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April 2005

Life goes on...

Paul Hester’s loss has affected us all here in the Melbourne music community. In some ways bringing us together... Paul was a very inclusive, warm hearted fella. Musicians can be bitchy bastards... Paul was always encouraging, tho he could be cuttingly witty and caustic about pomposity. I worked with him with Kutcha Edwards and Songlines in a mentoring programme with young koori musicians and Paul was generous with his time and heart. Paul was a major factor in Crowded House’s success... As good as Neil’s songs are, Paul gave the band an edge and humour and vitality that without would have made them less successful methinks. May he find the peace he so desperately was searching for. The send off for Paul at the Prince of Wales featured great and amusing eulogies from Mark Little, John Clarke and Mick Molloy... and Mike Rudd played “I’ll be gone”. May we come around as a society to recognising the debilitating effects of mental illness... and tell your friends how much they mean to you at every opportunity.

Womadelaide - Not Drowning, Waving... pressure build up, lots of rehearsals at the Lonely Planet warehouse over in Footscray... We sure as hell didn’t want to make fools of ourselves... Short change overs are a little problematic for a band of our size, but the feeling on stage was electric. As great as it was playing to that size of crowd, on that stage, at a festival that is so celebratory musically, to me, just looking around on stage and rekindling the feeling of how brilliant each of the NDW players are and that “bursting” sensation of all creating this magical noise together was what I took away from it. JP was once more driving these strange edge ridden surges and drones and melodies and the odd tasteful power chord... loud as always.. loved it. And the way Russ and James and Benny build these rhythms that layer up then drop then build again to exploding point... and their lugubrious Melanesian beats tom toms, congas, garamuts, kundus and the mighty kick drum. Rowan is such a melodic bass player and for someone who was a bit worried cos he hadn’t played a heap over the last decade, nailed it... and I forgot what a fine acoustic guitarist he is... and Pius Wasi, the phantom... (with regularity on the Tabaran tour I would see him over breakfast... I’d woken up, he was coming home from the night before... Now he is a driven man in promoting PNG culture... He’s currently in the process of organising a big Sing Sing festival in Lae, Morobe Province.

Highlights... Lo Jo under the trees with the kerosene lights (drummer reminded me of Michael Barker), Ozomatli’s hi energy hip hop, brass, dub and latin thing... Kronos in the rain, George Telek and Rrurrambu’s duet and George’s kick boxing Whitefella/Blakfella routine... Dulsori and Mia Dyson’s new tunes are a major step forward for her.

NDW are planning gigs in Melbourne, Canberra, Sydney and Brisbane in August... fes napuan in Vanuatu in November... and seeing about festivals such as Homebake, Falls, Meredith, Woodford and Darwin and Perth festivals. This is what we are aiming for... some of it is out of our control... so we’ll see.

I played at the Two Fires festival at Braidwood, near Canberra, in memory of Judith Wright... art and activism... caught up with Arnold Zable, Noni Sharp, Kate Grenville, Kavisha Mazzella, Shane Howard, my Auntie Barbara (anyone whose been to one of our gigs in Canberra would know her)... Did a gig, gave a talk on West Papua and showed Telek’s new “West Papua” clip that Tim Cole edited out of Mark Worth’s morning star doco... stared out over the high plains towards Lake George... A place that has some resonance for me as that was where my grandparents died in a car accident when I was 7... heard lots of inspiring stuff. This was the inaugural festival... May it bloom...

Port Fairy... the Cake rocked, plenty of beers on the verandah with Andrew and Greg, the Tennessee bluegrass guy from “O Brother, Where Art Thou” singing “I’m a Man of Constant Sorrow,” had a good chat with Rob Hirst and Paul Greene, and saw Narbalek rock out... (Tim Cole has some great stories about touring round outback NT and WA with this band.

Remote Area Nurse... 6 times one hour drama set on Masig Island in the Torres Strait. The series so captures a sense of place, a view of these northern islands that I don’t think has ever been captured before. Tis by Penny Chapman pictures and stars Susie Porter and Charles Passi and many local actors... Have just finished this score... Must say its been a good way to be spend the last couple of months with Tim Cole during the week soaking in Torres Strait music, moods and tropics... Have worked up a lot of tracks with Albert David’s singing and percussion. He and I ventured up to Hammond Island about two months ago to roam about with a portable recorder and a stereo microphone recording choirs, percussion, and atmos sounds... resonant wind thru melaleuka trees... There are plans to release this score, if only to get more people to hear Biston Special’s version of “I nor wnade go”... “Biston Special” is a pretty fine stage name methinks.

The soundtrack to Weary Dunlop will be available on this site (and thru Mana) in a couple of weeks and at the theatre where the play is being performed... Starts in Adelaide next week, in Melbourne in a couple of weeks, then Sydney... But it will be playing around the country over the next twelve months... lots of spoken word and music pieces, many reedits and a bunch of new tunes... There are nine tracks off Nautical Forlorn... Different edits and some with Weary’s words over the top.

Phil’s wedding... This Saturday (tomorrow)... Am so looking forward to it. Phil Wales and Phillipa Overgaard, two of my very favourite people. And oh, what a party it will be... Phil has asked me to sing Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” which I will do with extra emphasis especially in the verse that mentions being “tied to the kitchen chair”!!! Robby Craw is going to give the speech in the manner of John Cooper Clark... Am looking forward to that... not so much to Sunday morning...

Been listening to Joanna Newsome’s CD Milk Eyed Mender... love it... harps meet Shirley temple...
Waving my hands in the air to The Polyphonic Spree
King Kadu “listen to my drum”
Thievery Corporation’s Dub “Babylon Rewound”
Tape... Opera... Swedish outfit
The new Go-Betweens record is their best since 16 lovers lane in my humble opinion... also mixed by Mark Wallis
Finally got to see George Clinton and P-Funk live...”make my funk the P funk”...
Shantaram... I think I’d like to finally go to India... Compelling book...

In the light of the joint declaration between Australia and Indonesia, I have included the following letter sent out by Vanda Hamilton...

You may have read that the Indonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, and John Howard have signed a joint declaration for a comprehensive partnership between Indonesia and Australia. The joint declaration signals the beginning of negotiations between the two countries for a new security pact, after Indonesia abandoned the 1995 treaty when Australia became involved in East Timor. Alexander Downer has indicated that the new security treaty could be finalised "within months" (The Age, March 19).

In a joint Ministerial statement released after a meeting between Indonesia and Australia on 18 March 2005, Australian Ministers said that they supported special autonomy in [West] Papua and Aceh and that Australia's support for Indonesia's territorial integrity was "underscored". Both Mr Howard and Mr Downer have enlarged on this statement in subsequent interviews and made it clear that a security treaty with Indonesia will include provisions that Australia will not support independence movements in Indonesian territories.

The Ministerial statement also commits Australia to investigating any evidence of pro-independence activities in Indonesia by Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) funded by Australia.

West Papuans have been fighting for independence for their country for well over four decades, first from the Dutch and then Indonesia. I will not take up more of your time to detail that struggle. I'm sure most of you are aware of the history of West Papua, and I have included links for those who wish to read more. Some of you may have seen a report on Dateline recently about the current allegations in regards to Indonesia's activities in West Papua (I have included a link to the report).

If Australia agrees to include this proposed provision, we will be abandoning the peoples of West Papua and Aceh, people who have fought so hard to have their voices heard in international fora. These are very vulnerable people. West Papua in particular is resource rich and is being plundered now, dispossessing people of their lands and robbing the country of its wealth. If Australia allows this provision to be included, we will be tacitly supporting Indonesia's brutal tactics in both West Papua and Aceh.

It may be that you believe the interests of small, underdeveloped nations are best served by being a territory of a powerful country. There is some validity to this view. However no country should be immune from scrutiny and criticism of its human rights practices ( I realise this plea is a tad hollow coming from an Australian). If the proposal to investigate Australian funded NGOs is included in the treaty, we will not only effectively be locking out local NGOs, we will be overtly supporting Indonesian maneuvering to escape scrutiny of their conduct in West Papua and Aceh. The proposal is so loosely framed at the moment that it is uncertain what "evidence" of NGOs supporting pro-independence movements would consist of, and what type of funding of an NGO by Australia would open up an NGO to investigation. We have already seen the reluctance of Indonesia to accept humanitarian help in Aceh after the tsunami. What other sorts of activities are they likely to consider suspect? One of the targets of this policy is the aid wing of the Australian union movement, Australian People for Health, Education and Development (APHEDA), which has supported campaigns in support of independence for West Papua and has passed on reports from pro-independence movements to human rights organisations. The proposal could also have enormous ramifications for churches which work in the areas, particularly in West Papua. There is little doubt that if this provision is included that reports on human rights in West Papua and Aceh will be very difficult to collect and disseminate, let alone take action on.

The proposal to include provisions in relation to support for Indonesian territorial integrity and to investigate NGOs activities must be closely scrutinised and vigorously debated by the Australian Parliament and the wider community. This provision cannot and must not go unchallenged. Please - write to your local federal member to encourage them to learn more about the issue and to bring the matter up in parliament. If you have the time write to the papers - the more letters they receive on an issue the more likely it is that letters in relation to the issue will get printed. Talk to your friends about the issue and encourage them to do the same. And please pass this email on through your networks and ask those who receive it to do the same. Even if that's the least you do, it will be a great help.

Dateline background on West Papua

Dateline feature on West Papua

Dateline interview with John Rumbiak

March 16 Dateline feature on West Papua

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