January 2005

Seasons greetings to you all for 2005.

What a fortnight it has been with barrages of Tsunami images, and you can’t help but ask what have the Acehnese done to deserve this, let alone the Sri Lankans, Thais, Sumatrans, etc. Best to leave alone… am sure everyone who ventures near this site has responded appropriately.

My best opening recommendation is to visit journalist George Monbiot’s site www.monbiot.com and have a peruse at his article comparing the amounts western government’s have given to the Tsunami regions with how much they are spending each day in Iraq. Monbiot also wrote a book called Poisoned Arrows, on the situation in West Papua which is a rewarding read.

Won’t keep this too long. The most important info is that Not Drowning, Waving will reform and play Womadelaide THIS YEAR, March 4-6 which will coincide with the release of “Through The One Last Door” a compilation double cd. This is less than two months away now, and we’re pretty excited bout dusting off the cobwebs. We will play other shows round the traps, but not close to the WOMAD dates (as far as I know). The WOMAD dates will be with Telek, Pius Wasi and Ben Hakalitz… It will be the Tabaran tour band exactly as it was (with a couple of extra pounds round the waste.)

My Friend The Chocolate Cake are playing Port Fairy Folk Festival (March 11-13) and Apollo Bay Music Festival (April 22-24). Phil and I will also do gigs at Apollo Bay. I am also playing and talking at the Judith Wright Two Fires Festival in Braidwood, near Canberra on March 18-20.This festival focuses on art and dissent and also includes such persons as Phillip Adams, Arnold Zable, Kate Grenville, Romaine Morton, Kavisha Mazzella, Patrice Newell, Mick Dodson, and Richard Frankland.

I’m trying to write presently (tis a slow process… and not back into the swing of things yet) with the aim of recording a new DB album mid-year. Jotting down words, trying to make sense of things… more music than words at present… It’ll all make sense eventually.

I have a few soundtracks to compose in the coming months including:

(1) a documentary on Bertrand Wainer (1970s abortion rights campaigner),

(2) “Call Me Mum,” a film for SBS with a strong Torres Strait flavour to it,

(3) the music to a theatre production on Wear Dunlop, one of the very great Australians.

(4) and a very dark feature called “Twinkle.” The film is set in a brothel that pays its workers in heroin… it kinda reads a bit like John Hillcoats’ “Ghosts of the Civil Dead” that starred Nick Cave and Dave Mason

(5) Am toying with the idea of doing a stripped back piano and vocal album of mainly covers such as Another Girl, Another Planet, The Red Flag, Hallelujah, Thoughtless Kind, Hank William’s “I’m so lonesome I could cry” and some other choice tunes etc…

Anyway… once again seasons greetings… a big thanks to Rik Nicholson for re-jigging the communication forums, thanks to all those who came a long to the Telek gigs, I hope you are enjoying listening to “Amette” and I hope to see you at some show or other this year.

Reading Tim Winton’s Turning (Deckle Edge) short stories, Helen Garner’s “Joe Cinque’s Consolation” and listening to my daughter singing the theme from the Saddle Club, Sigur Ros, Arvo Part’s Tabula Rosa, Coldplay’s “Parachutes” and the Blackeyed Susans’ “Spin the bottle” (in the car) and Shannon Noll’s version of “Come on Aussie Come on”!!!