It was grand. It was a kick-on. Below is a first taste of what it was like in the Stables on Grand Final night in B-town, when all of Ballarat's rock and roll survivors from the turbulent 90s gathered to kick on in honour of a true soldier of the Great Fight Against Boring...
Thankyou so much to everyone who organised it - first place getter Rockin' Ronnie - who got the bands togther (and off again) the whole day (while pausing to knock out a high voltage set with the 23rd of Elvis); Roddie Ramos, who made the stage look space-rock-a-go-go (and was nice enough to get up and beat the living bejesus into the Fat Thing's set), Suds McNulty who brewed a special slab of beer for the occasion, Big Beats Bad Boy Corey on the barbie and wryness, Shep "No Bullshit Bids" Huntley whipping the ker-lassic t-shirt auction into shape... and there was the bands.
The bands. We love you all. We forgive you, man of the broken lead on the Gibson for the Rye Catchers. That epic set-up time. That edgy drummer who kept nailing sweet little hardcore double bass/snare riffs. And then, the sonic horror. Those shallow Generation Whatevers know it in GuitarHero talk as the 'bit where the bottles start hitting you' - but here, in Ballarat, we love you for getting up and having a crack. It was rock, the crowd was loaded, and the night was magnificent. And I am so broken.
For now... A quiet Sunday arvo and some time with a cup of tea and a media encoder... Stay tuned for more... including these guys, featuring the man himself - Kan- ... er - Len, ripping the guts out and flaying them in sacrifice to the Gods of Rock themselves.
1 comment:
Thanks for forgiving us! It was a pretty classic rock'n'roll f$%#up moment, hey what?
But it wasnt our fault! Really; it seamed like we took so long to setup- but we originally weren't supposed to be on til 9.30 but then someone who was supposed to be on before us (wont mention any names) didnt turn up! So we got asked to jump up early at the last minute, but not all our members were there (they had been earlier in the day, but had gone on a mission) so our singer did that solo stuff while waiting for the others to turn up; then our set up was the 15minutes it normlly takes except for the guy with the gibson having sound problems AND...
it wasnt just that his lead was broken, we later found out (when we had proper time to analyse the gear later) a) one of the pickups on his guitar had died, b) one of his pedals was shorting out and c) two of the four valves on his amp had blown! (all on the one night- we'd checked the gear at jam four nights earlier) so no wonder he couldnt figure out (on stage) what the hell was going wrong with the sound!
But yeah, we tried to rock out regardless; so lucky everyone was nice and tanked for Len as you say and would have almost enjoyed it no matter what we did. (We played the following week at the Public Bar and sounded quite reasonable; please belive me). Still, it was a great night, and Len is well sorted from it; thanks indeed to the mighty Rockin Ronski and all and sundry.
Long live Ballarat music and our great history of being half arsed. ;P
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