G'day mates!!
Well, I couldn't resist. Get ready for TOO MANY silly puns and references..... sorry in advance.
Left: Here I am Rockin' IN AUSTRALIA to AC/DC's "whole lotta rosie" from the crushing live album IF YOU WANT BLOOD...
It's great to be here..wow...what a DAY (literally) of travel.... I started with 3 or so hours of air travel from Asheville NC to Nashville TN, then a short drive to BelewCentral, where I crashed in the Fripp Suite, then packed up Adrian's remaining fly-gear, and caught a 3pm flight to Denver, then LA. In LA I met up with the Slicks, and we hopped on the United flight for FOURTEEN HOURS to Sydney Aus, then hung about in that fine airport, until we flew to Melbourne, where we'll be for the next 3 days or so. TIMEWARP!! We left the USA on saturday...now it;'s MONDAY afternoon, we got here around 1130am...weird...
OF course in typical style I had to crank up some AUSTRALIA connected music for the flight over, mixed into my playlist - unrelated to OZ -was lotsa Fiona Apple (Tidal, Bootleg:Orpheum Theater Boston '97), the new McCartney album as THE FIREMAN, fantastic, not as spacey as the earlier stuff but plenty psychedelic/acoustic bluesy folk (of course), Steve Hillage "Green", lotsa Zappa music (incl. Lather, Sheik, Orch Faves, Mothers of Prev., and some great Zappa/gear interviews...) and of course AC/DC..the mighty rock champs from down under....
How much do I love these guys ??.... let me count the ways. Let's start with THEY ARE THE FIRST BAND I EVER SAW ONSTAGE at a real concert...I was 14, it was Madison Square Garden, (summer 1979) they opened for Ted Nugent...tickets were about $10....as were the T shirts and programs...wow! It was ..incredible... Somehow my mom let me go to that one..inexplicable. But it kicked my ass....and here I am. An unapologetic rocker, thru and thru.
Plus BON SCOTT was still alive...man oh man. Tragically he would die 5-6 months later...
Well - I went on to see them with Brian Johnson 2 or 3 more times thru the years...and will attend a show pretty soon on the SOLD OUT USA tour going on right now.
My fave Angus Young story - true or not (??) - is when some journo asked him:
"Angus..you've been accused of making the same album eight times..what do you say to that??"
Angus replied with a snarl:
" Tha's a durrrty lie !! Ah've made the same album TWELVE TIMES !!"
Ah yes. they are PERFECT. don;t ever fix it. I had the joy of running rehearsals for the AC/DC show when I worked at School Of Rock, Bergen NJ...what a blast that was.
Anyway -- of COURSE I also had to rock some MEN AT WORK (because I'm the corniest, silliest man alive..) As i was listening to them -- I came upon a store..and guess what they had for sale:
Yes , the infamous yeast spread of Australia: VEGEMITE. Some of you may only know of it from the MAW song "down under"..it;'s a STAPLE here, as MARMITE is in the UK..similar stuff. Think of a combo ofMiso paste and peanut butter, perhaps??? A salty, yeasty conccoction they eat here with EVERYTHING...especially toast and cheese. Altho' our tour liasion suggested 'toast, avocado and vegemite' ..Hmm.. will have to try that, I've already rocked some on flax crackers - fantastic!
So - mark me down as Idiot Tourist. There I was in an airport natural food store..buying Vegemite while Men At work was on. I dare you to do something more stupid.
Hmm.. Then THIS stuff caught my eye.... Um... guys...what is this cheese MADE OF, exactly..?? "Tasty"..huh??
I love finding words and signs in other lands...that would mean crazy stuff back home...or vice versa, or viva voce, or whatever.
But wherever I go , it's a chance to see how fucked up humans are in their quest to torture, maim, abuse and then SLIT THE THROATS OF innocent, or even not so innocent animals. Today's entry in the "Slow To Evolve" sweepstakes is this little display of various JERKY products..including Emu, Kangaroo and Crocodile. Poor little bastards never saw it coming. Emu??? I thought they were ..endangered? Guess not. And - of course if someone "farms" them ..then they can hide behind that I guess.. Well...lotsa work to do...at least it's a few steps better than factory -raised, drugged up, irradiated cows, chickens and pigs, as in your typical all-american egg/cheese/ham breakfast ....BON APPETIT!
We're OFF today and tomorrow (Tues) as well...Adrian arrived in Sydney a few days before us to do press, he gets here (Melbourne) tomorrow some time....and our first gig is Wed in town. I dropped Allan Zavod a line, hopefully he gets it in time and can make it out to the show... Allan played keys for many great bands, his own jazz, classical and fused projects first and foremost, but also for the great 1984 Zappa tour ("Does Humor Belong In Music") video from the pier in NYC... and also some great Ponty tours and albums.
If you are in Oz or know someone who is.....
ADRIAN BELEW POWER TRIO
DEC 2008 - AUSTRALIA
03 WED Melbourne, The Corner Hotel
04 THU Sydney, The Basement
05 FRI- 07 SUN Adelaide Int'l Guitar Fest.
08 MON Newtown, New South Wales The Vanguard
09 TUES Newtown, NSW, The Vanguard
10 WED Cronulla, NSW, Brass Monkey
11 THU Bulli, NSW, Heritage Hotel
5 comments:
Hey Andre! I had to comment and say that AC/DC was my first show too! I saw them in 1976 when I was all of ten years old. They warmed up for KISS at the now extinct Capital Center in Landover, MD. I went with my best friend at the time and his Dad! We had never heard of AC/DC before the show but we sure didn't forget them after.
My favorite Angus Young quote was one I heard on the Howard Stern show. Howard was asking Angus some technical question about something and Angus replied with "Brains aint me forte", a quote I have used often over the past few years to describe myself.
I hope you guys have a GREAT time in Australia.
Peace,
Scott
Angus rules!!! Thanks for a great new story....He is the Zen guitar madman. He -- and his UNSUNG brother Malcolm on guitar - have defined what we know as killer rock riffs, only a small club has done that, then there are 1000s of imitators. That's the bottom fuckin line.
ugg... I may never eat again.
Bring us back some Mighty Vegemite!
So... is your hair hanging upside down? Blood rushing to your head? Or...maybe it is WE in the north who are "under"... such hemo-centrists we are!
Perhaps you will be able to hear the songlines the people sang to map the continent as they walked in dreamtime.
see Bruce Chatwin's"Songlines"
"...the labyrinth of invisible pathways which meander all over Australia and are known to Europeans as 'Dreaming-tracks' or 'Songlines'; to the Aboriginals as the 'Footprints of the Ancestors' or the 'Way of the Law'.
Aboriginal Creation myths tell of the legendary totemic being who wandered over the continent in the Dreamtime, singing out the name of everything that crossed their path- birds, animals, plants, rocks, waterholes- and so singing the world into existence."
rock on, as usual!!
Is it true that the toilet water flushes around the opposite way down there then up here? LOL
I just heard AC/DC was touring here, but tickets are sold out and I'd have to find a babysitter anyway...
As for the jerky...it is all probably just ostrich with different artifical flavorings and packaging. LOL
And yeah you are totally cheesy with the whole vegemite/Men at Work. Ya big cheeseball.
Yeah. Counter-clockwise toilet swirl: myth or truth?? LOL
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