and is a state of the art black boxed room where we put on a full tilt rock'n'roll show for our funny crowd. It was pretty high energy- even though the first set is mostly semi acoustic. That probably makes it more demanding and keyed up. People in the front row were singing to every word. Hanging off the music. I haven't played in that kind of atmosphere for a while - if ever. People crying and laughing.
The show goes for well over two hours.

There were some great shots taken at the Newtown show.

The next night we played in Newcastle at Lizottes which is a lovely old dinner show venue in a converted cinema. This show was performed justly as if in more of a theatre style setting.We got to use the other backdrop which had been painted on canvas by Stephen Bush back in 1994.

 

pic by Stewart Hazell

On the Sunday we had a very pleasant breakfast with each other. The only times we'd been together had been in quite highly stressful rehearsals or performing situations so it was great to just be together for the first time.
We then drove back to Sydney and did a show at the Basement right in the heart of the city of Sydney. One of my favourite venues, which we hadn't been back to for years. I love old school Sydney night life joints and this is one of them. Again it was more of a  dinner jazz kind of ambience so another shade-cloth over the performance. It was great getting to do the sets in these different tones and pitches.

The show was really epic- as they all have been. People very emotional and telling me - spilling me - their life stories.

We travelled and did all the shows with no management or crew. We carried our own gear and set it up and sold what merch we had by ourselves- well that was me. The management and logistical planning and booking was all done by Clare Moore. Robin travelled by bus to both Sydney and Melbourne from Canberra and we drove from melbourne to Sydney.

In Sydney we had no media engagement at all and there have been no live reviews of any of the gigs. I don't know whether I expected any as there is so little actual media in music in 2015. Despite all the buzzing and blogging and hyping. Yeah - it's mostly just people making things happen and finding out about things and diving in.

On October 24th we are doing a  show at the Crown and Anchor in Adelaide. This is close to sold out so an extra gig has been added for October 23rd at the same venue. 

Dr Strangelove image here on the poster as that was written by Terry Southern, who also wrote a  short story called "you're too hip, baby"

 

Night Of The Wolverine is available at itunes in an expanded edition with extra tracks. these being seven demos I did in 1991 ona  four track cassette. 

https://itunes.apple.com/au/album/night-wolverine-expanded-edition/id1012194652 

 This is the Terry Southern book with "you're too hip, baby" in it. 

 Horace McCoy was one of those pulp writers I loved so much. You know that part of Night Of The Wolverine where I sing "oh if I coulda stayed home....."

 

In this Chandler book I read the line "she looked at me from out of her eyes" and I wrote it into a song for The Brother Who Lived / SUPERMODIFIED.

 

From this book came .... 

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."...he felt again the peril that was so strange a part of her allure. That was her charm: to be as  dangerous, as cold as a coral snake; and yet to be passionately seductive." Jonathan Latimer.

 

Thanks again, Horace!

Horace again! But when I wrote "no pockets in a jumpsuit" in 1998 I'd long been envious of the rockabilly song by Hasil Adkins (?) "Coffins have no pockets".

Sorry for all that- needed to get it offa my chest. Ha!

Sunday Oct 4th - dave graney and the mistLY at the Post Office Hotel in Sydney Rd Coburg.

Dave Graney'n' the Coral Snakes 2015 -
Friday 23rd October and Saturday
October 24th at the CROWN and ANCHOR in ADELAIDE

Dave Graney solo in WA
Friday Nov 13th - Hyde Park Hotel
Sunday Nov 15-Fremantle Arts centre 2-4pm

Presentation Night w/ Dennis Cometti. Isn't Melbourne strange?

This was bubbling along while we were madly concentrating on the reunion shows. For those interstate or overseas, Dennis Cometti is the doyen of football callers on television. "The golden voice of the west".

These fellows from Sydney who manage all the most happening rock bands in the country started doing these events as they seem to be totally excited by it. They pair a musical person witha  sports person and Francis Leach, an excellent broadcaster in any field (but who now mostly works in sport) chairs the proceedings.

Hey Triple R radiothon is on- do the right thing and subscribe . Its called PAINT THE TOWN RRR .
This is my KEN NORDINE type tribute to the colour ORANGE

Dennis and I both came on to a  theme tune. Francis had walked on to the Smiths "This Charming Man". We were still in the dressing room and I asked Dennis his opinion on the Smiths. He said he liked a track from Morriseys 2014 album called "istanbul" but wasn't really fussed by either. He came on to some "Game of Love". I walked on to Lynyrd Skynyrds "Workin for the MCA".

Francis threw up some photos of different things and we gagged about career flops and highs. Dennis confessed to  an interest in the JFK shooting and a thwarted tv special he had once almsot made.

I talked of teen footystuff and playing music. We had to bring a  fave bit of music to talk about. I Dennis brought a young American band he had produced an album for in 2010 called the McKennas. I brought LIVE DEAD by the GRATEFUL DEAD and talked about DARK STAR.

 

We had to talk about heroes. Dennis had pictures of  djs he had loved. American and Australian. I had pictures of the author John Cowper Powys and the explorer Richard Burton.

Powys

Burton.

The audience was .... well I don't really know. Hey we kept it light mostly!

Triple R radiothon - subscribe! My tribute to the colour white

Anyway, had  a marvellous time. Dennis was a lovely fellow and we promised we'd have dinner on Grand Final week. I'll hold him to that. 

Oh, I had to play a few tunes so I did "saturday night bath", "life's a dream" and "flash in the pantz". In reverse order to that. 

400 people came on a  cold Sunday night to hear two old smoothies talk about their lives in the world of luck and chance. Isn't Melbourne strange? 

return of dave graney and the coral snakes shows - melbourne

We set up at the Memo Music Hall in Melbourne on the Monday to have  a practice and to do a filmed interview which appeared on ABC tv Lateline later in the week.

Hamish Fitzimmons did the story. 

Barry Douglas aka Barry takes Photos was there to document our reconstitution of ourselves.


We rehearsed later in the week at Soundpark. One of the coldest winters in decades in Melbourne.

Did some mad promo stuff as this reformation opened doors for us that had't been in or vicinity in years.
Mick Molloy got me into MMM in Melbourne and I found myself on the Hot Breakfast show with him and Eddie McGuire.

Clare and I also talked to Glenn Ridge at 3MP and Dennis Walter at 3AW. Pros!

Chris Hollow wrote a story for fairfax.

Iain Shedden wrote a story for the Australian.

We set up the old paper backdrop the Stephen Bush did for us back in 1991. Water colours on paper. It had been rolled up in our studio ever since. With the help of some Gaffa tape it looked quite spiffy.

 

 I wore my maroon jumpsuit in the Night Of The Wolverine set and my black one for the "unbuttoned set. 

Friday nights show was tight as a drum. Very powerful. EPIC. Like doing a  theatre show. 800 people came in over the two nights. Two of the happiest and most powerful shows of our lives.

Barry Douglas took photos for both nights.

Mandy Hall took some excellent shots on the Saturday. 

We saw so many old friends. I got hugged from one end of the room to the other. Had an absolute ball.
Both nights were recorded but I haven't had  a chance to get into the studio.

A funny thing was I was playing Tupacs "all eyez on me" cd over the PA as it was what was always playing in our house in 1995. It elicited some strong complaints from a fellow in the audience.He called it "racist" (to the sound engineer out front). People funny bwoy!

Now we head up to NSW with the show.

Dave Graney'n' the Coral Snakes 2015 -
Also playing September 4th at NEWTOWN SOCIAL CLUB - SYDNEY
September 5th at LIZOTTES - NEWCASTLE
EXTRA SHOW! Sept 6th at THE BASEMENT - Sydney
October 24th at the CROWN and ANCHOR in ADELAIDE

It really was a great couple of nights. That room at Memo is something special too. Here is my card.

How the LIVING LEGENDS SHOW went. Amazing night in Melbourne.

So yesterday, Sunday July 12th 2015, Clare and I were feted at the Gasometer Hotel in Melbourne by a line up of great musicians playing our songs back to us.
It was organised by Mary Mihelakos as part of the LEAPS AND BOUNDS Festival, which occurs every year in early July. They began these LIVING LEGENDS shows last year with nights for Kim Salmon, Charlie Owen  and Spencer P Jones at the Tote. This year Steve Lucas was also subject to this giving of tribute.

Kim had said he loved the experience last year. Clare Moore and myself approached it with a bit of trepidation in the months then weeks then days leading up to it and then as we drove in. There is  a mezzanine area at the gasometer and we imagined standing up there, being a bit remote. Upon arrival we were shown to a table in the middle of the floor complete with champagne bottle in a  bucket (for Clare) and a bottle of ginger beer for me. A classic round saloon bar table with a white linen cloth over it.

Proceedings began at 5pm. I will list the songs and the artists here and let me say I was absolutely thrilled by all the care and feeling that went into the performances- all of them. If I comment on any particularly it's not to lessen the enjoyment I got from experiencing any of the others. I loved the whole night.

Special mention to comrade MALCOLM HILL who mc'd the whole night (at an afternoons notice) and kept proceedings coherent and fizzing. It was tough crowd- US!

The Ancients had the difficult job of starting the night off and powered through "I'm gonna release your soul" (1994) and "rock'n'roll is where I hide" (1995). The latter sung by the angelic Sophie at the keyboards. Spectacular. We love the Ancients!

Henry Manetta then got up with Adam Rudegeair and his band of jazzers and did an amazing version of "the second hand man" from Clares "the third woman" album (2001). Adam pulled on his KEYTAR and whomped his way through "I'm in the future now" (2007). We really began to relax now, seeing and hearing people do songs from all different periods.

The Ocean Party got up and did "night of the wolverine" (1993) and "All Mine" from the DAMES album of 2014. It was like a real pop beat band taking our songs for a spin. So stoked to hear people in their early 20s playing our stuff.

Elizabeth McCarthy, a dear friend and comrade from RRR read out a three page sentence from my book "1001 Australian nights". The story was "I who know the others".

Jane Dust then got back on the stage for the first time in 18 months or so and did extremely poised introductions and solo electric guitar and voice versions of Clares "Out of Where?" and my "there he goes with his eye out". These were both from  HASHISH AND LIQUOR (2005).

The SAND PEBBLES also reconstituted themselves for the first time in a  couple of years and did "Natalie", which I co-wrote with them and "twilight of a villain" (2003). Chris Hollow on bass spoke hilariously about their dealings with us and did the first of several impersonations of my speaking voice. Their sound was huge and so were the dynamics. They stayed on stage and backed Jeff Williams on a  version of "Morning Dew" which we recorded on LURE OF THE TROPICS.

Kaye Louise Patterson sat at the piano and accompanied by our great comrades Stuart Perera and Stu Thomas did a great version of "a lot to drink about" from Clare's LIQUOR (2005) album.

Go Go Sapien then turned up in dusty bearded , hatted and bewigged costumery and did an amazing version of "my schtick weighs a ton" (2005), complete with mock masturbatory moves and then turned their madness to "junk time" (The DAMES 2014) . I love those guys!

Zayd Thring from Pets with Pets wandered in from the street and gave us a wonderful reworking of "Double Life" from the Moodists which he played on electric guitar and jammed along on a  loop he'd put onto his iPhone. Really great. Such a pop star! (Zayd also did a good impression of me as I apparently spoke when we first met. He'd told me his mother liked my stuff and I'd said "your mother has good taste". I seem to speak a bit like Humphrey Bogart....Zayd had then gone to the school library and gotten a Moodists album out as he didn't know my stuff at all.)

Edwina Preston sang a Moodists song with Harry Howard as well. It was "Some Kinda Jones" and she sang it so commandingly. Lots of words and she pinged them all off so hard! Harry then played "New Face in Hell" by the Fall which we'd covered in our narrative show "Live in Hell".

Jarrod Quarrelle from LOST ANIMAL got up, impossibly thin and hairy and sang a song from one of my favourite bands, LOVE. He did " a Message to Pretty" and then did two songs from the band we first saw him playing in in the early 2000's, NEW SEASON. Tons of charisma.

Sean Simmons came on with THE SPOILS and they did an EPIC version of "lure of the tropics" from the album of the same name (1990). Degree of difficulty - very high!

Tony Martin got up and read three excerpts from "1001 Australian Nights". these were the "I had a dream" parts where I dream of intruding into current pop moments.

Stu Thomas brought his PARADOX to the stage (Phil Collings , Stu Perera and ....  sorry - I forgot to note who ....on bass) and did a superbad and evil version of "death by a  thousand sucks" (2000) with Stu just making dank, squelchy sound from a mini moog he held in his hand. He was also manipulating his vocals from a  processor on a stand. Outstanding! He gave a wonderful talk about us and then they did a Moodists song called "Bad Cabin" which veered into jazz and dub. I loved this stuff!

Kim Salmon got up with Mick Harvey on drums and Stu Thomas on bass and Mike Stranges on guitar to play "a million dollars in a red velvet suit", "I got myself a beautiful nightmare" and "everybody does what they want to" from I WAS THE HUNTER AND I WAS THE PREY (1992). Sounded so great! I love the songs on that album!

Mick Harvey then came out front to sing and Mikey went to the drums and they did "you wanna be there but you don't wanna travel" (1994) which segued into "double life" (1985) and then an incredible lunge at "2068 babe" (2008) complete with loops , bird noises and screaming white noise synth sounds! (We've never attempted that song. It's only one note for ten minutes but it's got layers of dark and white squelching and fizzing noises spinning out of it.)

Malcolm Hill got up with Helen Smart on drums and Penny Ikinger on electric guitar and they played great versions of "am I wearing something of yours?" (1998) and "are we going' too fast for love?" (2001) . Malcolm was wearing a "Moodists wig" which looked very convincing. Chris Walsh joined them on bass and they did "Machine Machine" from the Moodists (1984)

Malcolm moved to electric guitar while Penny Ikinger gave a  wonderful speech about us and then they played Clares "Tomorrow Inc" (2005)

Caroline Kennedy got up with Mick Turner on guitar and Ian Wadley on bass and they played "gone dead" (the Moodists 1981) , "I held the cool breeze" (1993) and "out there in the night of time" (1993) .

Then the Moodists did a version of RUNAWAY with Kim Salmon guesting on guitar in Steve Millers absence.

Had such a great time, like  a wonderful party. It finished well after 11pm. Thats five or so hours of our songs......

So much of your life as a musician you feel that you've done something terribly wrong. Hearing our songs back from people we admire, love and respect really touched me. I choked up on occasion and just had a ball in general. I had the feeling that actually, I'd been right to get mixed up in all this foolishness.

dave graney 'n' the coral snakes shows in August-October.

Hey! In the meantime I have played another show in Ballarat. At the same venue- the Eastern- and had a cool time. I was travelling by myself and drove on to the Victorian town of Kyneton, about an hour or so away. I had stayed in the hotel in Ballarat and awoke early. I found myself in Kyneton before lunch and parked in the street and fell asleep. Luckily, an old friend, Matt Sigley, called up and I spent an excellent day in his great secondhand book and record shop in the main drag. I highly recommend it.
Long Story Short is the name of the shop and this is it's Facebook Page.

It's upstairs at 58-60 Piper st Kyneton.  (03) 5422 2909

I bought Clare a Dostoyevsky novel. I'd gotten myself a John Cowper Powys epic (WOLF SOLENT) in the town of Daylesford along the way. 

Matt was once in the EARTHMEN and also the LOVETONES and his own DAYTIME FREQUENCY and is now also involved in VIDEO VIDEO with MATT DOLL. 

VIDEO VIDEO have an album at itunes 

The gig was in a restaurant/ cafe called Major Toms and it was great to play to a  full room of people out to hear some arcane music. Well, arcane music is all I have so that's what happened. I played with my K YAIRI acoustic 12 string and my 1957 IBANEZ archtop through my CRATE solid state acoustic amplifier. I had  a ball. Then I drove back to Melbourne.

 

We have also been progressing with these dates we are doing as Dave Graney 'n' the Coral Snakes. That's me, Clare Moore, Rod Hayward and Robin Casinader. We were invited to play at MEMO MUSIC HALL in St Kilda - specifically to play the 1993 album NIGHT OF THE WOLVERINE.

We thought that , if we were getting the band back together it'd be good to play songs from outside that one album so we'll be doing another set at the shows of songs from records we made before and after that particular disc. Rod, Robin, Clare and I made NIGHT OF THE WOLVERINE, with bassist Andrew Picouleau guesting on some tracks. We asked Gordy Blair, who played on all the other albums to play the shows but he declined to be involved. Stu Thomas from the mistLY will be playing bass. He knows most of the songs already.

dave, clare, robin and rod on the set of the "you're just too hip, baby" film clip shoot.

Robin lives in Canberra and the rest of us in Melbourne. We last played at the end of 1997 , when we'd put out our album THE DEVIL DRIVES. We met up in early June and rehearsed the original arrangements of all the songs as they were on the original recordings. It was quite eerie how it all just sat back together again. I was just singing - no guitar- and really enjoyed getting into the songs again. Quite an openly, emotional album. Powerful experience. 

We'll be playing the two shows in Melbourne first and then moving on to Sydney, Newcastle and Adelaide. Here are some link to tickets.

In Melbourne its at the MEMO MUSIC HALLin St Kilda - August 7th and 8th.

In Sydney it's at the Newtown Social Club September 4th.

In Newcastle it's at Lizottes - September 5th.

In Adelaide it's at the Crown and Anchor October 24th.

Hanging out at the Lounge in Swanston st where we played a lot in the early 90s.

 Here is a clip from the NIGHT OF THE WOLVERINE era. Shot and directed by Kerry Negara for SBS. I could talk underwater in those days.

Other shows we've done recently have included a week in Sydney , Wollongong and Newcastle and another trip to Brisbane. The latter was a duo show with myself and Clare Moore. We played three nights in a row and then flew back to blast out two sets at 4pm at the Post Office Hotel in Coburg with the mistLY. Here's a clip from that show, taken by Barry Douglas aka Barry takes Photos.


Until next time, comrades...

Further Out - Swingy George - the Tantanoola Tiger!

Another thing I neglected to mention about time and the music you send out into the unknown.
There was a song on the Moodists "Thirsty's Calling" album called "Swingy George" . We came from St Kilda to London and put the song down there. Propulsive kind of song we were best at. Bass heavy on one chord with Mick Turner grinding out some crude slabs of slide guitar. No blues except for my style of repeating lines over and over. Nobody ever asked me what lyrics were about in the band. I never made it my thing to separate them out.We had no lyric sheets with our records and the whole experience was a totality. 1984.
Then I got a call the other week from a  friend in Mt Gambier. He and his friends, hot rod aficionados and long term potheads had been watching a  dvd of the Moodists LIVE IN LONDON (1984). 

He said "that song Swingy George- was that about Swingy George?"

We then proceeded to compare notes on this character from our childhoods who had been a presence around the local (east side) childrens playgrounds. He would just sit there in the swings, looking comical because of his adult size. Nothing rotten ever happened, he was just a bit of a bogeyman. "Swingy George". Anyway, it took over 30 years for that song to get heard by a person who could hook into it and KNOW what the fuck I was singing about!
I now realize it was a kind of a folk tune. the post punk scene had this imperative that you write about your own experience and environment. The only thing was, in Melbourne, that we HATED most of our environment and were totally into frequencies from New York or London. Really, why would you be interested in Cold Chisel or the Angels with the Birthday Party or laughing Clowns, Alan Vega/ Suicide, the Fall, the Fore Engines  or the Contortions in your head?
I also wrote it with the film "night of the hunter" in my brain. That film was such a touch stone in that scene. 40s movies in general. The word "swingin'" had all the connotations of hanging as well as the goofy musical feel. The Jungle Jim was in every playground. Something for kids to hang off. I liked things to be just a  few repetitive lines.

"george was real enough
it didn't take much to make him swing
he was a black coat that we all coloured
yeah something from sleep caught in our light
a bad shape caught in our back yard
we wanted to see him swing
he was hangin around this jungle jim
just a black coat drifting
swingy george
he was a black coat that we all coloured
yeah something from sleep caught in our light
a bad shape caught in our back yard
he was still there when he had gone
we wanted to see him swing
he was hangin around this jungle jim
just a black coat drifting
swingy george"

My friend was ringing about playing a gig in a  cafe on the main street of Mt Gambier in August. Also playing in the Tantanoola Hotel which is a timber town in one of the huge, spooky pine forests which surround the area. There is the legend of the Tantanoola Tiger!
It inspired Max Harris to pen this poem about the area ....

The Tantanoola Tiger

There in the bracken was the ominous spoor mark,
Huge, splayed, deadly, and quiet as breath,
And all around lay bloodied and dying,
Staring dumbly into their several eternities,
The rams that Mr Morphett loved as sons.

Not only Tantanoola, but at Mount Schanck
The claw welts patterned the saplings
With mysteries terrible as Egypt's demons,
More evil than the blueness of the Lakes,
And less than a mile from the homestead, too.

Sheep died more rapidly than the years
Which the tiger ruled in tooth and talk,
And it padded from Beachport to the Border,
While blood streamed down the minds of the folk
Of Mount Gambier, Tantanoola, of Casterton.

Oh this tiger was seen all right, grinning,
Yellow and gleaming with satin stripes:
Its body arched and undulated through the tea-tree;
In this land of dead volcanoes it was a flame,
It was a brightness, it was the glory of death,

It was fine, this tiger, a sweet shudder
In the heath and everlastings of the Border,
A roc bird up the ghostly ring-barked gums
Of Mingbool Swamp, a roaring fate
Descending on the mindless backs of grazing things.

Childhoods burned with its burning eyes,
Tantanoola was a magic playground word,
It rushed through young dreams like a river
And it had lovers in Mr Morphett and Mr Marks
For the ten long hunting unbelieving years.

Troopers and blacks made safari, Africa-fashion,
Pastoral Quixotes swayed on their ambling mounts,
Lost in invisible trails. The red-faced
Young Lindsay Gordons of the Mount
Tormented their heartbeats in the rustling nights

While the tiger grew bigger and clear as an axe.
'A circus once abandoned a tiger cub.'
This was the creed of the hunters and poets.
'A dingo that's got itself too far south'
The grey old cynics thundered in their beers,

And blows were swapped and friendships broken,
Beauty burst on a loveless and dreary people,
And their moneyed minds broke into singing
A myth; these soured and tasteless settlers
Were Greeks and Trojans, billabong troubadours,

Plucking their themes at the picnic races
Around the kegs in the flapping canvas booths.
On the waist-coats shark's teeth swung in time,
And old eyes, sharply seamed and squinting,
Opened mysteriously in misty musical surprise,

Until the day Jack Heffernan made camp
By a mob of sheep on the far slope of Mount Schanck
And woke to find the tiger on its haunches,
Bigger than a mountain, love, or imagination,
Grinning lazily down on a dying ewe,

And he drew a bead and shot it through the head.
Look down, oh mourners of history, poets,
Look down on the black and breeding volcanic soil,
Lean on your fork in this potato country,
Regard the yellowed fangs and quivering claws

Of a mangy and dying Siberian wolf.
It came as a fable or a natural image
To pace the bars of these sunless minds,
A small and unimpressive common wolf
In desperately poor and cold condition.

It howled to the wattle when it swam ashore
From the wreck of the foundered Helena,
Smelt death and black snakes and tight lips
On every fence-post and slip-rail.
It was three foot six from head to tail.

Centuries will die like swatted blowflies
Before word or wolf will work a tremor
Of tenderness in the crusty knuckles
Around the glasses in the Tantanoola pub
Where its red bead eyes now stare towards the sun.

This song from FEARFUL WIGGINGS mentioned Max Harris and his poem "upon throwing a copy of the New Statesman from the window whilst driving along the Coorong".
 

 
We're playing some shows soon! There's also now a second show at Memo for Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes.