This page details some of the music I have been listening to and other exciting cultural inputs.

Music:

Feist - Let It Die

Silverchair - Young Modern

Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake It's Morning

Eddie Vedder - Into The Wild

Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova - Once - Soundtrack

Stickboy - (on myspace)

Lilie Parm - (on myspace)

Books:

Tim Winton - Breath.

Peter Carey - His Illegal Self.

Thoughts: 18 May 2008

On Monday 28 April my good friend and (along with our Jerry) long time musical collaborator died peacefully. I scratched this out in the days leading up to and after his death.

Hey Matty,
You have to go now
I understand, but I see you love.
Forget for a second
the music we played together.
Forget you helped us build our house.
You know parts of it no one has seen.
Shouldn't ever need to, we did it right.
I smile and remember you and I
under the house pulling electrical cables
and laughing, all the while laughing.
We always had such great
talks about life over dinner.
We were on a similar path Matty,
I won't forget.

There were other T-Shirts before it, sure
but Lovin' Life, that's the one,
that could have spawned a revolution.
Made people laugh a little,
You gave away a little gift of yourself.
Could have been a movie Matty,
you said so yourself.

November and you came down to see us
with your new song
and I knew then things weren't totally ok.
I've Got Something In My Head.
"whataya think of that?" you asked
and what could I say.
But we talked pretty seriously
around the subject.

Then it was New Year and a time we all think of you.
You came down with Sophie and the kids
and between Mia and other things our time together
was otherwise occupied.

January, and Frank came, and John and we
rode mountain bikes down a mountain
and you didn't have any brakes.
And you said to me whilst I tried to fix them for you,
"Ah Andy, that's what I like to see,
a man after my own heart. Struggling
with the wrong tool to do the job."
And I didn't get it fixed but you and Frank did
and we carried on.

"I'm not as fit as I used to be", you said to anyone who would listen.
None of us were!
But you had a double dose of chemo
Coursing through you that we didn't.

Clovelly for your 40th birthday party
If ever I have witnessed your gift for giving
on a grander scale I cannot recall when.
But you were like the post-it portrait,
a pixilation of yourself, you weren't clear,
you weren't yourself.

March, before you went to hospital
I caught you for an hour with San Pellegrino.
Not wine
...And what the Italians don't know about water
I don't want to know.
Sophie was a rock and you in prison blue
clinging with such love between you both.
I waved goodbye to you.

May and you holed up in St.Vincents
like a Yogi in a cave and friends and family
visit and stand silent sentinel to your suffering.
Talking in hushed tone
learning the whole time from you
and wondering if we could be so calm.
You lasted five and a half years
with something in your head.
And it never really showed.
Until now.

"Sometimes he takes the best ones
because they have already lived a good life"
Bullshit.

Where to from here I don't know for sure.
I already miss you
and imagine that will get worse.
But I can see you forever in my mind,
or I will remember you as the mist rises
up from the valley, through the trees.
I'll close my eyes
and just see you and your smile,
maybe a laugh, most likely a decent Sav,
and settle down face to face for a chat.
You never bullshitted to me.

You fought till the end
and you were a fine friend, my friend.
Some people will wish you immortality,
you were better than that, I wish you peace.

Love and light,

Andy

 

Photo by: JLK.