We played a set in the new performance space at RRR last Wednesday night. It was the first time we'd played all the material from "Knock Yourself Out" . Either Clare Moore had built and played all the tracks on the album or I had. We had to pull it all apart over the last couple of months at our Yarraville rehearsal place and play it as a band. Put it up on the blocks as they say in the extremely scientific world of commercial radio. We'd never had to do that before. It was like doing cover versions of my songs. They are sounding full of bounce and grit. Its another kind of energy and level of intensity in the dynamics.
Thanks to everybody for coming along, it was a great night. It went out live from 6:30 to 7:00 on Richard Moffatts "incoming" show. Afterwards we went across to the Lomond pub for a drink, well I had a lemonade. There was a duo playing, two fellows , one on drums and another on electric guitar. They play every Wednesday night and are called "Stackfull". The drummer had a real, old jazz kit with a big bass drum which had the front skin still on. He kept talking to us and telling us who they were. Their poster, he told us, was designed by Ian McCausland. This fellow has a lot of work out there. Have a look...
http://www.ianmccausland.com.au/
I looked up the drummer , Harold Frith ,on the magic box and he is now 73 and has been playing since that mythic time before the Beatles screwed the whole scene up, in a Melbourne band called the Thunderbirds.
http://www.thethunderbirds.com.au/pictures.html
The guitarist, Les Stackpool, had played in many bands from the late 60s on. Including Levi Smiths Clefs and Doug Parkinson In Focus.
I always love to see players keeping on playing.
The next day I flew to Sydney to catch up with the people at Fuse and then to sing some songs at an event that was a part of Brian Enos "Luminous " festival. A very distant part I guess. Heres what the Creative Sydney people said....
"Hear the likes of Old Man River, Spod, Sui Zhen, Loene Carmen and members of Dappled Cities, Bridezilla, RedSunBand, Tom Ugly along with special guests Simon Day (Ratcat) and Dave Graney reinterpreting old-school hits and indie classics, all backed by a supergroup of a house band featuring Lindsay McDougall (Triple J, Frenzal Rhomb), Cec Condon (The Mess Hall), Sam Worrad (The Holy Soul) and Cameron Bruce (Waikiki, The Beautiful Girls).
The night will open with a set by three generations of Sydney performers all from the one family - Holiday Sidewinder (Bridezilla), her mother Loene Carmen and grandfather Peter Head - performing some of Peter’s classic songs about Sydney such as “King of the Cross” (about Abe Saffron) and “William St Blues”.
It was a very warm event to be invited to be a part of. I was the only Melbourne person. An accident I think. I really enjoyed seeing Loene carmen pefroming with her father and her daughter , all of them taking the mic to sing a couple of songs in turn. Simon Day always makes me wonder why he isn't more active musically. One of the Dappled City fellows did Eric Bogles "the band played waltzing matilda" to this hall full of up for it 20 somethings. I thought he was mad. they quite liked it, but I always misjudge the current generations sentimentality about WW1. They've been brought up with it as a semi religuous holiday every year.
I got up eventually and did "hindu gods of love " by the Lipstick Killers and "smith and wesson blues" by radio Birdman. Two iconic Sydney acts. I also did "bodysnatcher blues" as its a one note boogie and I thought the band might dig it.
I went back to my hotel room, which had a view of the lights and vido art being thrown all over the Sydney Opera House. I turned the tv on and watched the entire game of St Kilda vs Carlton. It was a very exciting match.
dave graney - Moodists-Coral Snakes-mistLY-FEARFUL WIGGINGS
photo by Charlie Kinross. Cds available via links below (or click this picture above). Your support for our music is greatly appreciated.
About Me
- dave graney
- 2024 release of two albums. (strangely)(emotional) and I Passed Through Minor Chord In A Morning. 2023 book THERE HE GOES WITH HIS EYE OUT (lyrics 1980-2023) 2023 reissue Dave Graney and the Coral Snakes Night Of The Wolverine. Double vinyl release. 2023 ROCK album with Clare Moore IN A MISTLY . WORKSHY - 2017 memoir out on Affirm Press. Available at shows or via website. Moodists - Coral Snakes - mistLY. I don’t know what I am and don’t want to know any more than I already know. I aspire, in my music , to 40s B Movie (voice and presence) and wish I could play guitar like Dickey Betts, John Cippolina or Grant Green - but not in this lifetime, I know.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Thursday, June 4, 2009
proximity
The British writer, Nik Cohn, (who wrote "awopbopaloobopalopbamboom", an early reappraisal of pop music, as well as the story which inspired Saturday Night Fever" and more recently a book on Broadway as well as much great writing on New Orleans hip hop) used to, hilariously , bag Bob Dylan, because he saw him as a fake and a ham. He must have been able to see who Bob Dylan was channelling . The originals must have been fresh in his mind. Now those original figures, ( who Bob Dylan always attempts to draw people s attention to) are all but invisible and Bob Dylan is seen in splendid isolation, it is hard to see what Nik was getting at. The last time anybody cared to ask him as to whether he had changed his mind, Nik said something along the lines that he though Bob Dylan was hokey but he hadn't seen Bruce Springsteen coming. That's funny.
It.'s the same with a lot of popular music though. Things come and go and disappear like fuckin.. snow. I saw that character Devendra Banhard, ,whose initial pr encapsulated everything that I thought bogus and dim about indie music, on tv and was shocked at the outageous hamminess of his act. I'd heard his songs and the only thing I could detect of interest in his music was that little warble in his voice that was pure Marc Bolan.If you didn't know Marc Bolan you would be charmed, I am sure. If you did know Marc Bolan and T Rex, you would , of course, know where Marc took that great vocal effect and how he dressed it up in glam clothes and traded his acoustic for a Les Paul and spent years listening to nothing but Ricky Nelson records with that great LA rockabilly sound and all those cool James Burton licks. You would know that. That was in the future, in a funny way. You would also know it was , hopelessly, in the past.
Anyway, I'd heard the songs and had some hilariously hyped emails from his Australian promoter. Talking of this tramps genius and how he recorded his albums like a cat ,coughing up furballs in his sleep - and how none of it was tainted by artistry or craft, just unconscious luck and shit.. It was "ultra whatever,,,acoustic.." I'd even emailed back to the agent, saying , "this prick sounds like Forrest fuckin.. Gump!" ( In my world, an indictment of a recent modern scene but in reality, an affirmation of the innocence of idiots, loved by dolts the world over). And then I caught him on Jools Hollands show "later". He was sittng cross legged , with candles all around him , dressed in some sort of wizards cap and cloak, playing an acoustic guitar. Of course, all I could see was Marc Bolan in his pre electric Tyrannosaurus Rex days. I thought it was cute. It was a show a couple of years out of date. I remember that time. The national youth boadcaster radio network, had 9 songs of Devendra Banhards on their very tight and rare NATIONAL playlist at the time.
I guess its proximity. I was at high school when Queen actually had that horrible single out, "bohemian Rhapsody". The only kids who were into Queen were ones that would grow up to be Alan Partridge type characters. Guys who would wear driving gloves and play golf and actually BE swinging voters. That is where my mind has stayed with them.
AC/DC were funny. Now they are blown up hugely and what matter was there in the beginning just can't take the strain of so much interest. And they used to be a place for outcasts to go to and find like minded bedraggled headbanging types and be far from the trendified shit that was out there in the world. Now everybodys in on it! Leave AC/DC alone!
There is an act from Melbourne who make a music that is informed by the sounds of 1975. No punk rock and no mucking around. ( well there are lots of young acts like this, reactionary types). Anyway, they have been so enormously successful that its not worth talking about. They are in their early twenties and the singer was talking of his battles with Cocaine and writing their second album. Now , really, that is so scripted and lame that you would be ashamed to say it. Cocaine, the businessmans drug. What problem could you have? I am old school, you should only talk about drugs and problems, to the press, as you are COMING OUT OF GAOL AFTER BEING BUSTED!". Wouldn't it be boring to follow a script so closely? Why bother continuing? We have all seen Spinal Tap. Theres some girlfriends and some managers and some touring and a break up.
Speaking of Spinal Tap. We went to see it when it came out in London at a cinema in Notting Hill. 1984.I was wearing a leather coat ( brand new, like the Black Panthers) and leather pants and leather boots. Clare was dressed up like Annie Oakley in fine Western shirt and dress. There was hardly anybody there and it was so true to any musicians experience that we sat in a foetal position for the entire time. We tried to sneak out, feeling ashamed to be so overtly parading our Rockitudeness. I read somewhere of the singer of Silverchair talking of watching it with his dance nusic buddy and how they "cacked themselves". I was not surprsied to hear this . To us it was no laughing matter! We had the same experience watching "the Mighty Wind" People, who were not musicians, had told us how fun it was. This was even sadder than Spinal Tap. We knew people like that! It was very affecting. Again, it..s the proximity. This tinted drama into slapstick, the further away you got.
It.'s the same with a lot of popular music though. Things come and go and disappear like fuckin.. snow. I saw that character Devendra Banhard, ,whose initial pr encapsulated everything that I thought bogus and dim about indie music, on tv and was shocked at the outageous hamminess of his act. I'd heard his songs and the only thing I could detect of interest in his music was that little warble in his voice that was pure Marc Bolan.If you didn't know Marc Bolan you would be charmed, I am sure. If you did know Marc Bolan and T Rex, you would , of course, know where Marc took that great vocal effect and how he dressed it up in glam clothes and traded his acoustic for a Les Paul and spent years listening to nothing but Ricky Nelson records with that great LA rockabilly sound and all those cool James Burton licks. You would know that. That was in the future, in a funny way. You would also know it was , hopelessly, in the past.
Anyway, I'd heard the songs and had some hilariously hyped emails from his Australian promoter. Talking of this tramps genius and how he recorded his albums like a cat ,coughing up furballs in his sleep - and how none of it was tainted by artistry or craft, just unconscious luck and shit.. It was "ultra whatever,,,acoustic.." I'd even emailed back to the agent, saying , "this prick sounds like Forrest fuckin.. Gump!" ( In my world, an indictment of a recent modern scene but in reality, an affirmation of the innocence of idiots, loved by dolts the world over). And then I caught him on Jools Hollands show "later". He was sittng cross legged , with candles all around him , dressed in some sort of wizards cap and cloak, playing an acoustic guitar. Of course, all I could see was Marc Bolan in his pre electric Tyrannosaurus Rex days. I thought it was cute. It was a show a couple of years out of date. I remember that time. The national youth boadcaster radio network, had 9 songs of Devendra Banhards on their very tight and rare NATIONAL playlist at the time.
I guess its proximity. I was at high school when Queen actually had that horrible single out, "bohemian Rhapsody". The only kids who were into Queen were ones that would grow up to be Alan Partridge type characters. Guys who would wear driving gloves and play golf and actually BE swinging voters. That is where my mind has stayed with them.
AC/DC were funny. Now they are blown up hugely and what matter was there in the beginning just can't take the strain of so much interest. And they used to be a place for outcasts to go to and find like minded bedraggled headbanging types and be far from the trendified shit that was out there in the world. Now everybodys in on it! Leave AC/DC alone!
There is an act from Melbourne who make a music that is informed by the sounds of 1975. No punk rock and no mucking around. ( well there are lots of young acts like this, reactionary types). Anyway, they have been so enormously successful that its not worth talking about. They are in their early twenties and the singer was talking of his battles with Cocaine and writing their second album. Now , really, that is so scripted and lame that you would be ashamed to say it. Cocaine, the businessmans drug. What problem could you have? I am old school, you should only talk about drugs and problems, to the press, as you are COMING OUT OF GAOL AFTER BEING BUSTED!". Wouldn't it be boring to follow a script so closely? Why bother continuing? We have all seen Spinal Tap. Theres some girlfriends and some managers and some touring and a break up.
Speaking of Spinal Tap. We went to see it when it came out in London at a cinema in Notting Hill. 1984.I was wearing a leather coat ( brand new, like the Black Panthers) and leather pants and leather boots. Clare was dressed up like Annie Oakley in fine Western shirt and dress. There was hardly anybody there and it was so true to any musicians experience that we sat in a foetal position for the entire time. We tried to sneak out, feeling ashamed to be so overtly parading our Rockitudeness. I read somewhere of the singer of Silverchair talking of watching it with his dance nusic buddy and how they "cacked themselves". I was not surprsied to hear this . To us it was no laughing matter! We had the same experience watching "the Mighty Wind" People, who were not musicians, had told us how fun it was. This was even sadder than Spinal Tap. We knew people like that! It was very affecting. Again, it..s the proximity. This tinted drama into slapstick, the further away you got.
Saturday, May 16, 2009
talkin' about my kinda art the other night
We were asked to perform at the NGVA , which is in the Ian Potter centre. Not the national gallery which is just over the other side of the river but the national gallery of Victoria. Its at Federation Square across from the Forum theatre. Part of the performance was for me to give an "art chat". All this was to happen at 6pm .
I started my talk by saying I was pretty much educated by tv. Old films and tv series. Sounds bad but I got exposed to the greatest of early Hollywood films from the silents to film noir to all kinds of B movies and comic events like "F Troop" and "Get Smart" . Also "The Invaders" and the Australian scifi aboriginal series, "Wandjina". Lots of crap too but I watched it all and saw things by accident that you would have to get a degree to know of their existence nowadays. Everything might be available now but you have to know about something to look for it, in a way, and the chances of being exposed to all that cultural swamp, by accident, are very slim now. Only in some kind of "festival" would you get to see a movie like "Robinson Crusoe on Mars" or "amateur night at the Dixie Bar and Grill".I added that I never went to higher education so I really was schooled by popular culture and it was pretty good.
I talked about my love of mythology and especially self mythology and read a poem I'd written many years ago about my favourite mythic rock band, the Charlatans from San Francisco. The poem is called "the Charlatans playing silver city 1965". They were pretty much the frst of the SF freak bands and played their first gigs ina wild west replica saloon in Silver City.
I read from the fake "Benny Goodmans tour diaries" from teh fake GI music mag "Nuts to you". I read the first page of Ricahard Starks' "Point Blank" (Richard Stark was really Donald E Westlake) and talked of my love for 30s pulp writers like Paul Cain. ( he wrote the great "fast one" and one other collection of stories "seven slayers")
I read from Iceberg Slims "pimp" and talked of how you had to go into the erotic paperback section section of a secondhand bookshop in Kings Cross to find a book ilike that as it was not recognized by respectable book shops.
I read the first two words from Mayakovskys "my discovery of America. Written in 1925 by this young recolutionary poet and playwrite, the first two words are , "TWO WORDS!".I like his declamatory style and droll humour. And I discovered America again, reading him.
I also read some James M Cain. i was going to read a poem by Guillaume Appollinaire called "the pretty redhead" but I had left it home. I really love that poem and identify with lines very strongly.
I ended the talk with a reading of "lament" by Jim Morrison from the classic posthumous Doors album "an American Prayer".
The area we were playing in was a foyer just outside the John Bracks exhibition at the gallery. People were walking in and out. We were joined bya great turnout of people who I had never seen at any club gigs before. It was a fantatsic experience. Playing at such an early evening hour is sensational. Why dont more venue do this?
Basically I was trying to say that I found my kind of art by accident and , in that peculiar australian way, it took me a long time to consider myself an artist, to don the cloak, without smirking.
We began our set with "the birds and the goats and ended with "crime and underwear" and "lets kill god again".
On August 14th we are doinga release for our album "knock yourself out" at the Studio in the George Fairfax Centre in the Victorian Arts Centre. It is a deluxe theatre. Please put it in your diary.
In the meantime we are playing a lot of dates around Australia.
La Jolie Rousse
Guillaume Apollinaire, "La Jolie Rousse [The Pretty Redhead]":
Here I am before you all a sensible man
Who knows life and what a living man can know of death
Having experienced love's sorrows and joys
Having sometimes known how to impose my ideas
Adept at several languages
Having traveled quite a bit
Having seen war in the Artillery and the Infantry
Wounded in the head trepanned under chloroform
Having lost my best friends in the frightful conflict
I know of old and new as much as one man can know of the two
And without worrying today about that war
Between us and for us my friends
I am here to judge the long debate between tradition and invention
Between Order and Adventure
You whose mouth is made in the image of God's
Mouth that is order itself
Be indulgent when you compare us
To those who were the perfection of order
We who look for adventure everywhere
We're not your enemies
We want to give you vast and strange domains
Where mystery in flower spreads out for those who would pluck it
There you may find new fires colors you have never seen before
A thousand imponderable phantasms
Still awaiting reality
We want to explore kindness enormous country where all is still
There is also time which can be banished or recalled
Pity us who fight always at the boundaries
Of infinity and the future
Pity our errors pity our sins
Now it's summer the violent season
And my youth is dead like the springtime
Oh Sun it's the time of ardent Reason
And I am waiting
So I may follow always the noble and gentle shape
That she assumes so I will love her only
She draws near and lures me as a magnet does iron
She has the charming appearance
Of a darling redhead
Her hair is golden you'd say
A lovely flash of lightning that lingers on
Or the flame that glows
In fading tea roses
But laugh at me
Men from everywhere especially men from here
For there are so many things I dare not tell you
So many things you would never let me say
Have pity on me
-- From Calligrammes, 1918
I started my talk by saying I was pretty much educated by tv. Old films and tv series. Sounds bad but I got exposed to the greatest of early Hollywood films from the silents to film noir to all kinds of B movies and comic events like "F Troop" and "Get Smart" . Also "The Invaders" and the Australian scifi aboriginal series, "Wandjina". Lots of crap too but I watched it all and saw things by accident that you would have to get a degree to know of their existence nowadays. Everything might be available now but you have to know about something to look for it, in a way, and the chances of being exposed to all that cultural swamp, by accident, are very slim now. Only in some kind of "festival" would you get to see a movie like "Robinson Crusoe on Mars" or "amateur night at the Dixie Bar and Grill".I added that I never went to higher education so I really was schooled by popular culture and it was pretty good.
I talked about my love of mythology and especially self mythology and read a poem I'd written many years ago about my favourite mythic rock band, the Charlatans from San Francisco. The poem is called "the Charlatans playing silver city 1965". They were pretty much the frst of the SF freak bands and played their first gigs ina wild west replica saloon in Silver City.
I read from the fake "Benny Goodmans tour diaries" from teh fake GI music mag "Nuts to you". I read the first page of Ricahard Starks' "Point Blank" (Richard Stark was really Donald E Westlake) and talked of my love for 30s pulp writers like Paul Cain. ( he wrote the great "fast one" and one other collection of stories "seven slayers")
I read from Iceberg Slims "pimp" and talked of how you had to go into the erotic paperback section section of a secondhand bookshop in Kings Cross to find a book ilike that as it was not recognized by respectable book shops.
I read the first two words from Mayakovskys "my discovery of America. Written in 1925 by this young recolutionary poet and playwrite, the first two words are , "TWO WORDS!".I like his declamatory style and droll humour. And I discovered America again, reading him.
I also read some James M Cain. i was going to read a poem by Guillaume Appollinaire called "the pretty redhead" but I had left it home. I really love that poem and identify with lines very strongly.
I ended the talk with a reading of "lament" by Jim Morrison from the classic posthumous Doors album "an American Prayer".
The area we were playing in was a foyer just outside the John Bracks exhibition at the gallery. People were walking in and out. We were joined bya great turnout of people who I had never seen at any club gigs before. It was a fantatsic experience. Playing at such an early evening hour is sensational. Why dont more venue do this?
Basically I was trying to say that I found my kind of art by accident and , in that peculiar australian way, it took me a long time to consider myself an artist, to don the cloak, without smirking.
We began our set with "the birds and the goats and ended with "crime and underwear" and "lets kill god again".
On August 14th we are doinga release for our album "knock yourself out" at the Studio in the George Fairfax Centre in the Victorian Arts Centre. It is a deluxe theatre. Please put it in your diary.
In the meantime we are playing a lot of dates around Australia.
La Jolie Rousse
Guillaume Apollinaire, "La Jolie Rousse [The Pretty Redhead]":
Here I am before you all a sensible man
Who knows life and what a living man can know of death
Having experienced love's sorrows and joys
Having sometimes known how to impose my ideas
Adept at several languages
Having traveled quite a bit
Having seen war in the Artillery and the Infantry
Wounded in the head trepanned under chloroform
Having lost my best friends in the frightful conflict
I know of old and new as much as one man can know of the two
And without worrying today about that war
Between us and for us my friends
I am here to judge the long debate between tradition and invention
Between Order and Adventure
You whose mouth is made in the image of God's
Mouth that is order itself
Be indulgent when you compare us
To those who were the perfection of order
We who look for adventure everywhere
We're not your enemies
We want to give you vast and strange domains
Where mystery in flower spreads out for those who would pluck it
There you may find new fires colors you have never seen before
A thousand imponderable phantasms
Still awaiting reality
We want to explore kindness enormous country where all is still
There is also time which can be banished or recalled
Pity us who fight always at the boundaries
Of infinity and the future
Pity our errors pity our sins
Now it's summer the violent season
And my youth is dead like the springtime
Oh Sun it's the time of ardent Reason
And I am waiting
So I may follow always the noble and gentle shape
That she assumes so I will love her only
She draws near and lures me as a magnet does iron
She has the charming appearance
Of a darling redhead
Her hair is golden you'd say
A lovely flash of lightning that lingers on
Or the flame that glows
In fading tea roses
But laugh at me
Men from everywhere especially men from here
For there are so many things I dare not tell you
So many things you would never let me say
Have pity on me
-- From Calligrammes, 1918
Friday, April 24, 2009
parnassian pass- headin' you off
I still ain't gettin' the hang of this blogging business. i get the feeling its supposed to be more inclusive and conversational. Welcoming even. But I'm stuck in these tracks and thats the way I'm rolling. Too late for everything I'm afraid. Guilty!
Being a musician, its tough when the audience thinks they can run the show. Look at the mess such thinkin' has gotten us into!
Upon reflection, after watching football downstairs whilst reading some stories aboiut the late comic genius Peter Cook, (By the by, there were several moments during the game which could have given the commentators the opportunity to portray the events on the field in an Anzac-iacal light. These opportunities being left begging , I must question the patriotic fervour and spirit of said sporting pundits. they are not putting in! Was all that useless slaughter for nothing?) I have come to the conclusion that my vibe, my general thing, is Parnassian. But perhaps that early and late Parnassian the crossed over into Symbolism. Thus allowing the great respect for formal arrangements that characterized the Parnassian as well as the striving for the opaque objectivism and repulsion for their precursors, the Romantics, who loved to wallow in dank emotion and feeling and free verse. The crossing over into Symbolism could explain the demands and tension my very expressionistic and determinedly individual mythologising places on the classic forms and structures I like to inhabit. I like to hang loose and play wide within a set of boundaries I know and range like the back of my hand. I like to lair and I am a lair and I inhabit a lair. The 2009 Worlds Lair!
Everybody else ? Stuck in a Romantic phase, or is that a neo classical loop? Hopelessly generic for the most part. Rooted in alkaline, sterile water. Hydroponically suspended in a bowl. Smooth between the legs. Stoppered with dried plaster. With no memory of being able to move.
Being a musician, its tough when the audience thinks they can run the show. Look at the mess such thinkin' has gotten us into!
Upon reflection, after watching football downstairs whilst reading some stories aboiut the late comic genius Peter Cook, (By the by, there were several moments during the game which could have given the commentators the opportunity to portray the events on the field in an Anzac-iacal light. These opportunities being left begging , I must question the patriotic fervour and spirit of said sporting pundits. they are not putting in! Was all that useless slaughter for nothing?) I have come to the conclusion that my vibe, my general thing, is Parnassian. But perhaps that early and late Parnassian the crossed over into Symbolism. Thus allowing the great respect for formal arrangements that characterized the Parnassian as well as the striving for the opaque objectivism and repulsion for their precursors, the Romantics, who loved to wallow in dank emotion and feeling and free verse. The crossing over into Symbolism could explain the demands and tension my very expressionistic and determinedly individual mythologising places on the classic forms and structures I like to inhabit. I like to hang loose and play wide within a set of boundaries I know and range like the back of my hand. I like to lair and I am a lair and I inhabit a lair. The 2009 Worlds Lair!
Everybody else ? Stuck in a Romantic phase, or is that a neo classical loop? Hopelessly generic for the most part. Rooted in alkaline, sterile water. Hydroponically suspended in a bowl. Smooth between the legs. Stoppered with dried plaster. With no memory of being able to move.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
dave graney- LIVE IN HELL- review by la MASCARA
LIVE IN HELL, like its predecessor, "POINT BLANK" is a show we did at the Butterfly Club in Melbourne. the most distinctive thing about performing in the club is that there is ni microphone or PA system or amplification used at all. This is pretty exciting for a performer and singer . Whenever I had to talk up the show to a radio or press person they would always refer to it as "unplugged" or "laidback" when its completely the opposite. With a microphone you cane be intimate and breathy and whispery but without one you have to belt things out , 19th century style.
We used a mic plugged into a small guitar amp for a couple of songs in LIVE IN HELL to give it a little sonic variation. POINT BLANBK was presented with vibes, piano and voice, LIVE IN HELL had Clare Moore on a tiny drum kit (Snare case as a bass drum etc) , Stu Thomas on fuzz Baritone guitar through a tiny amp and Stu Perera on a , luckily, very lou nylon string guitar. We hope to expand the show into a bigger room. POINT BLANK was all my onw songs, LIVE IN HELL was mainly my songs wth some songs by fellow travellers.
This review is about as good a representation/review of Live in Hell as you could get...
"The few fortunate enough to see one of Dave Graney's "Live in Hell" shows at the Butterfly club came away both entertained and enlightened.[I certainly overcame an ennui caused by the sea of banality that we currently swim in.] Neither just a pop hits package nor a lecture from a lectern, the performances were carried by Graney's eloquence and humour, not to mention the considerable contributions by his musical comrades :- the two Stu's (Perera and Thomas) on guitar strings, and the multitalented Moore on glockenspiel,cymbals,snare,melodica,and road case!
A continuation of his earlier cabaret "Point Blank" wherein Graney delved into the nature of performing, "Live in Hell" is purgatory from a performer's perspective. Graney begins by clearing up delusions about deities with a track from his recent album "We Wuz Curious" . "Let's Kill God Again" is not so much an irreligious rant as an appeal to reason. And though the Blues, Rock'n'Roll, and even Jazz have long been labelled "the Devil's music", Graney rejects the very notion of Satan. He chooses Roxy Music's "Bogus Man" to denounce the Devil as just another God-Man construct to frighten us. Later he brings Hell back to the surface with another cover -this time the Fall's "New Face in Hell". The point being that our Hell is here and now not some fanciful fire and brimstone netherworld. He goes on to argue the Devil we fear is other people -using a twisted cover of the Presley hit "One Night with You" which becomes "One Night of sin".
Finally Graney draws on one of his confessed favourite performers- Jim Morrison - reading the Lizard King's "Lament". Though I'm not a fan of this pseudo shaman, Graney uses him to perfectly illustrate a point.ie. By name and nature Rock'n'Roll is about fucking, so Morrison's paean to his penis and the death thereof, expresses the performer's Hell. even Morrison's detractors like his former manager Danny Fields who denounce his poetry as "sophomoric bullshit babble" recognized that pound for pound Jimbo had more cockmeat than most. "He was sexier than his poetry" conceding "he had a big dick". And Morrison's penchant for flopping it out onstage left nothing to the imagination. But to be effective it requires more
than just a willingness to wave your wiener. As evidenced by the success of some eg. Iggy and Lux, and the failure of others eg. GG and Fred - the latter just look pathetic. Morrison combined his cock with a look copped from whip-dancing Warhol/VU sidekick Gerard Malanga to create a wet dream for his hippie fans. So maybe in a flash of peyote-induced clarity, Morrison imagined his own impotence [performance anxiety?] and saw his own Hell ? When it became a reality for the fat and flaccid Door-man, it wasn't long before his corpulent corpse was found bobbing in the bathtub. For a Rock'n'Roll performer onanism isn't an option - though many succumb. Pop music is a veritable magnet for masturbators. Dave Graney knows this and paints his Hell as a sea of wasted "guz" [which we're told is a combination of jiz and diz]. But he needn't worry - his potent performance tonight proves it! "
La Mascara
We used a mic plugged into a small guitar amp for a couple of songs in LIVE IN HELL to give it a little sonic variation. POINT BLANBK was presented with vibes, piano and voice, LIVE IN HELL had Clare Moore on a tiny drum kit (Snare case as a bass drum etc) , Stu Thomas on fuzz Baritone guitar through a tiny amp and Stu Perera on a , luckily, very lou nylon string guitar. We hope to expand the show into a bigger room. POINT BLANK was all my onw songs, LIVE IN HELL was mainly my songs wth some songs by fellow travellers.
This review is about as good a representation/review of Live in Hell as you could get...
"The few fortunate enough to see one of Dave Graney's "Live in Hell" shows at the Butterfly club came away both entertained and enlightened.[I certainly overcame an ennui caused by the sea of banality that we currently swim in.] Neither just a pop hits package nor a lecture from a lectern, the performances were carried by Graney's eloquence and humour, not to mention the considerable contributions by his musical comrades :- the two Stu's (Perera and Thomas) on guitar strings, and the multitalented Moore on glockenspiel,cymbals,snare,melodica,and road case!
A continuation of his earlier cabaret "Point Blank" wherein Graney delved into the nature of performing, "Live in Hell" is purgatory from a performer's perspective. Graney begins by clearing up delusions about deities with a track from his recent album "We Wuz Curious" . "Let's Kill God Again" is not so much an irreligious rant as an appeal to reason. And though the Blues, Rock'n'Roll, and even Jazz have long been labelled "the Devil's music", Graney rejects the very notion of Satan. He chooses Roxy Music's "Bogus Man" to denounce the Devil as just another God-Man construct to frighten us. Later he brings Hell back to the surface with another cover -this time the Fall's "New Face in Hell". The point being that our Hell is here and now not some fanciful fire and brimstone netherworld. He goes on to argue the Devil we fear is other people -using a twisted cover of the Presley hit "One Night with You" which becomes "One Night of sin".
Finally Graney draws on one of his confessed favourite performers- Jim Morrison - reading the Lizard King's "Lament". Though I'm not a fan of this pseudo shaman, Graney uses him to perfectly illustrate a point.ie. By name and nature Rock'n'Roll is about fucking, so Morrison's paean to his penis and the death thereof, expresses the performer's Hell. even Morrison's detractors like his former manager Danny Fields who denounce his poetry as "sophomoric bullshit babble" recognized that pound for pound Jimbo had more cockmeat than most. "He was sexier than his poetry" conceding "he had a big dick". And Morrison's penchant for flopping it out onstage left nothing to the imagination. But to be effective it requires more
than just a willingness to wave your wiener. As evidenced by the success of some eg. Iggy and Lux, and the failure of others eg. GG and Fred - the latter just look pathetic. Morrison combined his cock with a look copped from whip-dancing Warhol/VU sidekick Gerard Malanga to create a wet dream for his hippie fans. So maybe in a flash of peyote-induced clarity, Morrison imagined his own impotence [performance anxiety?] and saw his own Hell ? When it became a reality for the fat and flaccid Door-man, it wasn't long before his corpulent corpse was found bobbing in the bathtub. For a Rock'n'Roll performer onanism isn't an option - though many succumb. Pop music is a veritable magnet for masturbators. Dave Graney knows this and paints his Hell as a sea of wasted "guz" [which we're told is a combination of jiz and diz]. But he needn't worry - his potent performance tonight proves it! "
La Mascara
Sunday, March 23, 2008
sshhhhhhhhh
I am cheered by the lack of notice this page has gotten. It remains an experiment. I shall continue cruising down the river, firing shots into the dense jungle on both sides. shots into the void. It remains pure and unsullied , No distortions or sudden , creepy shadows moving over the page as I write.
I had three hours sleep on Friday night/Saturday morning and then caught a plane to Perh which is two hours backwards on the clock. I stayed in a guest house run by a woman called Sappho. The room had a mezzanine/loft type bed which was accessed via stairs that were as steep as anything in Amsterdam. Very high. I did a two set gig at Mojos, probbaly two hours of playing with my 12 string acoustic. I trialled my new Aphex acoustic exciter which allows you to dial up and blend in "big bottom" and "aural excitement". I believed it and it worked. My wooden , highly strung racing camel had some funk and some zing. I hung on at first and by a few songs in I was taking the reins and flying.
There was a man there who said I had been to school with him. His name was "Deathmore". I'm sure I would have remembered and befriended a name like that. Must have been the chaotic pubic years. The pubic wars.While we talked, my nose started to bleed. I walked down to the beach and stood in the dark listening to the crashing waves and breathing some sea air for about half an hour. I got back to the club and did the gig, feeling vulnerable.
I arrived back at the loft and a little house dog called Hef was jumping up and down to meet me.
I slept like a log and negotiated the climb twice during the night.
The next day I had a lovely breakfast of fruit , coffee, juice and toast and drove to a place called Pinjarra.
It took me three hours to get there. Along the way there was a detour as two helicopters battled some sort of fire in the furtherest Perth/Fremantle suburbs. Helicopters wheeling above the suburban streets picking up water from the sea and dropping it on the blaze. I sat in a jam in endless looping West Australian housing cul de sacs for ages watching the people come out of there houses to look at something actuually happenning and listening to the football. I got to Pinjarra which was a wide spot in the road and then a dead end . I consulted my map and directions and eventually found the venue deep within a real estate operation that seemed to be half finished and still on the drawing boards from the road. I went past the golf club and the winery and the private zoo and the display homes to find the pub. It was said to be beside a river but that was a dry bed behind the trees and down a hollow in the earth.
I played for an hour and a half straight to a crowd of people who sat around on folding chairs or simply laid out on the lawn. It was a lovely day out. Things are really booming out west. Thats how its told to the rest of us and it really seems to be the case.
I had three hours sleep on Friday night/Saturday morning and then caught a plane to Perh which is two hours backwards on the clock. I stayed in a guest house run by a woman called Sappho. The room had a mezzanine/loft type bed which was accessed via stairs that were as steep as anything in Amsterdam. Very high. I did a two set gig at Mojos, probbaly two hours of playing with my 12 string acoustic. I trialled my new Aphex acoustic exciter which allows you to dial up and blend in "big bottom" and "aural excitement". I believed it and it worked. My wooden , highly strung racing camel had some funk and some zing. I hung on at first and by a few songs in I was taking the reins and flying.
There was a man there who said I had been to school with him. His name was "Deathmore". I'm sure I would have remembered and befriended a name like that. Must have been the chaotic pubic years. The pubic wars.While we talked, my nose started to bleed. I walked down to the beach and stood in the dark listening to the crashing waves and breathing some sea air for about half an hour. I got back to the club and did the gig, feeling vulnerable.
I arrived back at the loft and a little house dog called Hef was jumping up and down to meet me.
I slept like a log and negotiated the climb twice during the night.
The next day I had a lovely breakfast of fruit , coffee, juice and toast and drove to a place called Pinjarra.
It took me three hours to get there. Along the way there was a detour as two helicopters battled some sort of fire in the furtherest Perth/Fremantle suburbs. Helicopters wheeling above the suburban streets picking up water from the sea and dropping it on the blaze. I sat in a jam in endless looping West Australian housing cul de sacs for ages watching the people come out of there houses to look at something actuually happenning and listening to the football. I got to Pinjarra which was a wide spot in the road and then a dead end . I consulted my map and directions and eventually found the venue deep within a real estate operation that seemed to be half finished and still on the drawing boards from the road. I went past the golf club and the winery and the private zoo and the display homes to find the pub. It was said to be beside a river but that was a dry bed behind the trees and down a hollow in the earth.
I played for an hour and a half straight to a crowd of people who sat around on folding chairs or simply laid out on the lawn. It was a lovely day out. Things are really booming out west. Thats how its told to the rest of us and it really seems to be the case.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
nice room
I have no idea what the point of a blog is. Who its for etc. I get enough self expression from writing and playing music and guiding that stuff out into open waters or safe looking harbours. I don't think I'll be seeking any software ( of which I'm sure it exists) to alert people of this stuff I'm hanging up here. Here in this lovely, empty room. I have played to empty rooms before.
Everybody likes empty theatres. I mean theatres in the daylight hours. I am treating this as an "audient void" which is a lovely turn of phrase I copped from HP Lovecraft. I take it to mean a listening emptiness. A vacuum like space in which things resonate purely. The room gets a bit of its own character and actually begins to effect the living sounds which are drawn near to it. They become excited as they hover tremulously on the edge of the doorway, the event horizon.
Yes, its nice in here. Hellooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.......
Everybody likes empty theatres. I mean theatres in the daylight hours. I am treating this as an "audient void" which is a lovely turn of phrase I copped from HP Lovecraft. I take it to mean a listening emptiness. A vacuum like space in which things resonate purely. The room gets a bit of its own character and actually begins to effect the living sounds which are drawn near to it. They become excited as they hover tremulously on the edge of the doorway, the event horizon.
Yes, its nice in here. Hellooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.......
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