A tip if you tend a blog. Write things down when they are still a hot experience, when your clothes are still smoking. Get it down.
I flew to Hobart to do some shows at short notice. Another player had forgotten he had a gig double booked at a music festival in Europe so I was asked if I could volunteer. "Yeah, why not?"
I said.
The first show was at a room I'd played at before but had recently changed hands.
A week before the gig the new owner was played my song ULTRAKEEF by the cook and she tore the promoter a new one via the phone, telling him I was not to play anything of the sort in her venue and she wanted "nice music for nice people". Wow! Still got something or other! I thought and chuckled.
"Sure", I said. "Why not? I can be nice!"
Show time came and the promoter picked me up. I basically thought I was doing everybody a favour stepping in to fill the breech. Actually being nice!
He filled me in on the scene. It was a good room and there weren't many of those in the town and it'd be great if I could be nice. "I can be nice!" I said, and chuckled as I looked out of the car window.
We parked outside the venue. Misty rain was coming down. There was a young woman standing in the adjacent business's doorway. She had her hood on. She smiled, I said hello. I got out my guitar and bag and she came up behind me and asked if she could help. I said "nah, I'm right thanks" and kept walking.
She followed and said "you wanted to meet me."
I said "I'm sorry?"
She said, "you wanted to catch up!"
I said, "hey I'm sorry but what's this all about?"
She took a step back and said "you wanted to talk to me about cyber bullying..."
I said "cyber bullying? Sorry I dunno what you're talking about."
It was still raining and we were still standing in the street.
She kept taking steps backwards and started saying "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" and then turned and disappeared - somehow - walking quickly into the empty street.
It was the reopening of the venue after having been dormant for a while.
I stowed my case and took my guitar down to soundcheck. the shaven headed, bearded barman said hello and the female venue owner came in to talk to the promoter. She nodded at me. They chatted and she mentioned she'd been meaning to put the name of the entertainer up on a board outside but hadn't gotten around to it yet. The show was a matter of hours away.
It was raining outside and there were buckets on the floor in front of the stage, collecting the occasional drop.
I soundchecked and then thought I'd eat. A young woman was writing the menu up on a blackboard. She was on a ladder. The barman "joked" that she'd asked to work as she loved my music. He thought that was amusing. That a person would know of my stuff, let alone like it.
She looked embarassed.
The opening act was standing around having a beer. A solo performer. I tried to talk to him, a fellow traveller and all, a comrade. He had a strange smile and said "what?" to every question I asked. It was tiring. A nervous thing, I know. He looked and smiled a lot like the British comic actor Nick Frost. Perhaps it was actually him? Researching a new role.
I had a plate of vegetables and went for a walk. I came back and the rain was bucketing down. Literally, splashing into a bucket in front of the stage and also out of that and all over my guitar pedals. The other singer was sitting and watching it. He seemed to be incapable of any action that could influence the world as it rolled out over him. I moved my pedals back and the young woman wiped the floor.
A few people came in and the opening act started. A very straight folk singer. He had skills, chops. He had obsessed over his chosen frequency. I could have been in the same room in 1964. He had no rock'n'roll in him. His showmanship was nil. Normally I would have loved this level of rough non-engagement with showbiz. He would talk with a wry, secret smile in between songs, sentences trailing off, talking to himself more than anything else. Old folk songs, grim tales of Irish rebels and transportation, poverty, mining and death and ghosts. I was sitting there all dressed in black leather as I had been expecting Antarctic weather and I'd been proven right to have done so. Then a man started dancing. He wore an old beanie and an old flannelette shirt undeneath which I could see the frayed, pilled sleeves of two older jumpers. His pants were torn short above his ankles like a pressed ganged sailor and he had long johns on underneath. He had no shoes on. He danced a jig for a couple of songs. A couple of feet away from me.
I sat on a chair and did my two sets. It was quite enjoyable in the end. I didn't swear and it was kind of illustrative how many of my recent songs had that kind of rough language in them. GLORIA GRAHAME as well as ULTRAKEEF.
I chatted with a few people and then after an hour or two, went upstairs to bed.
The next morning I was fixing a coffee and the woman owner of the venue walked past. We were the only two people there. She nodded and kept to her work, cleaning a couple of other rooms.
I took my bag and guitar and, leaving the key in the door, walked down to the water and caught a ferry to MONA where I did a long set of music sitting in the Nolan room.
I sang many songs with swear words as well as long, slow tunes that you couldn't really let fly in a pub room. Here in an art gallery with high ceilings they could work.
I had a ticket out of town for 9:45 and it was 3pm. I sat and had a coffeee while I waited for a bus to the airport. When it came it turned out I was the only passenger and I had a nice chat about Tasmanian football with the driver.
I thought I could talk my way into an early flight but they love to say "No" at Virgin so I sat to read my book. I was at page 908 of John Cowper Powys's OWEN GLENDOWER.
After a while I noticed the plane didn't have any boarding time. Then it got delayed for half an hour. This kept happening every half hour or so until well after the flight time of 9:45. At 10:30 they gave us meal tickets.
It kept getting put back until, finally, at 1:30 am they admitted it was cancelled and we had to collect our bags and wait for details of our accomodation or the night.
It felt a bit like a disaster movie. I'd started to chat with a young couple who'd actually been at the show on the Saturday night. Very nice, intelligent and amusing company. The girl, Monica, kept buying magazines. She had one called WOMANKIND. I told her it was an Amish stroke mag.
That couple started to wonder about the person who was looking after their cat and whether it was right to call them at 2am. We were all standing, delirious tired in a queue at the airport at 2am. Me and the young couple were right there as they talked across us. It was like we were in a circle. Then the man said that it wasn't such a bad thing to spend another night in a hotel and smiled and they put their phones aside for a moment and cuddled and embraced. We were all getting too close. People were overcooked,too loose or too tight, turning back into their weird, domesticated selves.
Another couple were trying to get to an ill paarents' bedside and also - one of them- to Spain the next day where he was to manage and monetize a young rock climber.
A rotund young Asian man in hip-hop gear and thongs walked around, speaking French into his phone.
I got to bed at 3am and woke at 7:30 and ate a nice beakfast of black coffee and Bircher Muesli before catching a cab to the airport.
There was a fresh group of grotesque travellers. Fat families, tattos, beards and martial arts t shirts. A young lesbian couple locked into a long, tongue kissing embrace for twenty minutes right in the middle of the scrum. Also amongst them were the survivors from the previous night, more than ready to hear of their plane and plans for the future to be cancelled again.
The plane left on time.
art- Tony Mahony
New album from Dave Graney and Clare Moore coming in October. ONE MILLION YEARS DC
First single. HE WAS A SORE WINNER.
2019 shows
September 27th - Dave Graney solo at PALOMINO NIGHTS. A show in SA at the heritage GLENCOE WOOLSHED. (Near Mt Gambier).
October 10th, 17th and 24th Dave Graney and Clare Moore will be playing
with the mistLY at THE JAZZ LAB - 27 Leslie St, Brunswick Melbourne.
Sunday October 13th at 2pm Dave Graney and Clare Moore will be playing at Scrub Hill 1869
1713 Daylesford, Ballarat Rd, Newlyn VIC 3364 phone 0409 645 237
1713 Daylesford, Ballarat Rd, Newlyn VIC 3364 phone 0409 645 237
October 25th and 26th Dave Graney and Clare Moore will be appearing at the JUNK BAR in ASHGROVE, BRISBANE.
November 15th Dave Graney at the Music Lounge, Merrigong theatre Company, WOLLONGONG.
November 16th Dave Graney and Clare Moore at SOUNDS DELICIOUS in HUSKISSON, NSW.
November 16th Dave Graney and Clare Moore at SOUNDS DELICIOUS in HUSKISSON, NSW.
November 17th Dave Graney solo at GASOLINE PONY in Marrickville, NSW
Thursday November 21st - Dave Graney and Clare Moore at DUSTY ATTIC MUSIC LOUNGE in Lismore, NSW
Thursday November 28th Dave Graney and the mistLY at Birds Basement jazz club in Melbourne.
