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