The Bogle Blurb
By Eric Bogle
13 August 2002, South Australia Hello Folks
It's been a while since the last Bogleblurb, and I apologise for the long silence, some of you might have thought (or even hoped!) that I had finally fallen off the twig. I must admit at times over the last two months or so I have been hanging on to the twig with faltering, desperate claws, but somehow managed not to fall off. And so with that laboured avian simile I kick off the latest Bogleblurb......
Well, the new CD is finished, and in the main the process was less painful than I had anticipated. But isn't that always the case? The anticipation of pain is always more painful than the actual pain, if you know what I mean. Do I know what I mean? I think so.... Anyway, to continue, I wound up recording 16 songs in total, which is probably 2 or 3 songs too many. But when it came down to cutting out the deadwood, my courage failed me. How can a father spurn his own children? Sob, sob... I had 20 songs to choose from, so I wasn't a complete wimp, I managed to cut 4 songs, but it was hard, hard. Apart from the paternal aspect of the whole thing, I have always been a terrible judge of my own songs. So, I torture myself with the thought that maybe there was a potential World No.1 hit amongst those four I rejected. Or then again, maybe there was not. My career as a songwriter to date probably suggests the latter. What a relief!
The actual recording went very smoothly, thanks entirely to the wonderfully professional and creative musicians I cajoled and, in some cases, blackmailed into appearing on the CD, and also to the recording engineer, Mick Wordley. His calm, no bullshit approach, total mastery of his desk (recording console -ed.), and comfortable and roomy studio helped to make the whole process something that almost approached enjoyable. Or at least it did until the cheques had to be written. Unsurprisingly the main area of difficulty was with the vocals, my vocals, I mean. Was that sound like a Coke® bottle being crushed underneath a dying pig really me singing? Alas yes, and once I was convinced of the fact that no amount of studio recording trickery could make me sound instead like Michael Bolton, I settled down, and grunted my way through the rest of the recording. John Munro and Kat Kraus, the vocalist from John's group Colcannon, contributed the bulk of the harmony vocals, and managed to smooth out the rough bits on my lead vocals. Dave O'Neill and Jon Jones from my band did their stuff, and excellent stuff it was. The aforementioned Mick Wordley contributed some mighty bass lines, John Munro jumped in with some guitar licks, and hey, presto! the CD was finished.
But is it any good? Well, as always, you will be the judge of that. Don't expect any objective calls from me, this is my brand new baby. I hope people will like it of course. If they don't, I will be pretty devastated, and will probably have to hit the bottle or something (at last, an excuse!). As a songwriter you tend to put a bit more on the line than a singer or an instrumentalist does. In the main, all they can be criticised for is the quality of their singing or playing and perhaps their interpretation, which is bad enough, believe me. If you write and perform your own songs, and those songs have a strong political or social content, which the majority of songs on my latest offering do have, then the areas for criticism are numerous indeed. Your lack of depth, sensitivity, understanding of issues, grammatical expertise, relevance, talent, vocal range, etc. etc. The list can be as long as the critic wants it to be. Because in writing the songs and arrogantly believing that you actually have something to say, then you must of necessity lay all that you are and believe on the line. Such exposure of course makes you vulnerable. You have to accept that vulnerability, it goes with the territory. Here endeth the lesson.....
The CD is called, "The Colour Of Dreams" by the way. It will be released in Australia at the beginning of September by Rouseabout Records. (You will have to hunt for Rouseabout within the site, but, trust me, it's there. -ed.) Greentrax Records in Scotland will probably be releasing it in the UK before the end of the year. As usual, I have no record company in North America prepared to distribute it, so I will be selling it on my upcoming tour. After that, Greentrax will be distributing it through it's North American outlets. I hope it sells a million, as indeed does my wife, my bank manager and various Adelaide antique shop owners.
And talking about the forthcoming North American tour, the air fares are booked and paid for, the hire cars have been reserved, the health insurance fully paid up, the Canadian visas obtained, my bags are packed and I'm ready to go, etc. In fact, all is ready except the visas from the U.S. Immigration people. They are dragging their feet a bit. I've no doubt that visa applications are scrutinised more carefully since September 11th, which is not surprising. It's not time to panic just yet, but if I haven't had any word from the Immigration Dept. by the middle of next week, I'll start to get a teensy bit worried. Worse case scenario is cancellation of the tour of course. But we haven't reached that stage yet, and hopefully it won't come to that. Everyone keep their fingers crossed please.
Being busy with the recording I didn't have time to do any actual live gigs of course. So I'm woefully short of match practise, so to speak. I do have a couple of concerts coming up a week or so before, hopefully, I start the North American tour. Dave O'Neill, my former guitarist and fiddler, has left the group to play guitar for a great Irish fiddler, Liz Dougherty. And only 23 years before he was due for a gold watch too! Dave's first passion was always Irish music, and this is a great opportunity for him, so he left with my blessing and all good wishes. I have since heard from him a couple of times and he assures me that the Guinness is great. No mention of music though. Another guitarist and fiddler from Canberra, one Mr. Peter Ritchens, has joined the group, and he plays his first gig with us in September. He's tall, good-looking, a very competent musician, and singer. I forgave him the first two flaws and hired him anyway.
On the family front, nothing much happened. Carmel & I were sort of hibernating for the winter. Only 18 days to go and it will be Spring, thank God! Not that Adelaide winters are what you would call severe mind you, certainly not to an inhabitant of Minneapolis or Winnipeg. Although it occasionally gets down to as low as 5 degrees centigrade (40 degress F -ed.). I am still locked in a life and death struggle with my two little thugs, Radar and Ranger (pictured at right -ed). Unless I can keep proving to them that I am in fact the leader of the pack, they could tear me to pieces at any time. Carmel and I get up to our shack (cabin -ed.) on the river Murray whenever we can. It's incredibly beautiful and peaceful at this time of the year, with abundant wildlife. In summer the jet-skiers and water skiers take over the river a bit and can make things a bit noisy. But I suppose the river is everyone's, not just mine. Nonetheless, I hope all the aforementioned skiers break many limbs during the summer. Nothing life-threatening of course, just painful and debilitating.
That's it folks, for this latest enthralling episode. I finish off with this photo taken a month ago of Carmel and I, and John Munro and his wife, Alana, at Mt. Buffalo in Victoria, where we were snowed in! This is just to prove to many non Australians that it does snow in Australia, but not, thankfully, where I live. (The photo was a tad large, I had to cut it for the Bogle Blurb. But you all deserve to see the entire picture, Australian Snow! - ed.)
Live long and prosper, Eric
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