The Life and Times of Peter Green
Archive: 23 July - 5 August 2012
Edna, Neil and Liam....USA Feb 1987
July 23rdI manage to track down a handful of slides of the Skyhook boys doing their infamous CLEO shoot from way way back in the seventies. These are some of the reject snaps. I'm stoked as Bobby Skyhook wanted one of him with the gas mask covering his ..well cock! The slides have darkened a bit but if nothing else it means he gets one of his wishes for his upcoming 60th. A snap of him in his prime. It's a great addition to his other cool gift from us. The fun part will be going into Kmart photo lab and getting the nudie shot converted into a snap.We are still working away on GHOST CARS Crowdies book, just tidying up areas, a few segments to go but coming together. Mark has done a really good job with lay out. I am impressed. Such a fast learner he is. The book has taken over our lives. July 24thI am appalled at our crappy Liberal state government is ripping $290 million out of TAFE. It causes such problems for people around our area, Swinburne at Lillydale will be forced to close it's doors, very sad because it is the only university campus in the outer-east. On August 8th at 12.00 pm there is a public rally at Swinburne Lillydale (plus live music and a sausage sizzle-so very family friendly) so we are going to go along. To try and turn Ted Failleu (opps Bailleu) around on this. He really is one of the worst premiers Victoria has ever had.July 25thJack White plays a kick arse show at festival Hall-he decides it's all girl band night (he has both a female and male band with him on tour and decides which one will play that night). It helps move his brilliant solo album BLUNDERBUSS back up the aussie charts (ten spot jump this week) it is so close to gold. If ever there is one album to buy this year buy this one. JB HI FI have it on special at a mere $16, best $16 bucks you've ever spent this year.We are at JB in the evening as they have their 6.00 sale on today, 20% off. I buy Hellraiser 31 on bluray and some old vintage Dr Who. I head to the Kmart photo lab as I need to get the nude Bongo snaps printed. A very cute girl is at the photo lab so I explain who I am and what I want done-so she doesn't think I'm some sort of pervert. She helps me change the size of the jpeg etc. She goes "Oh Skyhooks oh my god"...I think Wow she KNOWS them...and then she says "My MOTHER loves this band". How funny...well they are old school after all. We are in the office past midnight working on Ghost Cars, the Crowdies supporters are great on GryphonMusic twitter, keeping me amused. Thanks Tweeters. July 26thHappy Birthday Bongo! The big 60 and in the words of Miss Candee "You just keep getting better"!!!We give him a call and it's just fun, Bobby really looked after us when we first came to Melbourne, getting us the flat in Toorak and then living at his house that first time on Osborne street. Fun days but they seem so long ago now. We'll see him in a few days at his party. We hear from some of the girls, Mark so doesn't want a birthday number, just a handful of people having some food at the local Indian restaurant. So an easy chilled birthday. Not sure if our friend with his new girlfriend is coming along, probably not so I guess it's drama free. I'm a bit over the bullshit. July 27thHappy Birthday Marky! The years fly by but here we are together still and stronger then ever! Truly fantastic. I watch other peoples b.s. and it's like watching some sad arse soap opera through a frosted window. We count our blessing! We find out that Marks mum was heading to the cinema when Mark decided to "exit" a month early. Strangely enough she was going to see "The Case Of Dr Laurent" which has a REAL birth in the movie. It's an old french movie. Said it would be headline making if she gave birth during the movie. "A pregnant woman gave birth today during the "birth scene of the Dr Laurent Movie". I tell Mark he would of been known as the "Laurent Baby"...so I now call him that *GRIN*.Indian was wonderful really good food. Our mate Jeff helps me keep my promise around his book for our friend Warrick. None of our stock arrives yet so Mr W has the first Shirl book! At least I am true to my word. It's such a bargain price anyway-$20 at Kmart, $22 at Big W. Bargain- SHIRL is a really enjoyable read. Some talk that Tasmania may well be the first place in Australia to allow gay marriage. Tasmanian Premier Lara Giddings seems to think so-finally someone brave enough to take us in the right direction. July 28thFoggy foggy foggy, nearly all day the mountain is covered.We head to the St Kilda Bowling Club, that fun music venue in the heart of St Kilda. We drove right past it as they have a high fence up...but eventually find it. Bongo says no presents so of course we take one. The amazing Rolling Stones SOME GIRLS hat box full of goodies and his CLEO photos. He's way way too excited, think we blew him away. Sit next to Tony and Leonie. Tony replaced Shirl in the Hooks, just this wonderful lovely man. He's always been a sweetheart to us, and some of our favourite Skyhook gigs have been with Tony as lead singer. Leonie who we have only briefly met, rally nice lady, a friend of our mate Gabe. So we sat and laughed and watched the party roll by. All the remaining Hook boys turned up.... so we thought and hoped the various members might have a play. So towards the end of the night Bongo Starkie, Bob Spencer, Fred Imants Strauks and Greg Macainsh take the stage. On lead vocal is Laura Davidson -who has sung with some of these guys at the Caravan Club. Back then she did 4 songs, tonight it's 6. She's cool actually and one of the few people who can hit those Shirl type notes. Greg makes me stress that it is not a Skyhooks 'reunion' but just mates having a play at someones party. So you older readers do not get too excited... When they are playing so many people whipped out their phones to record it for all those internet areas. At least Mr Starkie asked me to bring my camera... other highlights, most of us burning ourselves on overheated party pies. Mark posing for a photo with Tony Skyhook-that NEVER happens- Red Symons arriving for 3.2 minutes, Greg Macca's old flame Jenny Brown who penned Million $ Riff book...I love seeing the "ex's" when they are older....Bongo being so over the moon and having fun.... catching up with Toni Gibbs again and Bongo's first child Indianna who is drop-dead gorgeous in 2012.... where did the time go no longer a baby. Over all we had a wonderful night so thanks Bobby boy! Laura you do rock....lets hope some more shows happen of that band that isn't THAT band.... home by 3.00 July 29thRecovery day. We do work in the office. Mostly on "Time On Earth" segment of Ghost Cars. Email some of the guys some snaps from last night.July 30thI fine turn the Afterglow segment of Ghost Cars, use a few of Neil's original handwritten comments that he gave us just prior to release for an Update sheet. Mark balances it with some type- and it's hard to get it right but he does.Pay our private health cover -always seems like a lot but as proven by those kidney stones it's sensible. Still I could use the money elsewhere-x4 more solar panels come to mind. July 31stWestpac have located my new debit card, don't you hate it when the banks auto machine says a staff member will call you back in 4 hours but you don't hear anything for two days?August 1stMy amazing sister gave us two incredible tickets for Dame Edna, the really expensive stalls area. So it's a 1.00 performance so again we head into the city. Bite the bullet and park in the car park near the theatre , you know it's going to be over $50 just to park, in the lower, lower, lower basement. You can smell sulphur it's so close t hell!The foyer is packed, another full house for the Dame. Mark points out that everyone is REALLY old, the woman in front cringes ... she doesn't want to be old but she is. If she had any more facelifts she could wear her chin as a rain hat! You just want to say "dear accept that gravity is real and grow old gracefully "! She really wasn't fooling anyone but hey if she wants to try and fight mother nature her choice I guess. The seats were great despite the usher telling me the wrong seat area. After a small mix up I am next to Mark and a sweet older woman (who has aged gracefully but her humour in tact) next to me. She tells me she is such a fan and went to the very early Barry Humphries shows. We both hope Sandy Stone will appear on the show, there's been no mention but the ol' 1950's ghost is a wonderful Humphrie's creation. Every seat taken this is one of the last performances so we all settle in. First on is Sir Les Patterson, and he's standing on the astro turf stage, astro turf everything, the floor, the walls even the piano. It's Les backyard and he's rehearsing for his own cooking show. A full house set is on the side, complete with garden shed .... Les is wearing a very bright Hawaiian shirt and shorts and of course that insanely HUGE schlong making itself obvious. He's as brilliant as ever, so socially wrong, so showering of spittle and mucus....and people pay a thousand dollars to be dribbled on by Les-I love it. We pick up a new Les nick name for Lesbians- 'Fur Traders" one even we haven't heard before, will have to bait some of our girl couple friends with that one. Sir Les's brother, Father Gerard Patterson-a new Humphries creation emerges tonight after a scene where a seance goes wrong. He tells how Cardinal Pell says " Gerard you've touched so many young Australians".... any alter boy molesting priests in the crowd just freaked at that line. Like many of Barry's creations it's straight for the jugular. We are next rewarded by Sandy Stone .... the ghost..and he is marvellous, just brilliant. As a ghost he gets to check in on his wife Beryl at her retirement home/hospital. She has a fall one day and her "wellness officer" didn't raise an eyebrow, too busy updating her Facebook page says Sandy. Which brought a huge chuckle from the crowd. Sandy finally gets to go to heaven at the end, a huge fluffy recliner chair complete with fluffy cloud lamp lands from above. Sandy venturers over to the chair- he clips on his seat belt (more applause) and he's off up and up flies the chair into the ceiling of Her Majesty's.. the curtain closes for interval. I stumble to the foyer and check out the Edna and Les snow globes... unfortunately they are pretty crappy- I just expected something more "real". The 2nd part of the show opens with a Hollywood True Story type expose on Edna. Finishing with her giving the media what they want, struggling out of a limo flashing her Dame Beaver...very Britney! Of course "it's" blurred out... just hysterical.... and so well done. Edna's secret life as she emerges from a Taliban cave... and her sweat shop making Edna rip off outfits. Edna herself arrives at the show on an elephant, it's insanely huge and it's trunk sprays glitter over the crowd. A fake Edna slips off the elephant and falls down 2 levels to the stage floor. Her Ednaettes gather around her and up she springs. A very hidden door lets the 'real' Edna in and her doppelganger out. She is in fine form, possibly the best Humphries show so far. It ends with a 10,000 gladioli backdrop being lowered and Edna flinging the flowers out. "I love to hear the crack of a contact lens" she shrieks. The crowd is really appreciative and eventually Barry Humphries himself comes out to thank everyone. I've never seen that happen before. What a hero! The world will be a sadder place without his creations and I'm not convinced we've heard the last of any of them. A brilliant show, a true aussie icon. August 2ndWork away on more book stuff, it does seem endless. But we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. We both head down to the office and work till 3.00 tonight. Determined to get another segment done. Down to the final few book spots so this will be sold out soon. Amazing.Almost mail one of our friends a tiara , talk about a drama queen. Some people never change they are destined to repeat the same mistakes over and over. They wonder why their lives are crap and blame the world for treating them so bad, in reality most of it is their own fault. As you get older you see through the bullshit and it's easier to shake your head and walk away. Talk about a bad case of denial! Down to the final 12 Crowded House shows that need Venues, so if you are reading this... see if you can help. We are so close to having a complete list. (Email: peter@frenz.com) March 1987 2nd-Austin-TX 5th-Oaklahoma City,OK 6th-Springfield, MO 8th-St Louis, MO (Eddie Rayner leaves after this show) 29th-Fort Lauderdale, FL-(this COUlD be Sunrise Theatre) April 1987 26th-Albuquerque, NM 28th-Dallas, TX 29th-Austin, TX May 1987 5th-Memphis, TN August 1987 20th-St Denis, Montreal, QC....this is probably St Dennis Theatre 31st-Victoria, BC August 1993 30th-Pretoria (Sth Africa) August 3rdRosemaree helps with some layout on a Skyhooks update. Great she can do this, as we are swamped-much appreciated. Jeff Apter's book n SHIRL is also at Big W stores for $22.00 so very cheap. A must for all Aussie music lovers.I hear from the girl on magnetic and the house is all ours. Our friend Jodie W is looking after our place for a week, she has time off and needs somewhere to stay so the place will be nice and safe, just got to show her how to use the security system with all it's cameras and alarms. Saying that our security guard guy is very cute, maybe she should set off the alarms about 10.00 at night! She'd look good in a cat burglar outfit! August 4thFinally we can burn again on the mountain. Mark says it won't burn it's all too damp. I prove him wrong, I'd make a great arsonist (yieks). So good to get rid of the pile of tree drop. Now just that massive tree trunk and our yard will start returning to normal.Our mate Jane sends me the snippet on Pete Jones and the honour guard of bikes from his funeral. He'd love that. Rosemaree spoils us by cooking dinner- so she calls in at 5.00, a really enjoyable fun night for us all. Food was great-thank you Miss R. I look like I've been in the forest for 5 years, mud and leaves... I was always taught to dress for dinner, this wasn't what they had in mind. Even my hair smells of fire smoke. We watch Hellraiser II on Blu Ray. We are only watching the first two, I'm sure it's all down hill from that point. How cool is Pinhead from the movie. Mark laughing at some of the Skyhook CLEO reject shots. Do we really need to see Red Symons , white skinned, naked and smoking? The Skyhooks website getting quite a few hits, the site address is in Jeff Apter's SHIRL book, so we are getting some traffic from that. Worth checking out for the seventies band photos alone. www.skyhooks-music.com August 5thSo Marilyn's been gone for 50 years now. I don't believe that she was killed, accidental death I'm sure. I always thought her house keeper was a bit f an odd ball..but maybe she really was loyal.We head off to the Record Collectors Fair today with our huge list of items that fans want. We find about 5% a few at amazing prices, the rest no sign of. I am a bit freaked at how expensive Crowded House items now are... the collectors market is through the roof. We are there for ages but at least we can say we gave it our best shot. I find a handful of one of the Canada radio shows, the Fair stall holder guy said he can get a handful more from his buddy in Sydney so a few Frenz may get a chance at another radio show. We'll only have a couple but it still beats Ebay I guess. I wish the guys would release a few more of the older shows, so few of these radio promo discs turn up, but those who get them are probably happy. We get home just before the storm breaks, it's not as violent as they were saying. The power actually stays on. It's been a long day so a deep warm bath is calling me. That's it for the moment. Thanks for keeping the faith. PG |