The Life and Times of Peter Green
updated 22 July 2024
 Neil Finn's Crowded House jacket now at the Music Vault-Vic Arts centre, Melbourne. |
July 8thI'm glad Melbourne airport has finally shown some common sense allowing the above ground railway station. Finished by 2030, great to see that a train to the airport is finally happening.Week #5 for Crowded House's "Gravity Stairs" and still no good news. It drops to #229 (60 spots) on the Australian charts. Selling a mere 116 cds/lps. I looked at the chart history on all the other Crowded House releases and this is by far the worst. The general public are not interested. I just thought the good will around this band would give it some solid sales but I was wrong. At least live they are still pulling in the crowds. Someone offers to buy our Split Enz Puppets from the Murder video clip. I said NO, crazy I know as it was a big chunk of money. I'm adding them into the Enz Archives. I just want future generations to enjoy them, they are so wild looking. It looks like the far right in France have lost the election. Hope so. I'm sure France will be in turmoil. Some good old "ganging up" against the Right. Which the right tend to do to everyone else, so it's fitting to return the favour. A nice chat with Aaron and her doggy, more pups have arrived! July 9thHeavy ran when I was driving off the mountain in the wee hours of the morning. Watch all these tiny cars bob like corks. The Red Beast growls at the weather and just rolls straight on to my destination.My friend Heather at work gives me loads of her home grown oranges (with a bit of hybrid mandarin in it as well) . So I make 2 lites of fresh OJ. All bottled and ready to be consumed. The flu seems to be everywhere so I'm doing all I can to keep us healthy. I chat to Mum at 4.00pm , she took a few steps today on her special walking machine , so that's great, still in hospital and will be for ages but she still hasn't given up. She's a tough Mum, think she stays here for her kids and grand daughter. I make meatloaf for dinner. We rarely have it but a craving tonight. I have to say it tasted great. July 10thWe pay the cable bill today, Foxtel is cr@p these days, after all these years we might get rid of it, so much garbage and the few channels we love are about to go. Plus I don't want too give crusty old Murdoch our money.Markys Youtube Wednesday is up. A fun one, Crowded House back into the pubs and clubs. July 28th 1991. Tims in the band too, and it's at Transformers here in Melbourne. The guys performing "Now We're Getting Somewhere". A good version too. Check it out and thanks for supporting our videos. July 11thA great sunrise. I'm up stupidly early as I had to do a runner and collect for some of Dr Troys medical stock for Gaza. All done, it was easy and no cars on the road. I head to charity after that and arrive 10 minutes before the boss so I am on time. I even managed to grab a coffee. The way too early departure has worn me out a bit.We lose another full time staff member soon so the pressure will be on again. As always the girls here will rise up for the challenge. I try 5 times to call Mum and say "hello" but the wards 2 hand held phones are out. A nice nurse called Oreka gives me her mobile number and she takes her phone to Mum so we can chat. How awesome is that. Oh no, I spot another house I like on Magnetic Island. The first the owner is renovating and I keep thinking he will wreck everything I love about it. The new house is stupidly expensive and very QLD. I'll keep an eye on it. I think I want us to live on the island in the future but just for Winter. It's a rather fine abode. Lasagne for dinner and Butter Chicken soup. YUM. July 12thI see the Crowdies have added some extra Opera House shows to the Aussie Tour. No surprise as the original gig was so beloved. They'll always do well live. Plenty of seats left for the bands Melbourne Rod Laver show.I'm driving to Olinda with Oasis "Dig Out Your Soul" cd playing in the car. 'Bag It Up' is a great track for driving music. I get to baby sit both Finn & Charlie the 2 gorgeous dogs at the bakery. Such Split Enz names!!!! Finn especially is smitten with me. I work in the garden and circular drive and Midnight spends the 2 hours with me. Clear blackberries and cut the agapanthus. We watch "Children of Men" , the 2006 movie and it's really great. Love the way it is filmed. So cool that scientists used the new Hi-C to analyse the 3D structures of a 52,000 year old Wooly Mammoth (Mammoth Genome). The mammoth found preserved with skin and muscle in the Siberian permafrost. Basically chromosomes. A first? Looks like beef jerky I hear. July 13thReally thick fog. You can only see a metre or two in front of my car.I have a really cool chat with a local, he is in awe that our power bill has only been $55.00 for 3 months. I love solar panels. I had good sleep last night, Midnight stayed on my bed till 5.30-that is her sleeping in. I drive to Butlers at Olinda and buy a birthday gift for our friend Trudi. They were just opening so I had the store to myself. I felt like Elton at Harrods. LOL. I find some footage for video maker Richard Lowenstein. Well maybe, too soon to talk about what this is for. Lots of rain on the way so I go out into the yard and plant some Avalanche Jonquils and some Chanterelle Daffodils. One of those evening where I just couldn't be bothered cooking dinner, so off to Kelly's tonight. Loads of locals, I guess the school holidays brings out the families. Have some laughs with Carolyn the owner , a really nice night. It was hard leaving the warmth of the Tavern for the sleet outside. I take it easy driving home as the roads are ice covered and slippery tonight. July 14thSuper foggy again and grey and cold. Still no snow. We have officially ran out of wood for our fires. I'm sure I can find a few bits to fill up a basket or two. We've never bought wood while we have lived here.I'n stuck behind some old tourist driver , who was doing 15kms this morning. Silly old coot refused to pull over and let the 20 cars past. So frigging selfish. Drivers were blasting him and shaking their heads. No bike riders today, way too cold. Just the old bugger turtling along. I'm laughing at Trump's line "it is incredible that such an act can take place in our country" as Trump gets grazed by a bullet at his rally. Really? Maybe for those of us who do not live in America I for one do not find it incredible at all. Your country is gun obsessed, only a matter of time. Some crazy will probably try the same thing with Biden. I am starting to think there really is no hope for America. I see that the brilliant Paul Kelly is playing some shows in America and Canada in September and October. So if you have never seen Paul live before, and he is playing near you, make the effort it's always great night to. Here is the link for the dates. New album out later this year too. July 15thMidnight so restless last night, I think she slept too much during the day, so not a lot of sleep from me. So I snuggle deep and sleep in. We have a week of crappy weather happening. The fog seems to be getting thicker every day. Still no snow.Trump shot news everywhere so I avoid it. Less I see of his ugly face the better my day is. I check out Youtube numbers and I can thank Chump for one thing, our views for the Split Enz MURDER video are the highest we have had in 2 months. How weird is that. Must be a Google thing. We work in the office all day, just catch up stuff on Emails and I did the tiniest but of archiving. I saw Twisted Sisters Dee Snider being interview and he was great. I always appreciate this message to Trump supporters when they used his song. "Attention QANON MAGAT FASCISTS,". "Every time you sing ‘We're Not Gonna Take It' remember it was written by a cross-dressing, libtard, tree hugging half-Jew who HATES everything you stand for. It was you and people like you that inspired every angry word of that song." Such a good response. I put up a few live Enz photos of Neil Finn onto the various social media areas today. I have to say the one time I found Neil to look truly amazing was at his 21st birthday gig at Wellington in 1979. His semi- gothic make up… our favourite year for the Enz too-Mark and myself would see them A LOT! You can check out cool Neil Finn here. July 16thI keep an eye on the charts, my top 500 Aussie chart. I wanted to see how Pearl Jam, Crowded House and Royel Otis are doing. Pearl Jam with "Dark Matter" -week #12 on the chart. Moves up a few spots in the right direction. #234 (was 237) +3. Royel Otis with "Pratts + Pain" week 18 on the chart. Moves up as well to #325 (from 341) + 16. Sadly, Crowded House with "Gravity Stairs"- week #6 drops again. #241 (was 228)- 13. The top 500 is really fascinating, I get sidetracked by it every week, looking at the sales or lack of sales. It can be shocking these days but there is hope, some of the younger Aussie bands are doing really well.A large crash last night during the wind and rain. I put on my big disaster coat and go outside but no sign of any damage or trees down. But this morning as I turn down the main road, yes, one of our big chunky trees across the road, tangled in power lines. I call into the oval and cal the SES and they also call the service provider and the council. By the time I am home they have removed 85% of it. Just left one big chunky bit and the giant tree roots in the yard. I was so stoked, so big shout out to the SES. Our neighbours have been really nice too. I give Mum a call and she has now been moved to a private hospital and started on her "gym membership" as she calls it. In other words her Physio, to try and walk again. She went twice and making some effort and it is slowly working. July 17thExcited, no rain this morning. Looks like it has finally stopped for a few hours. It really has set in though, loads more on the way.I work with Marky in the office for most of the day. I hear from the Music Vault and our Hester stage jacket and Neils Enz coat will be taken down on the 21st of July and replaced by the other 2 items. The Neil Finn stage jacket (as pictured on the front of the debut album cover) and one of the Split Enz "I See Red" coats. The same coats we made mini version of for our Split Enz MURDER video clip. So I'm assuming these new ones will be on display from July 22nd. Now remember the Music Vault at the Arts centre is Melbourne has FREE entry. I think it has a comments area so if you like what we have lent them, please feel free to leave them a positive message or a post on their FB page. Nice we can lend out bits of our archives from time to time. July 18thI wake up at 3.00 am and couldn't get back to sleep. Not sure why, my head is full of "stuff" I just wish it wouldn't emerge at that stupid time of the morning. I opened the curtains and watched the fog roll across the face of the moon . Rather beautiful No UFO's though, what a pity.One of our Salvo crew is leaving today, so Bye Bye Heather. Lots of cake and munchy's. It was a bit of a weird day. China installs 10 gigawatts of wind and solar power generation every FORTNIGHT. By comparison, Duttons plan to build 7 nuclear power plants would add fewer than 10 GW of generation capacity to the grid by SOME TIME after 2035! What a joke Dutton and his dud Nuclear "plan" is. July 19thIce wind blowing over the mountain. It is rare but I sit inside the bakery today and warm my hands on their pie oven and do a bit of work online.A software malfunction via CrowdStrike causing microsoft laptops etc gliches and problems. Planes are cancelled and some people panic. All our Apple Macs working fine and we have some cash if we need it. It's pretty much over by the end of the day. The media go into some sort of overdrive and the rest of us get on with our lives. I pop Skyhooks performing a live version of "Trouble With The Computer" on my social media pages. A boutique record company were set to run 1000 of the Split Enz (USA) Frenzy but by midnight it got knocked on the head. The Second Disc webpage ran an article. I thought it bit odd that the guys hadn't said anything to me. I spoke to Nigel tonight and he rarely mentioned it. So at the time of me writing this it's not happening. Of course I was flooded with emails, messages etc, even when I am retired I suddenly get bombarded. July 20thNigel gives me some details of the origin of "Murder" and what sparked Tim to write it. Mostly based on a real event. We think it was only ever played live 2 or 3 times. I dare say teenage Peter and Mark probably went to every gig when it was played. Yes teenagers, us- so long ago but inside we are still teenagers. Shit we had good musical tastes. HA!I see my friend Pauline hiking along the Tourist Rd and some sleet started falling so I pulled over and gave her a lift to the bakery. It's too wet to hike. I'm excited to have big bunch of fresh spinach from my friends at Pellegrino's, it seems crazy that spinach is currently very hard to find. I have no more in my garden, besides too much will give me kidney stones so maybe not a bad thing it is so limited. So I'm baking a fresh spinach and feta pie for dinner. The kitchen smells amazing and our giant oven is keeping it nice and snug. We really are enjoying the "True Love" TV series. A 6 parter, where a group of older friends make a drunken pact to not let each other suffer a slow painful death in old age. They engineer a more dignified death each. I've always believed it should be up to the individual when they decide they want to go. Providing others are not forcing that decision I'm all for it. So incredibly sad to see older people suffer and lose their dignity. Anyway a rather cool show. The actors rather excellent. July 21stFifty Five years ago, Neil Armstrong the first person to walk on the moon. You'd think after half a century + we would have aimed for Mars now and took a stroll! I keep volunteering but no Ione takes me up own the offer. I think Midnight wants to be the first cat on Mars, I see her looking skywards at night and the lonely red planet.Happy Birthday to our friend Trudi. She's a top shelf girl and we love her a lot. We sing and leave a message. No doubt we will chat later today. Her birthday present is rather fragile so we'll pass it on when we catch up. That's it for yet another diary from a frosty Kalorama. Love Peter x |
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