Saturday 25th October 1986. Do you remember where you were that day? I can tell you where I was. Selina's at the Coogee Bay Hotel. What a night!
I was working for Bandanna and we had gotten a gig that we were all rapt about. Supporting John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers as well as Aussie blues legends, Chain. This was a big gig for us, band and crew alike. John Mayall is such an influential person in the music industry that it was like doing a gig with some sort of minor God.
Continued at Gibbo's War Stories...
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Monday, August 29, 2005
The NSW Liberal party is a joke!
Where do I start?
First of all I find out last week that they are standing Nola Fraser as our local candidate then I awake to the news this morning that the alternative Premier of NSW has been taking drinking lessons lessons from Andrew Bartlett. Fuck me dead folks! Do you get Fly Buys for being an idiot these days or something?
We have just withstood 10 years of Bob Carr whose greatest achievement was to make it to retirement before being sacked, and what do we step up to the plate with? Nola bloody Fraser and John "Mail Order Bride" Brogden. In the words of Howard Dean... "Aaaarrrrgggggghhhhhhhhhhhhyyyyeeeeooooowwwwaaaarrrgggghhhh"
I was going to ask what John was thinking but obviously he wasn't. Sorry John, but you are going to have to show enough balls to step down now. You have, in one fell swoop, become nothing but a liability. Day after day we see the left side of politics in this country hoping like hell for the Liberals to self destruct. They know that this is their only hope of ever being elected as they are far too hopeless to ever be elected on merit.
Well..you've handed it to them on a plate.
First of all I find out last week that they are standing Nola Fraser as our local candidate then I awake to the news this morning that the alternative Premier of NSW has been taking drinking lessons lessons from Andrew Bartlett. Fuck me dead folks! Do you get Fly Buys for being an idiot these days or something?
We have just withstood 10 years of Bob Carr whose greatest achievement was to make it to retirement before being sacked, and what do we step up to the plate with? Nola bloody Fraser and John "Mail Order Bride" Brogden. In the words of Howard Dean... "Aaaarrrrgggggghhhhhhhhhhhhyyyyeeeeooooowwwwaaaarrrgggghhhh"
I was going to ask what John was thinking but obviously he wasn't. Sorry John, but you are going to have to show enough balls to step down now. You have, in one fell swoop, become nothing but a liability. Day after day we see the left side of politics in this country hoping like hell for the Liberals to self destruct. They know that this is their only hope of ever being elected as they are far too hopeless to ever be elected on merit.
Well..you've handed it to them on a plate.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
GetOverYourself.Com
Australia's latest political force, GetUp!, has only taken weeks to become a political farce. Liberal party reject John Hewson has reportedly resigned leaving the website as yet another Left Wing spam factory. From todays SMH:
"The group was designed to be a non-partisan political organisation focusing on issues such as industrial relations, media ownership and immigration detention centres. It was set up to appeal to people disaffected with the traditional party system.
But Liberal backbenchers, including the Sydney MP Malcolm Turnbull and the Melbourne MP Andrew Robb, denounced the group and its initial email campaign as little more than spam.
A Victorian MP and member of the parliamentary committee on electoral matters, Tony Smith, labelled it a "scam" that was "an old Labor front dressed up as a genuine movement".
What is it with these idiots and their never ending mission to re-educate the stupid people of Australia to their "approved" version of democracy? I'll give you a tip folks, we already have a democratic process. It's called an election. You lost hahahahaha!
I love the last bit though:
"Dr Hewson's resignation places the organisation in a difficult position.
The search is now on to find someone who is not aligned with either the Labor Party or the Greens to gain wider community appeal."
The key is right there folks. If you are aligned with the Labor Party or The Greens, you do NOT have "wider community appeal".
GetAHaircutAndARealJob.Com, now there's an idea for a political movement.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
I've got a new blog
Hi folks, here is a shameless plug for my new blog, Gibbo's War Stories.
It is a collection of the "roadie" stories that first appeared here without any of my political opinions! Plenty of people have asked for more of them & I'll do my best to post regularly.
Check it out & tell all your friends.
It is a collection of the "roadie" stories that first appeared here without any of my political opinions! Plenty of people have asked for more of them & I'll do my best to post regularly.
Check it out & tell all your friends.
Friday, August 05, 2005
Stevie
I was blown away last night to see Stevie Wright on This Is Your Life. During the late Eighties I worked for a while as Stevies live sound engineer, alongside brother of Gibbo on monitors and My Pal Brian(TM) on lights, and I have wonderful memories of some great gigs as well as some downright strange ones.
He was (I think) still on the needle in those days and was very definitley on the turps in a big way and was quite a handful. Even so, he was still very much a household name and drew decent crowds. The band, Hard Road, consisted of Peter Northcote (sax, keys, guitar), Bruno Renzella (guitar), Vic Young (bass) and Paul DeMarco (drums) and one or two others who slip my mind.
They were outstanding in both musical ability and counselling skills. It was a major effort sometimes just to get Stevie onto the stage in a reasonable condition to perform and the guys showed endless patience(usually!).
The guys started picking him up quite early in the day to get him to the gig before he got too blind. They would then keep him occupied and soberish backstage until show time. This worked for a while until the cunning bugger figured that he could just get the crowd to buy his drinks. "Who's gunna buy Stevie a Southern Comfort then?" would be the cry. Half a dozen punters would then head to the bar and buy him drinks. The look on the faces of the band was simply priceless. What can you do to help someone who is determined to trash themselves?
Poor old Stevie didn't have much of a voice left by this stage and it became increasingly difficult to get his voice to sit in the mix at a decent level. Brother of Gibbo had the worst of it as he looked after on-stage sound which was...loud! One night Stevie was having particular trouble hearing himself in the monitors so he decided he would kick them off the front of the stage, as you do. Classic rock 'n roll tantrum! Anyway, being the professional he is, brother of Gibbo wanders out from side stage nonchalantly and puts the speakers back on stage. Well, Stevie manages to kick them off again at which point brother of Gibbo decides to unplug them & remove them. Picture the scene... Band wailing, punters dancing, singer fuming and brother of Gibbo standing at the front of the stage giving Stevie a right bollocking. Common sense eventually prevailed and the rest of the show went well. During the packup I noticed out of the corner of my eye that one of the band members had brother of Gibbo bailed up side stage and seemed to be giving him a gobfull. Thinking there could be ill feeling about the incident, I wandered a bit closer just in case and managed to hear words to the effect of: "Why didn't you hit the bastard? I that had been my gear he kicked, I'd have floored him!" Brother of Gibbo explained that it wouldn't look good on his resume that he had knocked out Stevie Wright.
One day I'll tell you about the Stevie gig where I had to leave the mixing desk to punch on with some of the crowd! I've still got the scar where my tooth went through my mouth just below my bottom lip. I'll bet the other prick's still pissing blood though!
Thanks for the fun times and classic memories Stevie. Stay straight. I hope you find the peace you are looking for.
He was (I think) still on the needle in those days and was very definitley on the turps in a big way and was quite a handful. Even so, he was still very much a household name and drew decent crowds. The band, Hard Road, consisted of Peter Northcote (sax, keys, guitar), Bruno Renzella (guitar), Vic Young (bass) and Paul DeMarco (drums) and one or two others who slip my mind.
They were outstanding in both musical ability and counselling skills. It was a major effort sometimes just to get Stevie onto the stage in a reasonable condition to perform and the guys showed endless patience(usually!).
The guys started picking him up quite early in the day to get him to the gig before he got too blind. They would then keep him occupied and soberish backstage until show time. This worked for a while until the cunning bugger figured that he could just get the crowd to buy his drinks. "Who's gunna buy Stevie a Southern Comfort then?" would be the cry. Half a dozen punters would then head to the bar and buy him drinks. The look on the faces of the band was simply priceless. What can you do to help someone who is determined to trash themselves?
Poor old Stevie didn't have much of a voice left by this stage and it became increasingly difficult to get his voice to sit in the mix at a decent level. Brother of Gibbo had the worst of it as he looked after on-stage sound which was...loud! One night Stevie was having particular trouble hearing himself in the monitors so he decided he would kick them off the front of the stage, as you do. Classic rock 'n roll tantrum! Anyway, being the professional he is, brother of Gibbo wanders out from side stage nonchalantly and puts the speakers back on stage. Well, Stevie manages to kick them off again at which point brother of Gibbo decides to unplug them & remove them. Picture the scene... Band wailing, punters dancing, singer fuming and brother of Gibbo standing at the front of the stage giving Stevie a right bollocking. Common sense eventually prevailed and the rest of the show went well. During the packup I noticed out of the corner of my eye that one of the band members had brother of Gibbo bailed up side stage and seemed to be giving him a gobfull. Thinking there could be ill feeling about the incident, I wandered a bit closer just in case and managed to hear words to the effect of: "Why didn't you hit the bastard? I that had been my gear he kicked, I'd have floored him!" Brother of Gibbo explained that it wouldn't look good on his resume that he had knocked out Stevie Wright.
One day I'll tell you about the Stevie gig where I had to leave the mixing desk to punch on with some of the crowd! I've still got the scar where my tooth went through my mouth just below my bottom lip. I'll bet the other prick's still pissing blood though!
Thanks for the fun times and classic memories Stevie. Stay straight. I hope you find the peace you are looking for.
Monday, August 01, 2005
Gibbos new toys.
Gibbo shouted himself a new kit a couple of weeks ago and I've finally got around to taking a few pics.
I was in good old Sydney Town a few weeks back and, as you do, I popped in to Billy Hydes. As soon as I layed eyes on it, it was sold! It was exactly what I had been after and the colour(Ruby Fade) blew me away. I whacked a deposit on it and organised to come back on the weekend to pick it up.
Saturday morning rolls around and there is much excitement. Gibbo Jnr has even gotten out of bed early to throw his L plates on the car. He's driving on his first trip to the big smoke. After an uneventful trip in we decided to do a quick lap around Hydes to see if we could fluke a parking spot out the front. We were greeted with the site of a mob of folks standing on the corner outside the shop, which was closed! We parked around the corner and walked back to find out that there has been a fire in the building overnight and the shop was shut. Ahhhhhhhhh!
"Which kit was yours? We suffered no fire damage but a lot of kits got wet" says the guy.
"The Ruby Fade 6 piece Pearl."
"Cool. Your kits not wet. We can pass it out the window."
"Hang on," I says "I was going to pay with EFTPOS"
"Sorry mate, no power"
This is when I realised that you can only get $1000 a day out of an ATM. Damn, today aint goin' good!
Anyways, between myself, the ATM & Mrs Gibbo we scraped up most of it and the very generous, folks at Hydes let us pay the difference with a cheque.
Yeehah!!!
I have to say a very special thanks to Fab and his guys at Billy Hydes. They had many more important things to worry about that morning but they went out of their way to help me out. Well done guys. Top service!
I was in good old Sydney Town a few weeks back and, as you do, I popped in to Billy Hydes. As soon as I layed eyes on it, it was sold! It was exactly what I had been after and the colour(Ruby Fade) blew me away. I whacked a deposit on it and organised to come back on the weekend to pick it up.
Saturday morning rolls around and there is much excitement. Gibbo Jnr has even gotten out of bed early to throw his L plates on the car. He's driving on his first trip to the big smoke. After an uneventful trip in we decided to do a quick lap around Hydes to see if we could fluke a parking spot out the front. We were greeted with the site of a mob of folks standing on the corner outside the shop, which was closed! We parked around the corner and walked back to find out that there has been a fire in the building overnight and the shop was shut. Ahhhhhhhhh!
"Which kit was yours? We suffered no fire damage but a lot of kits got wet" says the guy.
"The Ruby Fade 6 piece Pearl."
"Cool. Your kits not wet. We can pass it out the window."
"Hang on," I says "I was going to pay with EFTPOS"
"Sorry mate, no power"
This is when I realised that you can only get $1000 a day out of an ATM. Damn, today aint goin' good!
Anyways, between myself, the ATM & Mrs Gibbo we scraped up most of it and the very generous, folks at Hydes let us pay the difference with a cheque.
Yeehah!!!
I have to say a very special thanks to Fab and his guys at Billy Hydes. They had many more important things to worry about that morning but they went out of their way to help me out. Well done guys. Top service!
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