The Bogle Blurb
By Eric Bogle
7 July 2003, South Australia Hello friends,
As usual it's been a while since my last blurb. As usual I apologize to those people who have been looking forward to the next breathless chapter in my life, � and also, to those who have been dreading it. That covers all the bases, I think.
The main reason for my perennial tardiness (apart from being congenitally lazy) is that I live a fairly boring existence. No Michael Jackson shenanigans for this little song-writing sobersides! So, I usually have to save up over a fairly lengthy period of time, all the interesting and even mildly interesting things that occasionally colour my life in order to put together a blurb that will not put the readers to sleep after the first paragraph (hey you, wake up! ... ... ...). That's my story anyway and I'm sticking to it.
So, whoz happenin' man? Well, after the twin horrors of Christmas and New Year were successfully navigated, with the destruction of as few brain cells as possible, it was back to work.
But not before I purchased a new band wagon. Well, a double-cab utility really (pick-up truck to our North American cousins). Here's the photo of the gleaming, new, blue beast with Dave, Jon and Ian standing beside it looking suitably impressed. I was sad to get rid of the old band-wagon. Funny how you can get attached to inanimate objects, isn't it? Even imbue them with a personality. I had a girlfriend like that once. Anyway, moving on hurriedly, I covered a lot of gig miles in the old wagon, a lot of good memories as well. So I was sort of sad to see her go. But like me, she was beginning to show her age, and latterly had not been as reliable as a band wagon needs to be. So it was out with the old and in with the new. It was ever thus, and one day it shall happen to me. In fact, I suspect it's happening already. My sadness in getting rid of the old beast was somewhat tempered by the fact that I sold it to a friend for an obscene amount of money.
My first concert of 2003, was an Australia Day concert in Sydney, on January 25th. I sang one song, "Shelter" and was paid a lot of money for that one song. It worked out to about $135 a second. I wish all my concerts were so short and so lucrative! Then it was back to reality, and up to Tamworth for the Tamworth Country Music Festival. Then on to Northern New South Wales and Southern Queensland for a further five concerts. I was a bit nervous about the concerts. I hadn't been to those regions for 3 years or so and was uncertain if anyone would turn up. But the attendances and receptions to the concerts were most gratifying. Underlining once again to me the loyalty (and short memory span!) of my audiences. We then went to Tasmania for two more concerts. A few weeks break followed, then I did a two week season at a cabaret-style restaurant in Melbourne called, "Capers." It was strange for me doing a "season", so to speak. I usually just do one night stands then move on before the reviews come out. But I enjoyed it nonetheless. The free food was very nice every night. There was a bit of free drink as well...
The Port Fairy Festival and the National Folk Festival in Canberra followed. Both enjoyable as usual. Then a new festival for me, the Mount Beauty Festival in Victoria. It's not called Mount Beauty for nothing, either. A very scenic, impressive place, even after a Summer of the worst drought and some of the worst bushfires in Australia's living memory. Traveling around the country the first three months of this year, it was obvious that the land was under extreme stress. I've never seen it so dry and so burned. The drought has since broken in many parts of the country, but not in all of them. In fact, we had a dust storm in Adelaide this weekend. Pretty unusual in mid-Winter, I can tell you. But the mid and far north of South Australia is still in the grip of the drought, and that's where the dust was blown down from. Canberra, our national capital, lost over five hundred houses in a horrific bushfire earlier in the year. Five people lost their lives. It was a miracle it wasn't a higher total. Jon, Ian and Dave, who live in Canberra, all escaped any damage to their houses. Although, Jon spent an anxious day on the roof of his house spraying it with water and watching the helicopters dumping water on the fires which were about half a kilometer from his house and getting closer every minute. It was, in his own words, "a scary and helpless feeling." The wife and daughter of a musician friend of his were both very badly burned trying to save their pet horses. They are still in hospital in Sydney undergoing treatment and rehabilitation therapy. All in all it was a dreadful summer. I was in Canberra about 6 weeks after the fire. The devastation was still almost unbelievable. I took a few photos, and I show one here. It shows a gum tree (indigenous to Australia) beginning to bloom again, whilst all the pine trees surrounding it (not indigenous to Australia) are burned and dead. A lesson to be learned perhaps. Canberra was surrounded by pine forests. No more, and probably never again.
My last Aussie concert, before the impending UK tour, was at a place called the Woodford/Maleny festival in Queensland. This festival is without doubt the biggest festival in Australia. It is certainly unique. The overseas acts who appear there, universally love it. I didn't actually play at the festival, however. It's a bit too far, too hot, too crowded, too close to New Year and too hippy for my tastes. But I played at their annual tree planting weekend. The Queensland Folk Federation, who run the festival, have actually bought the site, over 200 acres of it. Which is an incredible feat in itself. They have transformed it from a run down rural piece of land to something approaching a sub-tropical paradise. This they have done by dint of a lot of very hard work and the planting of thousands of trees, amongst other things. Every year they have a tree planting weekend. All the volunteers turn up and spend the weekend planting trees, clearing scrub, digging creek beds, and all that sort of thing. In the evenings they run concerts for them. I was one of the acts this year. It was very enjoyable and inspiring to see what they've done to the Festival site. A big, "Well-Done" to all those responsible. They're not finished yet, either. They have many thousands more trees to plant and are looking at acquiring more land. You can see why I call it unique.
To other things ... all the afore mentioned concerts were performed by myself, along with Ian, Jon and Dave (except for the Woodford/Maleny concert). Dave's Irish adventure petered out at the end of last year. For in spite of his flaming red hair and name, Dave is as Aussie as a gum leaf. He missed Australia badly, and found that the work in Ireland was not as frequent or as well paid as he had hoped. As he said, "I thought that if I was going to be broke and out of work, then it was better to be broke and out of work in Australia rather than Ireland. At least the weather's better in Australia!" Can't argue with that. When I heard he'd come back to Godzone, I offered him a job with the band again, at reduced pay rates of course, and he accepted with alacrity.
Much as I enjoy working with the boys, and I intend to do so again, touring overseas with a band, at least at my level, is financial suicide. I've expounded on this before in previous Bogleblurbs. So, for the upcoming tour of the UK and Ireland, it's me and John Munro, once again doing our down-market Everley Brothers impersonation. It seemed to work very well for us on the North American tour last year. Here's a publicity photo of John and I which was taken for the tour. The disturbing thing is, that it's the BEST one! John has retired from his proper job and is now a full time musician, the poor fool. I can only hope his superannuation pay-out was substantial. He's going to need it. As I write this, John is in Canada with his group Colcannon, and will join me in the UK from there. There should be no visa problems this time, though. John still has a British passport. We have about 58 or 59 concerts during the tour, a fair workload. Actually, allowing for the fact that our time on stage in each concert will average around 1 hour 45 minutes, we will only really work for a total of about four days and nine hours or so during the 3 months we will actually be on the road. Mind you, there will be a lot of traveling time... ... ...
Getting towards the end of it now. Not much more mangled grammar and fractured syntax to go... ...
My health has been up and down a bit. Got a bad cold during the Canberra Festival, which turned into a bit of pleurisy before I battered it into submission. I had some polyps removed from my greater or lesser colon, or somewhere down there anyway. But all were OK!!! In fact, the doctor actually showed me a photo of one of them, describing it as a, "classic." If I'd known he was going to take photos up there I would have asked my polyp to remember to smile. Mercifully, I will not post that photo on this blurb! I will however, post the latest photo of my two little ruffians, Ranger and Radar. As you can see, they are still cute. I will miss them for the next three months. You should be thankful I have no children, otherwise this blurb would be full of photos of sickeningly cute children as well. On balance, I prefer cute dogs.
And that's it folks. I'm sure there are a lot of things I've forgotten to tell you about, but I'm surprised I've remembered so much. There are obviously still a few brain cells flickering fitfully in my brain, somewhere. Wish me luck on the tour.
Best wishes Eric
Archives
