龍の家 - House of the Dragon

In the morning I felt fine, embarrassed, and stupid. Man, what a waste and I was a waste. Better be more careful. I drank nothing but water and soft drink until about three in the afternoon and stayed away from the green demons out there, and there were plenty of them. I also made a real effort to see more bands, and so I was there at the front of the stage from the start of the day.

Plastic Palace Alice opened up the tent stage for the day and everyone there was sprawled on the ground, chilling out with bottles of water and breakfast from the food vendors just outside. The band were slightly avant garde, slightly pop, and a little bit folk, like if Belle and Sebastian had grown up in North Fitzroy. It was a little slow for dancing, but then again, no-one felt like dancing. I shall keep an eye out for these fine kids again.

Most of the people in the tent were there to check out the next band up. Brisbane’s very own The Go Set, replete with bagpipes and mandolin, serve up Aussie flavoured Dropkick Muphys slash Flogging Mollys head kicking anthems, but with a pronounced Scottish bent. From the stomping pace to the synchronised jumps, they had all the kids on their feet and dancing, before wrapping it up and wilting with the rest of us. Any time, boys.

Outside, the big stage started with the rock antics of Young and Restless, but it was too early and too hot for that, it’s right out of an inner city pub on a cold night, kids with spiky collars and dyed black hair. The same curse hit Mammal and Horsell Common, both purveyors of more-than-competent rock (I think I’ve read articles about both bands use the phrase “post-grunge”, but I’m still no closer to cracking that particular code) and at the right temperature, both bands would kick some serious arse. But the winds was no longer coming off the ocean but from the dry north and pushed the atmosphere from fun to punishing. No relief could be found, not inside a tent, not under cover, not at the bottom of a can, not in the bar, mist tent, water tap, anywhere. This is the kind of weather that brings the crazy out, that makes sane folk go nuts for want of relief, and I knew it would be getting violent sooner rather than later. Till then, it would mean doing what we could, and getting sunburned in the face of whatever post-grunge is would not be part of this. We retired to hang with people who could provide shade and conversation.

When the middle of the day had passed it was time to get back to feel out the music again. Still too hot to handle, but I had to see these next acts. British India were fantastic, churning out Velvet Underground on speed tunes, while The Matches are only a decent radio hit from going stratospheric. It’s an odd story, given the pedigree that produced their last album (we’re talking the likes of Brett Gurewitz and Mark Hoppus here) that means almost no-one had heard of them before now, despite being around for a few years in a climate most suited to their success. Locally you are made or broken by radio airplay, and as Triple J become less and less important on this scene, getting a track on one of the mainstream rock networks becomes almost necessary to get by now. If these boys, young, well dressed and good looking, can ramp up their radio-friendliness – every percentage point that goes up, their number of fans will grow exponentially. I can feel it, and they deserve it. The fans who came out to see them probably didn’t know all that much of their stuff, but they played their little American butts off as the sun set right into their eyes and we rejoiced as it finally left us alone. They tore into every song and made more than a few friends on the way. Watch out it they hit your town someday.

The sun was gone and it was time to drink again. Donnie Las Vegas showed up, and questions were asked, and certain elements came into play. It would transpire that the rest of the year, and the first few hours of the next, would be chemically enhanced, as the wonderland came upon us in white powder and colourful little pills. We all took our share, and spent the rest of the night on the same page, the same level, even if we weren’t in the same place.

Shihad came on and took us all apart. That’s just what they do, smash people into small pieces, and rebuild them into rock and roll warriors. On records they come close occasionally to recreating the experience, but Shihad are a live band and tear it up like no-one else. They did not fail this time either, sending the crowd into violent spasms of righteous joy. Then it was You Am I’s turn, as Timmy Rogers and co stumbled out to play their way into our hearts. They’re always a rough proposition at that time of night, because everything revolves around how drunk Tim is at the time. And it was new year’s eve, and it was the second last band of the night, and Tim was on a knife’s edge. And there was this voice in the back of my head telling me, throw your shoe at him. Go on, clock him one, smash him good, take him down for rock and roll… And ignore this voice, I did, because they were rocking hard. Old stuff, some of the newer stuff, but classics all the way, and they had no choice but to play Berlin Chair. They did all this, and in an attempt to quiet the voice that would make me barefoot, I threw my two water bottles at him instead. One went long and took out Rusty, the other merely brushed the singer, and this served only to inflame the rage. One would have it that I took off my footwear in a fiery moment and took his bony white are down, while another would say I didn’t. Yet another saw a vodka bottle being filled with urine and hurled in his direction, while the filler and thrower’s identity remain safely anonymous. Either way, Tim took a hit to the head and flipped off the crowd, who did cheer – some reports later said this caused the band to leave early, others yet said they played on and left a raucously happy crowd in their wake. Who really knows what goes on in those happy moments of delirium, fuelled as they are by mystery and mysterious substances? I surely don’t, and hey, I was there, man.

Hilltop Hoods came on and the mood was so good by that point I didn’t care it was them bringing in the new year. In fact, it sounded awesome. Way awesome. I don’t know their shit, but I do now. They did the honours and the night was still young, the dance tent was set to go off and things were only just beginning to peak. Off we ran into the night, seeing things several steps ahead of time, and then minutes, and then hours flew over, faces, people, feelings, dancing, everyone was there, my little brother the young conscience, the Mount Eliza girls, testament to everything we are not, Donnie Las Vegas, the cackling Cheshire Cat, grinning up there with the very mood in the sky. Beats turned to light and colour turned to sound, I was wet and sweaty, then dry and happy, buzzing on the ground, my legs suddenly giving up and the tension of three days came back and said, ok man, you can hang here, but the dancing part of the night is over.

I kept a lazy eye on my brother, and eventually people called in to go hang at the campsite. I wasn’t so talkative anymore, in fact, talking was the last thing on my mind. I was commanded to chill and reflect, to bring it in easy, just like the new year. I brought everything in easy, told all the girls it had been an honour to party with them, and stumbled off to watch the sun rise over Bass Straight. It was, in a word, devoid of hyperbole, epic.

I want to end this here, and give Soldier Of The Party awards out to all involved, from the guys who stole a bottle of Jagermeister from their passed-out neighbours and drank it in an hour, warm, to the guy I argued about You Am I with for an entire hour as Donnie’s camp site. All of them deserve it, and that would be an ending. But we had to take down the camp site and get it all in the ute and get out of there. But with everyone doing the same thing at the same time, the line was outrageous, and with nought but a single dirt road going out of there, it would take a while. From start to home, it was about a six hour effort. Six long, un-air-conditioned hours. At the end of it, a shower, finally, a shower.

I hope you all had good times. I hope I have more good times this year, and I hope I have plenty with all you too. Here’s to it gentlemen, here’s to two thousand and eight.

My god, is it the future already?

I braved ill weather, and treacherous roads just for the chance to gaze into your dark eyes on the dance floor and shake my rumpus in your attendance, yet again (Held you in my arms in public twice this week! What a blistering pace!). A thousand bounds did my heart leap when I saw you parade through the glass reception at Las Palmas last night. A thousand leagues my heart did drop with the poor atmosphere of my work environment, and the selection of songs I sang in your presence. After you left, I found a number of songs I would have rather sung whilst you were in earshot.

With the determination of a suitor's spirit did I deflect the back-handed insult flung at me by the voluptuous Dominique. Did you notice the half-a-boob my camera captured in New Years Eve 004?? She basically called me a band geek in front of you at Palmas. I baited her to see how far she would go with her assumptions, and held back a sharp, stinging retort to prove my humility to you. Truth is: I was never in band. Yes, I play lots of instruments. Not only did I play drums in a punk rock band and tour the West Coast of the United States at the tender age of 19, I also was a part of the Kambara Taiko group and played amongst falling cherry blossoms at the foot of Mt. Fuji. "Actually Dominique, I played the clarinet. I meet twice a week at the cultural center with fellow musicians that wear glasses and are nerdy looking just like me. We discuss Nietzsche over green tea, and toot each other's horns!" You can believe that she would not be making the same shallow assumptions if she had met me in a mahjong parlor with the homies in Nagoya where we could have turned her out to walk the streets as a prostitute seconds upon greeting. No, I am not insulting your friend, she did get the drum thing right. I'm just saying that...oh, probably said too much already.

I called earlier in the day to ask if you take wine with your meal. Furiously cleaning the house in anticipation of your Tuesday arrival. On the menu is KATSU CURRY. Deep-fried pork cutlets served over a bed of sturdy English-style curry and white rice. If it was up to me, I would like to have you over for dinner BOTH Monday and Tuesday. Why should I have to choose one or the other? My intentions are honorable, I expect nothing in return except your fair company. After all, only hours remain before you depart this wretched land in search of new experiences. I want to put my best foot forward in an attempt to secure my name in your psyche as you prevail in your work on the other side of the Willamette Pass.

Oh, you got me writing crazy. Apologies if this message strikes you as queer. I like to work with words. Who can tell where my inspiration will come from?? Be it the drunken distresses of widower despair, or in the desperate calls of a sweet maiden's hand...I have to act upon it. Be safe traveling to and from Medford. Laterz.

Day two dawned, and it was already thirty degrees by eight am. Everyone on the campsite made two pilgrimages before the music had even begun. The first to line up and use the toilets (not much of a wait) or for the less adventurous, the showers (made the line for the bar look like the line for the Flock of Seagulls reunion tour ticket line). It goes without saying that showers in such times are for the weak, but that didn’t stop the less strong willed from succumbing to the pleasures of a clean body. The other trek was to go get ice at the bar to refill those eskies full of smuggled alcohol. It was a procession of people with bags of ice, and it was oh-so-cooling to carry. Then it was time to get some music on.

There were two stages, the main stage and a smaller stage under a tent. The tent was bearable because it also provided shade, even if it was still hot as all hell in there. Standing out in the open was nothing short of insane, especially if you don’t know the band too well, or at all. New things and open minds and all that, that’s one thing, but frying and going insane (and potentially getting pretty damn sick) just won’t make it happen. It’s a good thing my brother came with the right attitude, that the music was secondary to the experience of being there, and so we cruised past and only caught glimpses of the Dardanelles and the Exploders. Both bands were cool and deserved more attention than we could give, but it was way too early for the quasi stoner rock stylings of the Dardanelles and just too damn hot for the straight up rock of the Exploders – but watch those names, they’ll be worth seeing some other time.

My brother had other friends there and we went to see them, and back to hang with our neighbours, and to get well on the way to oblivion. We eventually went through half the slab of beer on that first day, it being a little hot to hit the hard stuff before the sun went down, and I spent a lot of time being amused by the antics and constant chatter of the Mount Eliza trash bag girls, as they powered ahead with their schedule of getting fucked up. They weren’t even up for seeing any bands that first day – so all they had was the party. More power to them.

Eventually it came time to go see Airborne. This is one band who will never fail to rip it up, and no matter what the situation, crowd or vibe, they play as hard as they can. And the crowd goes absolutely nuts, they lose their shit when they do their thing. It was on for young and old – the music sounds like AC/DC and the high point was watching Joel scale the scaffolding at the side of the stage – guitar attached. The low point was running into the circle pit of idiots, who were having the time of their lives tearing off the shirts of anyone who fell into their circle of terror. I found out too late, when one shithead grabbed me by the back of my grey singlet and ripped as hard as he could. It didn’t rip off completely, but was hanging on barely. I bought that singlet at Uniqlo nearly six years ago for the princely sum of one thousand yen and it has served me admirably since then. It didn’t look a day older than when I bought it and never let me down. Vale. And fuck you to the guy who destroyed it. He left two huge red lines across the side of my neck where the seams caught and still refused to rip. Badges of honour.

After the band I headed to the merch tent to replace my shirt. I was going to wait til the next day to make a choice on the merch, but my hand had been forced.

Next up were Kisschasy, Frankston’s favourite sons. The local crowd were way into it, they loved it, we sat back in the shade and watched the show of love for the local boys. I felt like they were channelling a strong Saves The Day vibe, but it got a pass mark from me. As they played out their last song (the hit single, duh) who should walk by but the God of Party himself, none other than Donnie Las Vegas. The missing ingredient had been found.

The bands in between there and the evening’s big names were blown off to go drink with Donnie and his crew. They had arrived that morning and had ended up with the camp site way at the back, so far from the stage they might as well have not been there. But they had more than enough shade to go around and a stereo with an iPod plugged in, so the scene was easy. We sat back and drank JB and Coke and applied sunscreen lotion every twenty minutes, and moved when the sun did. Still we got burned, still we suffered, and still we got drunk. Way drunk. We didn’t bother going for the water every other drink like we should have and when it came time to move to our camp site and then onto the music, it was more a stagger. By the time we got there I was gone, and still I kept drinking, and as the sun went down the harder edge stuff came out, and I went away for the night.

I still feel bad for missing the bands.

The first thing to do in our situation is get friendly with the neighbours. One, they have shade. Two, we did not. Our camping setup consisted on two one-man dome tents, two folding chairs, a rug straight out of the seventies, two eskies and the ute. Did we think about the sun? The total lack of natural shade? Fuck no. We had the inside of our tents, but it was stifling in there, what breeze was coming didn’t get inside. The people all around us had bigger tents, gazebos, all sorts of shade manufacturing devices. We would have to cozy up with them to survive.

So we did. The three girls next to us borrowed my airbed pump, and as such broke the ice for us. The turned out to be massive stoners, which is always fun. Next to them was a gaggle of Mount Eliza girls. Mount Eliza is a far, far outer suburb, so far out I rarely deign to call it part of my city. It is situated in a very picturesque part of the Mornington Peninsula and, as such, is possibly the most expensive suburb in the area. But Mount Eliza rich is a far different breed to inner city leafy suburb rich. It drives a nice car, but eighteen year old daughter snorted a monster line of dirt speed and crashed it into a Saab last week. It has more than enough disposable income to get the latest fashions, but gets them from Sportsgirl, not Prada. It went to a good school, but couldn’t quite get the marks to go to a good uni. That’s what was camped next to us. There were nine of them, and they had big expensive tents with buttloads of shade and welcomed us in. Score.

They all spent the next three days inhaling, drinking, snorting and smoking every synthetic substance they could get their hands on. They all had raspy voices and where inexplicably broad across the shoulders – hormones from chicken eggs? Mommy was on steroids when breast feeding? Who the fuck knows what goes on out that way? At nineteen, they were almost all bigger than me and had taken far more substances than I ever considered. They were all pretty damn fine looking, too, but were well on their way to some pretty severe beer guts. Proto-Peninsula People. We hung out with them when there was any amount of down time, and on that first day there was more than enough, with the bands not starting until the next morning. So we hung out with these genuine trash bags, then went to check out the stage.

It was set up right at the end of the island with the best sea view. The breeze was coming off the ocean from the south and that was what made the heat almost bearable. A couple of shade cloths were set up around the place, but it would turn out to not be nearly enough as the temperature was closer to forty than thirty after that; the sight of every square centimetre of shade occupied with people was striking, but conceivably I can’t imagine where more shade tents could have gone, without compromising views or safety. In the end, the battle against the heat became more about survival, keeping hydrated the challenge. Plenty of drinking water was on offer as well as a mist tent, free sunscreen lotion at the info tent and bags of ice being sold at the bar for the campers. Previous years had seen some pretty big logistical problems, mostly coming from getting all those cars in and out, but also a lack of food options and toilet lines. No such problems here, just the heat to deal with. When night came on day one, the change was almost instant, the heat disappearing to be replaced with a chilly night. No cloud cover means all that heat goes away, but it did mean drinking without fear of severe dehydration. All this was getting to me, having slept all of four hours the previous two nights, and I was in my tent and out by midnight.



2007, So Long

AWARDS NIGHT

Two awards will be won tonight. This will leave a lot of pain out there, because I know the many eyes on this column wait all year to hear what gets anointed as the best of the year – and this time, I couldn’t hardly give a care about depth in analysis, I just want to hand over the trophies and get on with it, leaving last year to mellow in the toilet of time before someone flushes it all away.

Fuck this, who does he think he is? Just because he had a bad year doesn’t mean he can get away with not putting any more effort into this. What a tool.

First up, track of the year. Whatever one song turned me on the most. Doesn’t have to be a single, just one track from somewhere that did it just right. As it turns out, this gem comes from an album I don’t even really like all that much. Some of it is good, some great, some downright annoying – but that’s just how the band does it, outside the template, outside genres, outside conventions. They’re always going to miss the marks of expectation and ask questions. I don’t like it all, but what I love, I love.

One song, from the whole year? I can’t take this anymore.

So come on down, LCD Soundsystem, it’s all yours. ‘All My Friends’ comes in with a twitchy piano line, not looping, not quite right, but moving around, twisting but staying the same, and in come the words. Are we still here, in this place? It’s the morning after and the music is still playing, are we awake or not? We’re not as young as we once were, guys, maybe it’s time to leave all this behind. What did we get out of it? And just enough time to contemplate each line between thoughts, and think, yeah, I might be burning out here, that line about taking the first five years to get with the plan and the next five years trying to be with your friends again – was it all really worth it? And more time to think between call outs and one liners and introspections, then you come around and it’s all, my God it was worth it, and when he gets to the part about not trading one bad decision for another five years of life, well, you know what he means. We went hard and we’re not sure if we went home, but where are my friends tonight? Where are your friends tonight? And there’s no realisation, no answers, just more questions on top of questions, and an urge to give it one last spin around. The piano is still going, right to the end, and you know it’s coming back on at some point in the coming week, because the track is right in the middle of the album. Things don’t ever stop there.

Holy fuck.

Album of the year was tough, but I had to make a call and sentiment wins out over happy times. I like a good story, and a whole album of stories just makes me wet. When the title is from a Jack Kerouac novel (‘On The Road’, no less) it gains even more points from me. I hadn’t heard of The Hold Steady before this, but I’ll be sitting up and paying attention from here on in. Boys & Girls In America channels equal parts Kerouac and Springsteen, filtered through every bar worthy of a set from New York to LA. It’s an album that rolled up early to the show to catch the band on the way in and stayed back to chat to t he local kids. Some nights it stayed and got shitfaced in the bar, others it walked aimlessly through the streets of whatever town it had ended up in, only half wondering if it might get in trouble, keeping half an eye out for a story to tell on stage tomorrow night. The kids in every suburb, every little corner off the freeway, all have kids like the ones in these songs.

They might not go through some of the things the protagonists deal with – the girl who can pick the winners of horse races in ‘Chips Ahoy’ stands out as the uncommon story – but we can all relate to the kids who party too hard in ‘Chillout Tent’ or the massive nights of ‘Massive Nights’, as everything comes through the Sal Paradise eyes of Craig Finn’s voice, more teller of stories than life of the party, looking out for the Dean Moriatys out there. And there’s plenty of them, ordinary, normal, special days, bad days, we’re there the whole way. That’s why this was my favourite album of 2007.

Is your washing done? Maybe a few dirty dishes in the sink? Could be you missed a sock at the bottom of the dirty washing pile, or maybe at the back of your bag somewhere? How about the housework, did you vacuum the carpet and scrub the toilets? Because if you did, if you’ve done any of these things, you either had a less epic new years than me, or are currently resident in a country where the Chinese variety is the preferred flavour. I was just going to tell you all about it, but then I remembered, I went to a music festival. And as you’ll see, the music was far from the main event, but still, this is where we review shit like that. Come pull your chairs around and have a listen. You might want to prepare a damp cloth, a few bandages and, at very least, a nice cold drink.

Christmas this year was almost reduced to an annoyance. As it stands, I have less to do with it than ever before, meaning as little to me as Ramadan or Hanukah or whatever else might be out there. If anything, my total disdain for the absolute commercialism (unseen in these parts by these eyes in some five years) made me physically ill, and on top of that the ten percent of total related coverage that is about any religious aspects – well, that just pisses me off. But I persevere and keep it to myself, and like a good boy scout, I go home to see my family and give presents and get presents and in the back of my head, calculate how much in the red or black I ended up. It can’t be stopped. I ensured I took away mostly things I will need and came out ahead.

An event like this is accompanied by a road trip home. I hate that town, more than life itself. If my family didn’t live there, I would never go back, except maybe to burn it to the ground and salt the earth once the flames had died. Christmas Eve I twisted my back lifting a slab of beer at the supermarket and spent the next three days in pain, unable to sit back in a chair or lie on my back. I didn’t complain, I just took it. Thursday night came around and my little brother went to hang out with some of his friends and I went with him, because I knew some of them. We ended up at some random house, a friend of mine was living there, but apart from him I didn’t know anyone else there. Nor did I need to. It was the run of the stereotype brigade, from the high school failure in the dead end job guys to the pregnant with kid number two while kid number one runs around unsupervised and all before the age of twenty-two girls and all manner of deadbeat in between. Let’s face it, if you are still in a place like that, no matter what you do with your life, you’re a failure. Holding anything back? Never.

Thursday ended in some genuine rejuvenile drink-like-a-sixteen-year-old style antics. I might have pissed in a backyard fountain. I might not have. There was about four hours of sleep in there somewhere, before lunch, a final goodbye to my parents and we packed up the ute and got on the road for the long drive back to the city. It hadn’t been too hot the week gone, but the mercury was past the thirty degree mark, and the humidity was negligible. Hot, dry, dusty, punishing. All this wouldn’t be an issue if the ute had air conditioning. Three hours later and there was roadwork being done on the West Gate Bridge. Traffic was at a crawl. Two city-bound lanes were closed and everything was just squeezing through like honey out of the freezer. This wouldn’t have been a huge problem if we had air conditioning. We got over it eventually and on through the city and out to our northern suburbs home. It was meltingly hot out there. I had to work that night, but before that, there was preparation to be done.

It had been planned for months, mostly because tickets disappeared almost instantly, so decisions had to be made. So I let my brother use my credit card to buy five tickets to the Pyramid Rock Festival, December 29th to January 1st. It would have been me and him, plus his girlfriend and two of her friends, and on top of that a few more of her friends would be there (they had their own means of getting tickets, it seems) to make a good sized group. In the meantime, my brother and his girl broke up, cutting down the contingent to two. Far from fatal, this changed nothing of our plans, or preparations. Just the dynamics of it all. We got together our gear and went to the supermarket when I went in to work and got food and booze. I put in eight hours and after a short stop at home to get it all together, we were off at just past six thirty am. It was already a hot morning.

The festival is on Phillip Island, on the east side of the city, past Western Port Bay. The Bass Highway turns into the San Remo Bridge which becomes Back Beach Road and from the bridge onwards, it’s two lanes all over the island. The crowd which shows up for the festival is huge and getting a camping spot close to the music is a pretty big deal, given the size of the event, that at least half the crowd showing up to camp come on the first day – a day when there isn’t even any music. Just getting the camp site together, have a look around, check out the setup, meet the neighbours, and have a few drinks.

A note about the drinks is due. All these big camping festivals don’t allow BYO drinking, because their liquor license only covers the music area and the bar there, and whatever is sold there. It’s more a liability issue than a killjoy issue, so to an extent, it’s no surprise that the cars coming in get a cursory search and little more. That, and there are several thousand cars trying to get in, and it’s hot, and people are already getting worked up. There’s still a need to try to hide your hooch because enough of the inspectors are zealous enough to catch you out and you won’t get away with a slab sitting clearly in the boot, so some kind of thinking is needed. Over the festival I heard a lot of stories about how people got their supply in, and I have to say, ours was one of the best. As well as the old roll up a bottle of vodka in the sleeping bag ruse (one so old we were damn lucky to get away with it), we had an extra trick. Take a slab of soft drink, they sell them in 24-can cubes, but take out all the lemonade and insert a slab’s worth of beer cans, leaving only lemonade where the cans are visible from the outside (a small slit in one end and at the top where there’s a handle) and glue it up again – off you go son, you’ve earned it. Other people got the tops off water bottles with spoons, re-sealed juice cartons, and one guy used the disused petrol tank in his car (he ran it on LP gas) and got in some nine vodka bottles. I presume it was for his mates, or he was a real pisshead.

We got through the inspection point with no hassles, although the guy came oh-so-close to uncovering our work. From there, on to the camp site. It was a huge empty paddock, offering no shelter from sun or wind, or should it happen, rain. We got set up near the front, behind where the stages were, so there wouldn’t be any sound carrying over. Not that we had a choice, they told us where to go, and so it was. We got the tents up quick smart and had a beer. It was ten in the morning, and already it was past thirty degrees. It was on.

(This was going to be a one-shot effort but I have to run off and do something. So come back some other time for part two, and probably three. I’m lazy, you know?)

Merry Christmas to all guests of the House.

I was treated wonderfully to a delicious steak dinner, and watched my own Portland Trailblazers give me a great Christmas present with a win. 11 in a row. Longest winning streak in years. Time for a reemergence of the Rip City Skin. I wonder if me mum bought me any sports gear for the holidays.

My Christmas broadcast of the Rokudenashi Radio Hour was a complete disaster. I don't know if anything can be salvaged from the show to share with you all. There is a small collection of shows available for download here:

rokudenashiradiohour.blogspot.com

Update: I am quite disgusted with my smoke dealer, so as a result, I have stayed stone sober for the holidays. My alcohol tolerance is turned up high from drinking cognac straight. I work at a Mexican restaurant hosting Karaoke and they pay me in triple shots of cognac on the rocks. So, I have had nary a buzz during this break. Quite surprising indeed. Need to start looking for toads to lick...or something.

NOTICE

The World On Sunday has been cancelled this week due to drunkenness. All apologies and does fuck you sound good? Then fuck you. This is how it is, or did I just fill my obligation by posting a fuck you? I like being right.

SIGNED, KC


But since this will likely sit here for a while, and kind of ramble will fill the void nicely. It’s better than posting nothing, which seems to have suited everyone else around here for a while. I’ll be in my home town til just before new year, then I’ll be at Pyramid Rock on Philip Island. Totally out of contact range, beyond civilisation, beyond recognition. Have peace, have mercy, have the insight to see good in the year that’s just past and strength to see adventure in the one to come. My brothers of the Dragon, I sense this has been a tense year for us all, a trying year, a questioning year. A hard year, one I didn’t see coming. Or maybe, one I didn’t see coming and still let it happen. A train wreck I didn’t move away from. If I’m half right, know that healing begins with accepting what’s gone wrong – whether we meant it to happen or not, whether we had control over it or not.

Celebrate your holiday season how you will – the US citizens out there, happy holidays. The Aussies, merry Christmas. The Taiwanese, happy Just Another Fucking Week At Work. And A Jolly New Years To Us Who Celebrate The Pagan Way – remember, Chinese New Year isn’t just a fuck you to the west, it’s a fuck you to us all.

See you next year with the wash up.

Fuck, I’m so drunk right now…

Unpleasant shit happens all the time. I don’t feel it as much as I used to. A train crashes in Pakistan, I somehow don’t feel too unhappy about it. People die all the time. A corrupt businessman wins the election in South Korea, and I feel anger. Not that the guy he replaced was a champion, but how does poetic justice apply here? It doesn’t, and we here in Australia are blessed with a truly vibrant democracy and if this lets me have the moral high ground in talking about other countries, so fucking be it.

Unpleasant shit, and sometimes, good things. Japanese whaling is something that shits me off, not just because it’s a topic I know more than most people – including Japanese people – about, and if I wasn’t sick of this soapbox, I’d let you have it. It shits me off especially because so many people who think they know about it love to play the apologist on the Japanese side. So very unnecessary, to say the least. Whaling started in big numbers only after World War II, at the advice of General MacArthur, to help feed the people. Give the Japanese whaling boats (something they had never had before) and they can feed the population with the meat and the US makes money from the whale oil. It’s winners all around. Somehow, like so much of life in Japan, it was wrapped up in old values and borrowed culture, and five decades later all anyone can seem to remember is that they’ve always been doing it. Japan is a strange place like that.

Strange places, and none more strange than Amsterdam. The days of Amsterdam as a backpacker Mecca are numbered, with some bastard killjoy mayor over there taking it upon himself to cut the red lights that made the city so famous by three quarters. That would be like Disneyland getting rid of the Disney, like Everest getting rid of the mountain, like taking away that big black box in Mecca. It is exactly like taking away that big black box in Mecca. The reason for going there, the reason it is known at all. Do people visit The Netherlands and go visit Rotterdam? Fuck no, they might go there because it’s in the neighbourhood and need a day to chill out. Otherwise, the Netherlands would be a real backwater. Honestly. That corner of Europe would be home to nothing but boring people and tulip hunting tulips. Not that I’m all about prostitution, far from it, I’m all about each to their own, but I think this argument is about paying credence to what pays the bills. Amsterdam is a wonderful place and whether red light windows adds to this or not, whether coffee shops help or hinder, it makes it the liberal capital of Europe, maybe even the world. It’s acceptance, it’s openness, it’s understanding and patience and grace, it’s trusting people and encouraging them to come and visit and be together. Stories, rumours more like it, abound regarding nasty stories or nights gone wrong, but they are more like folklore, in reality it is one of the safer destinations. You’re more likely to get ripped off, mugged or otherwise rumbled in any number of other cities; but nowhere else are you guaranteed such a good time.

With the changes looking like happening, I’m just glad I can say I was there when it was still in its heyday. I’m sure, like the Summer of Love or the Other Summer of Love, I missed the real apex, but fuck you, I was busy. I saw it when it was all that, when it was how the stories that surely will be told were true. Amsterdam will suffer for this, and the world will be a less happy place.

At least we might stop the Japanese whaling mission – it’s looking good so far.

Hazy, nothing’s clear today.
Everything’s coming in without a filter on.
Aperture is stuck on the widest setting.
How many mistakes do you have to make,
Before you learn to see them coming?


Since Jess cut my hair on Thursday, I’ve been really happy with the way it looks. It wasn’t a major change, the only major work was getting rid of the mullet (hey, it grows faster at the back, man, Jesus had long hair) and a tidy up. By her own confession, Jess is more of a colourist than a cutter, but she was cool with doing it. And I’ve never had such indie rock looking second day hair, I look like I did nothing the day before except stand in front of a mirror and get it looking just right. And that’s not just the hangover talking, either.

Last night was a friend of a friend’ housewarming party. I found the place, arriving on my own, and walked in to see a guy on the couch with a giant mohawk. Right then I knew it would not be awkward at all, it was my kind of party. Everyone was cool, and drunk enough that when I got there all the social tension had melted away. Getting there was a bitch, an a great advertisement for why Melbourne’s public transport is a steaming great pile. It was in Coburg, and a look at the map told me it was a way down Bell Street – no more than twenty minutes by car, if the traffic is against you. But there’s barely anything running from my end to there, especially past eight on a Saturday. I could have spent more than an hour on the train to get there, going all the way into the city and back out again – but really, who can be bothered? I just took a taxi, underlining the fucked-ness of it all. I’m never living the suburban life again, man.

I had this blue pill lying around for a few weeks, and because the colour of the thing weirded me out, I was pretty remiss to try it, especially since there’s been a lot of talk recently about the kind of stuff that goes into some of the batches. But no-one showed up dead on the news after that weekend, so I figured I would be OK, but still I wanted to at least show it to someone who knew about these things. The housewarming was for Cat, who I’d known of for a while, but hadn’t managed to squeeze my way into a meeting with yet. I knew of her from before the party and our mutual friend had expressed concern at her appetite for the less-than-legal stuff, so I guessed she might have the 4-11 on it. She’d seen them before and were fine, they just had a lot of blue dye in them. Won’t kill you, they’ll just make your teeth blue.

Sunday has been hazy, then, for good reasons. It’s been well over twelve months since I did anything like that. Does that make it any better? No, nor does it make it any worse. If I felt ashamed at all about doing it, I sure as hell wouldn’t write about it here. My straight edge days are behind me, or possibly just on extended hiatus. They will be back someday, and you can bet your house I’ll claim I was like that all the while – you just watch me, I do love the moral high ground. As fun as being a guru is, preaching down is better than preaching from the gutter.

I don’t know how I must look, or at least I can’t judge too well, or maybe the two gay boys were hitting on anything and everything, and I just got caught up in their path. Either way, I was so flattered by their advances I damn near said yes to joining them in the upstairs toilet. Would I tell you all about that kind of story if it ever happened? I like to think I would, but all that – that’s for another day.

I’ve been thinking about Kosovo a lot lately, what with it being in the news and all. Here’s a half-chewed posting I got caught up in writing, before it turned into a corpulent obese train wreck and I couldn’t be bothered fixing it. I like to think it’s insightful.


Kosovars and Russians, and how they learned to stop worrying and love the bomb all over again

A small corner of a small corner of Europe, a piece of land that’s really little more than that, echoes of the Great War, and divisions that could crack the plaster, crack the foundations, bring down the carefully laid plans. Monday saw the passing of a deadline for reaching an agreement on the future of Kosovo, and the events that start now could potentially be the rocks at the top of a mountain that cause a landslide.

The last piece of the former Yugoslavia to break away and begin its own story, Kosovo has long been a province of Serbia, and in the glory days of Tito the ethnic divide wasn’t a matter worth fighting over. But as the world saw, the latter days of Milosevic and rampant Serb nationalism made it all too clear that men like Tito are rare, few and far between, and tensions between neighbours are all too tenuous in old Europe. Milosevic started it, and the Croats were not entirely blameless for their part in the events which led to the war in the nineties, while it’s easy to see the Bosnian Muslims as caught in the crossfire and the Montenegrins as entirely complicit in their support for Serbia – the mess is incredible, and it can’t be said long enough that Tito must have been an incredible person to hold all the cards in the right order. For the longest stretch of the dividing of Yugoslavia, the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo looked almost as good as their cousins in Slovenia, waiting for their moment and taking control of their fate when the time came. I wonder what old Slobodan thought of the Slovenians leaving so apparently easily, and taking most of the industrial workings with them, but apparently he was busy murdering people.

While the Montenegrins went their own way last year, the Kosovars had a historical burden on them. The Serbs, while a minority in Kosovo, remembered all too well the nation-forging event of losing to the Ottomans there, and being so nationalistic as they’ve become, took that as reason enough to scour any Albanian who thought it might be his home too. A land belongs to the people living on it, and both sides need to agree on conditions if they’re going to get along. Enough had happened that I now agree with the Kosovars, that a peaceful arrangement with Serbia is no longer possible. Give them their independence, make sure they do it right and don’t go killing any more Serbs, and be done with it. It’s an incredibly dense topic to sum up this way, but there’s only a black and white response here. Do it or don’t – more people will suffer if it doesn’t happen.

But rather than making it about Kosovars and Serbs, old alliances have come into play. Old friends, treaties, agreements in play on a map that’s changed so many times since they were written and forged, that it no longer makes any kind of sense. Why do the Russians even give a shit about what goes on there? They line up with the Serbs not out of any kind of sensible rationale, but because they always lined up together. They lined up together against the Austro-Hungarian empire when Franz Ferdinand was killed in Sarajevo, and again when Hitler’s tanks rolled across the borders (not a great success that time, but who’s counting) and again now, over what is really little more than a rental disagreement in the grand scheme of international diplomacy and politics. Only now the cold war has been won and lost, only now the old Soviet Bloc is mostly EU territory, only now Russia feels more and more like the bear backed into a corner with more and more hunters lining it up in their scopes – only now Russia has veto powers in the UN Security Council and insists on using it not for what’s plainly right, but to throw its weight around and score points for its more beleaguered friends. Serbia has had a bad run these last 20 years or so and it’s not looking like turning around now. Russia continues to curry favour with its old ally and probably deliberately turn a molehill not into a mountain, but a wedge to further drive into the handful of cracks it sees in its enemies.

The chain reaction this could all cause is incredible, looking just at the base matters – but who thought that a few bullets in a street in Sarajevo would ultimately cause two world wars, who might have known? I’m not going to get entirely hyperbolic on you here, but the greater issue is how much weight Russia is throwing around, and the direction they are heading into. True democracy is once again an illusion there, with powerful thugs running the show at any cost, it all looks very twenty years ago.



Done. And now the block of text it complete, so I shall leave it. I was going to add a few notes on what I remember about the place, but once again, I’m over it.

It’s a Sunday, that feels like any other Goddamn day. It’s a day of strange sleep, of dead batteries, of frustration and maybe standing someone up. Of just not knowing, because it feels like every other day where I just don’t know.

Apart from Wednesday, when I went to discuss a potential problem and have some beers with Stevie, I worked every single night. They called on Wednesday, too, but I ignored it, knowing I had Friday and Saturday up my sleeve to get by money-wise. They called on Monday and Tuesday, and Thursday I went to a different store as a favour for the previous night manager. The guy, Agro, is as annoying as they come, but a more dedicated and enthusiastic worker you couldn’t hope for. He takes it all a little too seriously if you ask me, but working for him was pretty good overall. Every day? That’s another question. I put in nine hours three nights, and might again tonight (they called before). This means total hours for the week have already passed the magic number of thirty-eight, meaning every hour past is paid double time, regardless of time of day or actual effort on my part. Generally, management will bend over backwards to avoid this ever happening, but it’s likely they didn’t realise because I did that night for Agro. Suck shit.

So it’s been work, work, drinks, work, work, work and tonight, more work. I’m leaving a note telling them to fuck off from now on, I want my Friday and Saturday nights back. And I’ll be getting them. If it means I only get two nights a week up til Christmas, so fucking be it – there’s a price and I’ve finished paying it. I’ll clear a grand this week on payday, and it might even be above a grand after tax. Take that.

Last night was the real centrepiece in the Banquet of Unprofessional that the store can descend into on occasion. The reason? Annual Christmas party. I’d rather chew my own testicle off than go, such is my relationship with most of management (who I see barely ever as it is) and the rest of the staff, who I never see at all. I could have finally looked presentable and hit on the few checkout girls I do see at the end of their shifts; but fuck it, just fuck it. Not interested. Which meant that they asked me to work, and by coincidence, there was no-one qualified to be in charge in charge last night. I was effectively in command. Shit all got done, mostly because day crew did such a shit job and we had to clean up all their crap – and the people I had to work with were less than ideal workers. Part timers who come in maybe once a week. So yeah, it was a real circus last night. Wouldn’t have wanted to be there this morning.

So there was that. What a week. Maybe one day I’ll look back at it and go, holy fuck. What was I doing with myself? But it won’t be because I worked that fucked job so hard, it will be for more traditional reasons.

The reason I pinned down Stevie was to discuss a potential kick to the shins, one that in the following twenty four hours dissipated. I felt like Jess Jess could become something more than just a person with a couch to crash on; this is far from ideal considering what’s coming up, but oh so fucking typical of something I’d do. I ran it all by him, and he said he didn’t see a problem. Fair enough, was all I could say. And as we worked through a jug and pondered the unfortunate reality that apart, we look ok, but sitting together, we look like two guys who really need a haircut. Such deep conversations we have. And all that dissipated, because something else came along that made me want to crush my balls in a vice.

It’s all I can do to not jump off the roof! Beat me up, throw me around, then let me hold you. Then that shit with the ice cubes, and your friends, then paint me hooked. It’s probably wrong, too. We got past the awkward, which means there’s only a rich vein of fun to cut into – if only I could just call you, but your phone is always out of juice.

It’s been a stupid week. I didn’t really sleep in the middle of it. Then the second part was consumed with catching it up and in between, working. I feel like I’ve said this a lot lately. And not just here.

Well, onto it.

When I was a little kid, I somehow came across a book in the library about rabies. If it was a child’s book or not, I don’t remember – but it had in reasonably graphic detail what happens when an animal catches rabies. This gave me nightmares, for weeks. The sheer pain and helplessness of a rabies victim really got to me. The highlighted lack of any medical help hit me especially hard, in my fragile child’s mind. The fact rabies doesn’t exist in Australia didn’t help settle my mind at all. So when I got this communiqué yesterday, it was a genuine triumph.



From: Sonny Lau
Sent: Thursday, 6 December 2007 3:00:19 AM
To: ***********@hotmail.com

To Mr. ----- ------

Dear -----,

You have a good Rabies antibody level as of 19 November 2007.

Your level was 0.53 (EIA) IU/ml.

The result has been amended. Please discard previous report for this test. We received this amended report only late yesterday afternoon.

0.5 IU/mL or more of antibody is considered a protective level in people exposed to Rabies virus. In vitro, Rabies antibodies have been found to protective against Australia bat lyssavirus.

The World Health Organization recommends a minimum post-vaccination immune antibody level of not less than 0.5 IU/ml.

Please continue to take all precautions against contact with animals in general whilst overseas. All the proper post-exposure care is to be implemented upon an at risk exposure, including the 2 follow-up booster doses of the rabies vaccine. Do remember that the main purpose of pre-exposure vaccination against Rabies is to simplify & minimize post-exposure management.

Warm regards.

Sonny



HAHA! Take that, rabies virus! No longer shall I fear you! I have few real fears, genuine crippling deep seeded fears. Heights? Awesome thrill. Flying? More boring than anything. Terrorist attack or act of God? I ain’t that unlucky. Getting hit by a drunk driver crossing the road? Well, fine. But there’s no vaccine for that. There is a vaccine for rabies and while it’s not as simple as most (you still need some pretty serious medical attention) you won’t fucking die in a foaming mess of pain. And I’ll take that any day.

And what ‘John’ (fuck, I need to come up with a better pseudonym for that guy) calls the rainbows and Skittles effect. Why can’t I be like this all the time?

Oh, right. I’d go fucking insane, it wouldn’t be right, or good for business. Or good for anyone. You can almost hear me sigh at this point, and wonder why I’m the only person in my neighbourhood awake right now – people, just because it’s dark and society tells you to fear the darkness, set fire to your TV and bring the enlightenment upon yourselves.

Rainbows and Skittles. Man, I heard that guy got into some shit in Spain, I think it’s best we wait and hear it from him instead (or till I get bored of my bullshit and start telling you about his instead) and ended up in the crushing Zone Of Death, also known as Queensland. Queensland produces some compelling evidence that too much sunshine is really bad for you. Further research indicates that the Republic of California suffers the same problem. I guess I’m the only truly temperate soul in this house, and thus the only one sane, clear headed and rational to be truly worthy of attention. Long, cold winters and grey skies was too much of the year, with temperatures in the mid-teens seen as normal have bred in me the decency missing in so much of the world. Until the sun comes out and summer hits us early. And then it’s all rainbows and Skittles.

See, I managed to flush out the Bancho. It happens from time to time. But for the record, it must be stated that his post was total gibberish, except for the word ‘cognac’. Now we are languaging, people!

Insanity. I’m off to crush something I’ll likely need later on. Call it a plot development.

Kerouac Cat has all kinds of tricks up his sleeve to get a person to sit up and pay attention. His ability to infuriate as part of a greater scheme is astounding.

Mother fucker writes a story with me in it, and mistakes the Seahawks for the Blazers. What next? Confuse Manchester City with United to really get me roaring?? Pro sports, with corruption and deceit the norm, are my life and I follow these teams in no particular order. NBA - Portland Trailblazers, I am the RipCitySkin...How do you spell Rookie of the Year? R-O-Y. NFL - Seattle Seahawks, Lofa Tatupu and Rocky Bernard are my favorite players, both making up the core of the Seahawk's defense. Soccer - Country before club, but just barely. I root hard for Donovan and the Stars and Stripes, but I love Manchester City to the max. "We are not, we're not really here."

I hope this sets the record straight. Don't come 'round here when any of these teams are on the TV unless you plan on joining me in the festivities. Why am I able to freak people out when I barely weigh 170 and have a big nose and glasses?? Because of the sheer ferocity for which I root for those I love. It strikes fear into the heart of most folks, because there is nothing in their life that can enable them to achieve the volume levels with their voiceboxes that I am capable of. I am very loud and proud.

And lonely...Pro sports and Howard Stern/BTLS/Ferrall broadcasts fill the void in my life. And cognac, don't forget the cognac.

I think a lot, about all sorts of things. What’s going on at that party down the road, would it be a good idea to drink all the beer in the fridge, could I talk a jury out of convicting me if I bomb a TV station for cutting any decent programming just because it’s summer?

I think about Islam, about Nintendo games, about why Final Fantasy XII isn’t that good at all, about long-finished cricket games, about what my children will look like. I think that if I ever see a porn star with the names I want to give said children, I’ll have to pick new ones. I think about how my greatest achievement in life would be making a movie about Muhammad, because taking pot-shots at Christians just hasn’t got the zing it used to have.

I think about how most people think they know about linguistics but really know fuck all.

I think about how the girl for me is probably so far at the end of the bell curve, I’m going to have to go a long way far and wide to find her – but when I do, I’ll know exactly what to say.

And then the Jihad-wielding motherfuckers hunting me down because they take offense to my movie (teddy-bear naming teachers and Danes worldwide will know nothing of the fury rained down upon me) will slit my throat and upload the video for all the internet to see.

Man, isn’t life an adventure?

Sundays are back; did they ever go away? It’s a December special, early onset summer has me thinking something can be gained and learned from this year, here, at the end of all things – that Sundays shall come back to the House.

Free city rhymes bounce down from the twenty-first floor balcony, people down there are all in a state, all in the same way, they just don’t know it yet. One girls shouts about the boy who ruined her night, another boy tries to keep his pants up as he runs to wherever. They all shout at each other, ears deaf from music, all saying nothing.


Cutting
Running, look, you can see all the way from one end of LaTrobe street to the other
Diving
Jumping in, no fear, say yes, be generous, say what you want, say what you think,
You might be my long-lost brother
Falling
Sleeping, it’s my lunchtime while the world winds up its day and night
Leaving
Hoping, that all this won’t fade like the rainbow chaser.

A different feeling on the streets, like hope in the air, but revolution soon dies, sold out for a pay rise. But until the reality behind the promise shows itself, the land breathes fresh air, the hardening of hearts is over and the tyranny of mind can finally end. Too extreme, too much, too much time like that. We can say sorry now, we can face the past and do what we need to, and then the healing will start. Fairness returns to the working class, a fairness long fought for, a fairness that we missed so bad it hurt. No longer will we sit back and be slandered, for the nation’s voice has answered our call. Everything else, the more it changes, the more it stays the same and the less we miss it. Let dinosaurs be dinosaurs and may we not grow complacent.

But the streets already feel different, like it’s ok to hope again, for a brighter day, not search for a way back to simpler days that never existed in the first place. No, what is right will never be, because compromise wins all too often.

I made a new friend. True story. Sunday was spent wondering where she was, and driving in the sun. Bad calls are my thing, but apparently it turned out for the better in the end. Not better for me, just better all around. After working Friday night away, and a rostering error gave me Saturday night off, I got up at five in the afternoon and got started on a six pack of Coronas in the fridge. It’s Corona time of the year, a beautiful thought of its own, and the neighbours have a lemon tree within fruit-pilfering distance – I see no coincidence in that, just the divinity of the planet telling me: it’s Corona o’clock, boy, so get to it. And get to it I did. I’d planned to sit around, drink beers and play video games with my little brother, but he’d left the house hours earlier and was going to see My Chemical Romance at the tennis centre. This left me with plenty of beers but nothing to do until meeting him after the show. Cue a handful of text messages to random names in my phone, and just like that, I’m meeting Jess Jess for a drink. I call her that because that’s how her name appeared in my phone a month ago. We hit it off because of a shared love of Sublime (major props to my West Coast homies) and even though she told me she was gay, I still got a number. And she was bored like me, only broke, so I said I’d buy her a drink or two. Small price to pay to get to hang out with someone, and I had a feeling it would work out. Either I make a dick of myself or slide into awkward-vile, that’s the usual result – but not Jess Jess, it was direct and successful.

We went to The Workshop, my new favourite city bar, and over a jug we found out that we had a lot in common and plenty of stories to tell. For once I had someone who actually wanted to listen to my travel tales (mostly I get glazed looks) and there was just enough friction to keep it moving. She was actually broke, but not playing me at all, several times I got a promise that next time would be her shout. And we could hang out as long as we wanted, because her place was in the city and not far away, and had a spare bed to crash on. So on we went, from there to a few other places to her place. It was about two am that she just crashed out and had to go to bed, leaving me wide awake (the untold joys of working nights, no kidding) and wondering what to do. I lay down for about ten minutes and decided to go find my brother. Making decisions while in a state of not being suited to make decisions is a stupid idea, because I actually left. I made my way over to Bourke Street and found him outside the club, telling me he was ready to go home. What the hell? Two am is the heart of the night! What’s up with that? It turned out that everyone was heading back early (they’d all been at the My Chem show) and were going to stay at Tija’s place in Murrumbeena. Still, I wasn’t stranded, since going home would be an expensive taxi ride and Jess Jess’s place was locked to me – so back to Tija’s place, feeling like a dick and having gotten all worked up to drink and dance some more, like I had the party-equivalent of blue balls.

I couldn’t sleep at Tija’s place either. I lay there in her lounge room until the sun came up and people started appearing around the house. What a way. For the most part, the casualty ward was pretty clean of severe cases, so things got moving pretty quickly. In the heat we drove people home and then made it back ourselves. That’s my boring weekend.

There’s just too much shit and sugar out there to strain my tastebuds telling the difference right now. Full retreat, bring everything about, take note.