Australia Day 2011

I’ve had a throat infection for the last week and as a result my voice has taken on a husky, phone-sex operator quality - which makes it interesting to make business calls. It does seem to make it a bit easier to get people to agree to pay their bills though.

It’s kind of strange, don’t you think, that something really gross like a disease with a name like ‘pharyngitis’ can make you more appealing? Well, at least for a brief moment on the phone. After that the sexy voice dissolves into a sort of pubescent teen voice-breaking kind of thing, which has the complete opposite effect.

I live in hope that I will lose my voice completely and will be able to take some time off work. If I’m going to be sick I might as well get something out of it.

It would be good if you could have a time-out from an illness. Tomorrow is Australia Day, and it’s a public holiday. I wouldn’t mind switching off the sore throat for a day so that I can enjoy myself, then turning it back on for work on Thursday so I can stay at home and watch trashy TV while eating ice-cream and claiming that it’s for medicinal purposes.


Tomorrow will be spent, as usual, having the obligatory Australia Day BBQ and listening to the Triple Hottest 100 while trying to ignore the elitist bullshit from the people who think they’re better than everyone else because they listen to Triple J and not ‘those crappy commercial sell-out stations’.

Hey, maybe I’ll be able to use my sexy new voice to convince them to shut the hell up.


2011 is clearly going to be a very cynical year for me.

You too?

I know I’ve mentioned this before, but I feel that it requires another mention today – just because I’ve heard so much about it this week.

I think I am the only person in Australia - possibly even the world - who doesn’t really like U2. They’re playing in Melbourne at the moment and it’s all I have heard about all week.

So while I know no one is going to agree with this, I just want to put it out there that I think U2 is well over-rated. And Bono is really annoying.

Saturday with The New Pornographers

I had the most amazing weekend. Saturday night’s gig was truly awesome – one of the best nights I’ve had in a really long time.


It started at my best friend’s place, where, after the obligatory hour or so of changing into different outfits and finally ending up back in the first thing I put on, we headed outside only to find that it was pouring with rain. We sprinted to the street, trying futilely to cover our hair to prevent the sudden and unwelcome sprouting of a moisture-induced afro. My friend (who we’ll call Kate for the purposes of this story) waved her arm into the road like a crazy woman, and although the rain was much too heavy to see anything, somehow, only seconds later we were seated in the warmth of a taxi, wiping frantically at our hair to stop the explosion of frizz.


The taxi ride was short, but as we neared the venue my excitement grew to a point where I was literally bouncing up and down in the seat like a little kid who knows her birthday presents are about to be handed to her. I guess I’m dorky like that.

As the taxi pulled up outside I was ready to bounce right out of the door, and my insane excitement levels had me tipping the driver way more than a 5 minute car ride deserves – although to be fair it was partially so that I wouldn’t have to carry a bunch of stupid coins around in my jeans pocket.


We headed for the door, but found two burly bouncers blocking the way.

‘Can we see some ID please girls?’ The one that looked a little like Tony Danza on steroids asked.

Slow smiles crept across both our faces. This was a very pleasant start to the night. I can’t even remember the last time someone checked my ID! It was probably about 9 years ago.

‘Thanks’ said buff Tony Danza as he handed me back my license. He gave me what I can only assume he thought was a winning smile.

‘No,’ I told him. ‘Thank you!’


We wandered downstairs, grabbed a couple of beers at the bar and headed towards the stage. Two steps led down into a lowered section right in front of the stage, which was about 5 ½ feet above the floor level. We took up our place on the very top step so that Kate would be able to see over everyone. She’s pretty short and usually finds herself spending an entire gig staring at the back of someone’s head – or in this case it would have been the wall in front of the stage.

It was a fantastic spot, only about 6 metres or so from the stage with a completely unobstructed view. I would have like to be a bit closer, but I can’t complain since Kate agreed to come along not knowing any of the band’s songs.


It was about 9pm, and we had arrived just in time to see the support band, Little Scout. They played for about 45 mins, but although they were really good and the lead singer was adorable, I was eager for them to finish so that The New Pornographers would come on. After Little Scout finished we had to wait an excruciating 30 minutes before they took the stage.

As they all wandered on you could feel the excitement levels of the crowd rising. Everyone pushed forward and I found myself looking down into the massive, crazy hair of what I thought was a guy – until the man next to him grabbed him on the bum and I realised that the he was actually a very strange looking she.

Neko Case took her place on stage looking like she had just gotten out of bed; hair tousled and fluffy, wearing jeans and a hoodie. It made me love her just a little bit. She’s so normal, and her wild hair made me feel a lot better about my own crazy rain-ruined locks. Aussies generally make fun of rangas, but Neko would be the exception to that rule.

And Carl Newman was a lot bigger than I thought he would be. I don’t mean that he was fat; far from it. He was just taller and less weedy than I had imagined him.


They jumped straight into it, and the next 2 hours were filled with the most amazing live music I think I’ve ever heard. Maybe it was just that I like their stuff so much, or maybe it was all the wine and beer I had drunk, but it was just phenomenal. They mostly played their newer songs, but included the more well known tracks off their older albums too. There wasn’t a single song that didn’t have my foot tapping or my body moving.


Part way through the show, an audience member yelled out for them to play ‘Myriad Harbour’. They said they couldn’t, because they didn’t have Dan Bejar there to sing it. Later, when they came out for their first encore, they offered to play it if someone from the crowd would get up on stage and sing it with them. After a couple of moments of waiting, and it looking like no one would do it, a voice yelled out from somewhere behind me

‘Ah fuck it, I’ll do it!’

A cheer went up in the vicinity of the anonymous voice and spread slowly around the room. A guy pushed through the crowd, too short to be seen until he jumped up on stage. After a quick request that someone film it, he sang the entire song with the band – and pretty well, too. The crowd went wild, and cheered so loud and so long that the band came back out and played a second encore.

After the gig, we went to a bar where Kate’s roommate works and had a couple of drinks. Some random Canadian guy bought me a drink because I managed to guess where he was from and because I’d just come from seeing a Canadian band. A drunken Mexican hugged me repeatedly, and a guy who has been trying to hook up with Kate tried continually (and very obviously) to make a good impression on me. Which was wise, after all - because if the best friend likes you, it goes a very, very long way. Especially when it comes to Kate.


At about 2am the bar closed, and I was absolutely exhausted (you know, like I’ve said before - because I’m old and boring). Kate, on the other hand, pretty much never sleeps (because it gets in the way of all the drinking), so she stayed out while I staggered off home, to fall asleep and relive my awesome night over again in my head.

Saturday

On Saturday I’m going to a gig at the Hi-Fi and I’m pretty damn excited about it! I don’t go to a lot of shows – mostly because I’m trying to save my money to get rid of the hideous 70’s brown shag carpet in my house, but also, you know, coz I’m old and boring.

I’m going to see The New Pornographers, a band that I discovered while reading The Neon Lounge.

Despite the fact that I couldn’t find anyone who knew any of their songs all that well, my best friend agreed to come with me, because she’s almost as desperate as I am for something interesting to do.

The beauty of convincing her to come with me is the wonderful convenience of her apartment being within staggering distance of the venue. So it promises to be a good weekend. If only I didn’t have to spend Saturday cleaning out the garage, it would be perfect!


This is one of my favourites off The New Pornographers’ latest album ‘Together’.

Super Show

Best.

Show.

Ever.

The superbox experience may well have ruined me for regular concert-going. We watched the entire concert in comfort from our very own couch, complete with big squashy cushions. A huge glass window covered the entire front of the box, and it slid open and closed so that we could see and hear everything clearly.

An attendant stood by and topped up our glasses whenever they started to look a bit empty, so that half an hour into the show I had no idea how much I’d drunk – although from the difficulty I had making it through the hall to get to the bathroom I’d say it was a fair bit.

And in the bathroom – no lines! I didn’t waste half the night lining up with a hundred other women, which was great because with the amount of booze we consumed, we made quite a few trips to the bathroom.

The music was incredible too – JET and Powderfinger were both amazingly good. I’m more of a JET fan than a Powderfinger fan, so I could happily have listened to another couple of hours of JET, but I was surprised at how familiar the Powderfinger music was to me, and they're fantastic live - probably even better than they are recorded.

The only down side was that the superboxes are pretty far removed from the stage area. It was pretty dark in the Arena, but I managed to grab a few photos on my phone that show how far we were from the action:

Looking out over a sea of people

Watching Powderfinger with 10,000 of my closest friends

So obviously it wasn't quite the same atmosphere as it would have been if we were on the floor, but it was still pretty damn good. I definitely wouldn't turn down tickets if the opportunity came up again in the future.

Super Friday

Tonight I’m going to see Powderfinger play at Rod laver Arena. Yep, I’m all about the concerts lately. No dodgy arm stamps at this one though.

The best thing about this concert is that a friend got us tickets for a Superbox – so instead of being shoulder to shoulder with lots of loud, drunken fans; waiting in queues 100 people long to get a drink or use the toilet; I’ll be sitting up high in my soft, comfy chair having drinks brought to me with a wave of my hand. Or something like that.

Mmmm, corporate goodness

I’m not actually a massive Powderfinger fan as such, although I don’t mind them; but what I am excited about is that the support band is JET! At first I just agreed to go to the concert because KJ really likes Powderfinger, but now I’m actually pretty excited because JET are playing for about an hour as well.


I’m not really sure how the Superbox thing will affect the atmosphere of the concert – it’s about as far removed from the reasonably intimate Whitlams show I went to as you can get. Rod Laver Arena seats about 15,000 people, so it’s a hell of a lot different to a room with a couple of hundred people in it. And I’m not sure if sitting up high in a corporate box will mean that some of the atmosphere of the show is lost on us. There’s something about being in a throng of people all swaying to the same music that makes a show special. Having said that, it’s Friday and I’m incredibly tired because I’m old and boring, so the idea of standing up for 5 hours straight isn’t something I’m all that keen on – atmosphere or no atmosphere. So bring on the comfy chair and drinks service!


My other concern for the night is that we have to leave straight from work to get there, so I need to get ready here before we leave. The problem with that is that there are no mirrors here. Not one single mirror in the entire building. I will have to spend half an hour trying to do my hair and makeup while peering into a tiny little hand mirror. That leaves a lot of room for error. I could find myself with flawlessly straight hair except for one afro section in the back. I could do my makeup perfectly then find that I’ve missed an entire side of my face. Ok, these things are unlikely, but still. It’s pretty damn hard to get ready in a hurry without a mirror.


Because I think it’s nice to share my experiences, here’s a little of what I’m heading to tonight. Close your eyes, stand very close to someone else and sway a little while you play it. See if you can’t fake a bit of the atmosphere that I may miss out on.

Inked Up

On Saturday night a group of us headed out to the Corner Hotel in Richmond to see The Whitlams play. I went and saw them a little while back and they were incredible; such a fantastic band to see live. So when the opportunity arose to see them play one more time before they go on an extended break, I jumped at the chance. It also doesn’t hurt that Tim Freedman is pretty hot.


When we entered the venue, they stamped our wrists with a purple ink stamp of some cute little Snork-like creatures. Nothing unusual about that in itself. What is unusual is that it took me until this morning’s shower to get the damn thing off. I’ve been walking around for 3 days with a smudgy purple Snork couple tattooed across my wrist. I’m not a tattoo kinda girl, but if I was to get one it definitely wouldn’t be a couple of excessively cute cartoon creatures smeared across my wrist. It would probably be something useful, like a couple of lines for a to-do list, or maybe a small map of the city. Possibly some emergency phone numbers, but definitely not a dolphin, rose or random Chinese symbol.

Basically it looked like I’d been to a club and not showered for 3 days.

I’m not entirely sure why my stamp wouldn’t come off, because the two friends who crashed at my place that night woke up next morning with little purple Snorks all over their bodies from where their wrists had touched against them in their sleep. My skin must have some kind of magical ink-retaining properties that other people lack.

Combine this smudgy night-out remnant with the bruises and pin prick marks all over my arms from the hack job of a blood test I had on Saturday morning, and I looked like I spent the weekend at a rave rather than a Whitlams concert. Which is obviously not the case, because I can actually remember my weekend and it was totally drug and techno free - but still lots of fun.

Dance Music, Glam Metal & Boy Bands

The new formula for my life this week:

Illness = Medication = Insomnia = Me in a very grumpy mood today

I guess you could say I woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. I’m in a terrible mood, and there doesn’t seem to be any particular reason other than the fact that sleep is eluding me this week.

I think what might really be getting to me is the fact that having been ill for the past 3 weeks, I’ve barely left the house. I’ve had to cancel a lot of plans and I think I’m going crazy, like a prisoner thrown into solitary confinement for just a little too long.

Even thought going to work isn’t much of a social occasion for me given that every other person in the place is male, I’m even starting to miss that tiny bit of human interaction. Up until the last few days, I haven’t even really had the energy to spend much time online, which means that even online chatting has been out. My lifelong dreams of becoming a hermit are getting closer and closer to becoming a reality.


Luckily, this weekend marks an event in my calendar that no illness could stop – that’s right, it’s Eurovision time again!! This Sunday Night, a group of my friends and family will be coming around for our annual Eurovision party, where we will which the tackiest best musical talent that Europe has to offer.

The best part about watching Eurovision (aside from the complete and utter dagginess of it all) is that it transports you back about 10 or 15 years. For some reason, Europe seems to be a decade behind the rest of the world musically. Obviously there’s the occasional modern song which will usually fail dismally, or something traditional which fares well with the countries located nearby. But there is an overwhelming abundance of what I would call imitation retro music.

Last year’s completion saw a lot of bad 90’s style dance music:



with a bit of what I’m pretty sure is classified as glam metal thrown in:



as well as a few 90’s boy band-ish love ballads (I call this one Danish Ronan Keating):



It was like a trip down memory lane – that is, a trip down a foreign and slightly confusing lane where everything looks sort of familiar, but the signs don’t make any sense and you have no idea where the lane is leading.

As always, I highly recommend that everyone watch Eurovision. It might not be quite as funny since Terry Wogan retired from doing the commentary, but it’s still pretty amusing, and this year should remind you of a lot of music in the early 2000’s.

Now all that is left to be decided is what kind of foreign food I’ll serve at the party. I was angling to make something Norwegian since this year’s competition is being held in Norway, but it turns out that from what I can find, Norwegian food is slightly less than exciting and also pretty heavy on the flatulence inducing ingredients. Not ideal for a small room full of people if you ask me. I’m thinking maybe I can just go with a Scandinavian theme and do a bit of grocery shopping at IKEA. Maybe meatballs will do the trick – they seem appropriate.

I’ll leave you with last year’s winner, a guy that freaks me out because he looks a lot like a boyfriend I had in high school.

Cats

The weekend before the Easter long weekend, I went to see Cats the Musical. I’ve wanted to see it ever since the 80’s. I can remember seeing the ads on TV and hearing all this hype about how great it was and how everyone loved it. I had no idea what the show was about, of course – other than that it was about some Cats. Fair assumption, really. I think that’s probably the extent of most people’s knowledge of the show - that it’s about people prancing around pretending to be cats, and that it was written by Andrew Lloyd Webber. What else do you really need to know about it? It’s a musical after all; everything that you need to know they’ll sing about in the opening number.

One of the main reasons that I’ve wanted to see it for so long is that in the 80’s, you couldn’t go a week without hearing someone singing ‘Memory’ . You can’t hear something that regularly and not have it stick with you. It’s a pretty good song as far as musical numbers go, so I figured the rest of the show to be just like that – A lot of pretty good (if slightly 80’s-ish) musical numbers.

No such luck. It turns out Memory was the only song that was written from scratch for the musical. Everything else is just a bunch of TS Eliot poems set to music. What the hell! That’s just lazy! The poems themselves are reasonably amusing, but you can’t just string a bunch of poems together with some vague attempt at a plot so you can actually call it a story.

The costumes were phenomenal. The set was impressive. The choreography was great. The show, however, was terrible. There was no real plot. It was basically just a bunch of cats introducing themselves through long, drawn out songs that I couldn’t understand the words to.
I’m not sure if maybe I would have liked it more if I had of known what it was about before I saw it, but I didn’t, and because it was so hard to understand what they were singing about it was two of the most confusing hours I’ve spent in a long time.

At one point, the stage was full of people pretending to be cats pretending to be dogs and I couldn’t understand a single word of what they were banging on about – so it was really just a bunch of people in spandex with cardboard boxes on their heads chanting and occasionally barking like dogs. You don’t have to pay money to see that; you just have to find the right area of Melbourne and you’re bound to come across someone doing it for free.

So it was a total waste of time and money really. How sad. It did, however, confirm for me that my days of being amused by musicals are well and truly done.

What the....?

I heard this song on the radio when I was out yesterday and at first I thought it was a joke - but it's not. How sad.



I couldn't find a link to the official video, but I picked this one because it shows the lyrics on it, so you can see how truly deep they are.


EDIT: I found the official video here. Crazier than the song. I recommend you don't watch it, as it's 10 minutes of your life that you'll never get back. But if you do watch it, could someone please explain to me what the hell it's all about!?

Kookaburras at Work

I think it’s kind of funny that it took a court case to decide if Men at Work’s song ‘Down under’ ripped of the kids folk tune ‘Kookaburra Sits in the Old Gum Tree’. It’s pretty damn similar. And considering that the video clip for the song features a guy sitting in a gum tree playing the riff on a flute (check it out on the video, about 55 seconds in), I can’t imagine it took the judge long to find them guilty of copyright infringement.

It’s also odd that it took them 29 years to realise the song had been ripped off – especially since ‘Down under’ was such a massive number one hit, and not just in Australia. But I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – Aussies are essentially super lazy, and so I’m guessing they probably just couldn’t be bothered until now.

I say they did us all a favour by turning an irritating song that we were forced to sing over and over in primary school into something that we can all enjoy listening to again. Thanks Men at Work!

Australia Day Awesomeness

Soooo.... Australia Day Awesomeness. I promised it, and I shall deliver. I may have been a little bit misleading by calling it that – I don’t mean that I will necessarily deliver awesomeness myself, but I will definitely deliver something about the Australia day awesomeness that I was involved in.


I like to think of myself as quietly patriotic, much like most Aussies. That truly is the Australian way – we love our country so much; but the part we love the most is the laid back attitude, so our patriotism is usually conveyed without moving from the lounge room sofa. Australia Day is generally celebrated as such, mostly involving sitting in the sun all day doing as little as possible while enjoying the things we like to consider the truly Aussie traditions.

We’re only a very young country, so our traditions aren’t quite steeped in history the way traditions of other countries are. Our traditions mostly involve relaxing and enjoying life. BBQ’s, beer drinking, backyard cricket and the hottest 100 form the basis of our Australia Day celebrations and that’s exactly the way I spent my day - minus the cricket, of course. I think I’ve well and truly made my thoughts on sport & exercise in general known by now.


After debating what radio station to listen to, I did end up listening to the Triple J hottest 100 after all. My best friend came around and we sat outside in the sun, listening to the countdown and drinking beer. I chose to drink Crown Lager, because it seemed fitting to drink a beer that was originally only available to visiting dignitaries but after being released to the public has been embraced in truly Australian fashion by being given a good Aussie nickname. So I drank ‘Crownies’ all day.

The countdown was followed by an awesome Paul Kelly tribute concert, which apparently was filmed/recorded back in November of last year somewhere here in Melbourne. It’s a shame because if I’d known about it I definitely would have gone along. I’m not a massive fan of Paul Kelly as such; I probably wouldn’t go out of my way to go to a Paul Kelly concert, but he is an amazing songwriter and hearing some of his songs performed by other artists was pretty cool. There are a few that really need to be sung in his very unique voice, but it was otherwise a great show.

We rounded out the day by watching Aussie Comedian Carl Barron on the Comedy channel. I just about wet myself laughing, which is much better than the traditional ‘wet-yourself-from-drinking-too-much’ that can generally follow an Australia Day celebration.



So that was my Australia day awesomeness. I’ll end by sharing some highlights of my day - the number one song in the hottest 100 countdown, one of my favourite performances from the Paul Kelly Tribute and a bit of Carl Barron.

Happy (belated) Australia Day everyone!

Australia Day 2010

It’s the Monday morning before a public holiday, and because of the fact that I’ve run out of annual leave, I’m pretty much the only person in Australia who’s working. So I’m using that time wisely to do things like update my blog, and surf the web. So I guess I’m working just about as hard as everyone else. Ah well, it’s the Australian way.


Tomorrow is Australia Day, which really means we get the day off to have a BBQ and listen to one of the myriad of music choices available on the day. The big one is the Triple J Hottest 100 which is counted down every year on Australia Day. Triple J is Australia’s big alternative music station, and I hold a kind of secret hatred for it because much like Mac users, Triple J listeners are interminably smug. They are over the top anti-commercial-radio, which annoys the hell out of me, because every comment they make seems as though it’s designed to put you down for daring to listen to anything else.

It’s a shame really, because they play a lot of good music, but the attitude of the average Triple J listener really puts me off. My best friend is a Triple J listener and she complained nonstop when she had to stop listening to the countdown in order to go out to a hen’s night drink-a-thon that she wasn’t even paying for!


Anyway, enough of my ranting about Triple J. The other radio stations are all doing best of Australian music countdowns, which I’m looking forward to because there is a hell of a lot of awesome Australian music that, as demonstrated in my previous posts, I mostly had no idea was Aussie.

So I suggest that even if you don’t live in Australia, you should spend tomorrow cooking some lamb chops on the BBQ, drinking beer and listening to some good, Aussie music.

Don't listen too closely

This morning on the way to work I counted no less than seven songs to which I was singing made-up words. Not just lyrics that could possibly fit into the song, but entirely made up words to replace words that I couldn’t make sense of. This brought me to a very sudden realisation – Because I make up weird sounds and just blab them in time to the music, I have absolutely no idea what half of the songs I listen to are really about.

I think this might be the key to liking all music, because if you get too caught up in the lyrics, it might put you off what is really a great melody. It also explains my dislike of Grunge music, because it all sounds so whinge-ey that you just tune it out like you would a whinging person. But even when you tune it out you know that that dull sound in the background is still someone complaining, so it's just annoying rather than appealing.


After I realised I was making up words, I actually tried quite hard to make out the lyrics in the songs I was listening to. This turned out to be a big mistake.

I turned on the radio and Bryan Adams ‘Run to you’ came on. While it’s not something I would listen to very often, I know the song well enough to sing a few of the lyrics and make up the rest. This morning, I actually listened to the lyrics and decided that I don’t like the song at all any more. What was a catchy tune that I could sing randomly along to turns out to be a song about a guy that is screwing around!! I can’t get on board with the whole idea of cheating on someone you love, so there’s no way I can like a song like that. If it comes on the radio again, I’m going to have to turn it off.

Now I’m too paranoid to listen too closely to my favourite music, in case, like Bryan Adams, they all turn out to be cheating jerks.I think i'll jsut stick with making words up and be happy with that.

Liza with a Z

Sunday night was the Liza Minnelli concert – you’ll have to forgive me for waiting until today to post about it, because a few post-concert drinks meant that I wasn’t really feeling up to coherent sentences yesterday.

The concert was excellent and horrifying all at once. You could tell that she is (or was) a proper entertainer of 1950’s influence. I guess with Judy Garland as a mother you couldn’t help but be influenced by that era.

The show was excellent because even at 63 years of age, Liza can still perform and can still entertain a crowd. But it was horrifying because at 63 years of age, the inability to show even the faintest wrinkle on your face is just creepy.

In the opening numbers, I was horrified by the skeletor-like grin on her face - a woman shouldn’t be able to smile and show all of her teeth without creating even a few tiny wrinkles. Then after a song or two, Liza seemed incredibly breathless and was panting heavily. I became increasingly paranoid that she was going to keel over on stage. I was convinced that I had come to the show where Liza was going to drop dead on stage, and while that would have been memorable, it’s not something that I wanted to happen.

I guess it was a weird concert for me because her age, illnesses and show biz lifestyle have taken their toll, and I think a lot of what people enjoyed about the show is what they remember of Liza at her peak. For someone who hasn’t followed her career right through, it was more like an echo of something better. A lot of her high notes were lost and her lisp a lot more pronounced than I ever recall it. But she still knows how to keep a crowd entertained, and in amongst it all there were a few fantastic moments – in particular when she sang ‘New York, New York’ to a standing ovation.

It was a chance that I’ll never have again, so I’m glad that I went along. Sometimes it’s nice to go to the sorts of things that you wouldn’t have gone to on your own.


In unrelated news, entries for the Photo5 comp are due by the end of the week, so I might be a little absent this week as I rush around taking last minute shots. I've only finished 2 out of the 5 briefs so far, so I have quite a bit to do still. Wish me luck!

Life is a Cabaret

In a giant cliché, this Sunday I am going with a gay friend to see Liza Minnelli in concert.

This isn’t something I planned to do – Liza Minnelli wasn’t exactly top of my list of entertainers to see in concert - but my friend bought himself a couple of tickets as a birthday present and his partner is currently overseas, so I’m taking his place.

It should be good. I don’t mind music like this. In fact I’ve yet to come across a form of music that I don’t like – with the exception of some grunge music (in particular Nirvana, who I think are the most over rated band in history) and that weird rainforest/pan flute/bird noise sort of music that is supposed to help you sleep but really just induces a subconscious fear of being eaten by large carnivorous birds.

We had to watch Cabaret back when I was at high school and I quite liked the music – it was catchy – it made you want to kick your legs in the air and strut around. That’s pretty typical of show tunes-ey type music I think.

Luckily, I don’t think there will be room at Rod Laver Arena for that sort of thing.

Remastered

The release of the Beatles’ remastered Albums has meant that all day today it’s been non-stop Beatles music on the radio, which has been awesome. Since i got into the car to come to work this morning it’s just been one big Beatles-fest. The only problem with this has been that since I arrived at work and put the radio on, the guy who sits opposite me has been whistling along to every single song from start to finish.

Not cool. If there’s anything that could ruin a day of the Beatles, it’s being trapped in a 4m x 4m room with a man who whistles incessantly. Seriously, who whistles the ‘Na Na Na Na’ section of Hey Jude? And what kind of person can whistle for six hours straight without getting some kind of mouth cramp?!?

This new release of CD’s seems like as good a time as any to replace my copy of the White Album, which I lost in a bet to a friend quite a few years ago. It wasn’t even an interesting bet that I could blog about; it was just something stupid that I can only vaguely recall now.

Even better, I might go home and listen to the record, because no matter how cool digitally remastering something is, nothing will ever sound as good as that scratchy old record noise that somehow makes the music all seem more real.

Wonderful Weekend

I had the most amazing time on the weekend. The Whitlams were phenomenal. Tim Freedman is such a fantastic live singer, I felt like I could have been listening to an album in my own home – I mean, aside from the fact that I was pressed up against a thong of half drunken strangers with barely enough room to sway to the music. That doesn’t usually happen at home.

So my concerns about keeping up with my best friend’s champion drinking ability were well founded - It turns out that I really am a cheap drunk, and that all it takes is 3 beers to get me to a very jolly stage of drunkenness. It might sound a bit sad, but it’s very budget friendly, so I don’t mind too much. It does make me wonder what has changed over the last decade to decrease my tolerance for alcohol, but I’m just going to put it down to the fact that I don’t drink as much as I used to.

The friend who I went to the Whitlams concert with has recently moved into a shared apartment in the city, which is where I spent the night after the show. It’s such a different world to where we live. She lives in a three bedroom apartment, with one very small shared living/dining/kitchen area. It really struck me what a different sort of lifestyle you lead when you live in the middle of the city. Three of them share this one small space – none of them have a car, they catch public transport everywhere. They very infrequently cook, instead eating out most nights. They go out drinking three or four nights a week, they all work odd hours.

Now this might be a weird thing to say, but the apartment sounded really strange. It had that sort of dull nothingness sound – the quiet hum of thick concrete walls and ventilated air. I’m not used to that, because we live in the very outer suburbs where there is a lot of fresh air and light and space - and also a lot of really irritating dogs barking all the time. I expected to ehar a lot of city noise, but there wasn’t really anything at all, just an odd absence of noise with the occasional distant cough coming through.

It was really interesting, because it’s so different from the way KJ and I live, and despite the fact that I don’t think I could ever do it long term, I did enjoy it for the short time that I was there. I liked the convenience of everything. For us it’s a good 30-40 minute drive to get to the city, so if we want to do something different, it’s a big deal rather than just a stroll down the road. It would be nice to be able to find a hundred things to do on a Saturday night all within walking distance.
I might have to go and visit her more often.


I thought I’d leave you with a Whitlams song so that you could get a glimpse of what my awesome weekend was like.