Chairman Of The Bored

Spring is finally here, sidling in like a compunctious wombat. The established cliche of Melbourne is that you can experience all four seasons in one day (Michael Fish would probably have something to say about that, but he'd be wrong). On the left we have the view over the south bank of the Yarra river, with Federation Square (leading off to the angular Melbourne film institute) in the middle. Dave and Jodie have now left for New Zealand - it was great hanging out with the guys for a few weeks, and I really hope we get to hook up again in NZ. While they were still here, we accompanied them to Genevieve Gauckler's exhibition - there were some good 'cut up' / digital collage works, I found the fast food and medical technology ones particularly interesting.

We also went to a retrospective look at the 'Skins And Sharps' culture of late 60s/70s Melbourne. From the photographs and film footage, it did not seem too distant from similar movements in Britain of the time, but with an edge that was distinctly their own. While I find the prominence and glorification of violence abhorrent, all the other factors of the movement seemed to be a distillation of youth culture - underage drinking, sexual politics and of course loud, urgent music (which was typical of the Aussie rock scene, and was a precursor to bands such as AC/DC). Stories of drinking and fighting up and down Swanston St. (now the main artery of the Central Business District) abound - a favourite trick was to fill the tram lines with petrol and throw a match into it. Very different to the mass of commuters and tourists lining up outside the cafes this morning. As Dan pointed out, this was very much their own scene, very particular to a certain time and place and not easily bought into - you couldn't just walk into high street shops and buy the required CDs and uniform to associate with a group of people in magazines that looked cool. I should imagine there was little room for likely pretenders. It was also interesting that the kids involved were a lot younger than I was expecting - starting at about 12, you would have been considered an old man by 19. It got me thinking about some of the paradoxes and ironies that occur within cultures such as these - a recurring theme is always conflict and nonconformity - towards parents, other groups and of course the authorities. Yet for all the championing of nonconformity towards outward society, there always seems to be the inward pressure of conforming to a specific set of attitudes within that group. The immediate reaction is to write it off as moronic, and I don't think I'll ever agree with the unrelenting machismo and violence, but it's important to remember just how young some of the "kids" involved were. There's a lot to be said for good employment rates, decent education, not to mention available entertainment - I think boredom is a factor which is much ignored a lot of the time. One anomaly in the picture was the clothing - aside from the boots and trousers you'd expect, multicolour knitted cardigans featured heavily. In the context of the time and people, it would have been de rigueur and dead sharp ... wear them today and you'd be booted out of a Belle & Sebastian gig for being too twee. Funny how certain items of clothing become hot retro items, and others from the same time get ridiculed.

I had a conversation with one of my friends recently, who asked if I was going to come from 12 months of travel "a bit of a hippy". I'm not quite sure what that means ... I'd guess she means more relaxed and less of a grumpy git. We're at the halfway mark, and to some degree that's the case ... physical discomforts bother me slightly less, however I'm finding it more and more difficult to ignore the attitudes that I disagree with. The standard cliches of backpacking seem to be lazing around on beaches, hiking mountains, riding around on buses and "talking to loads of cool people". We've done some of that, but a good amount of the people I've met I would not describe in any way as "cool". Depends on the definition of course - if you count random aggression in the street, or a misogynistic, homophobic or casually racist attitude then yes. They were pretty cool.

Probably not so surprising, this sort of shit is often pushed through mainstream entertainment, sometimes subtly, sometimes not. I particularly get annoyed with Hollywood action films that seem to be getting dumber, more sexist and more full of product placement by the minute. It's not so much the fact that they exist that depresses me (freedom of speech and expression, after all) - it's the fact that so many people choose to sell themselves out to this sort of attitude. This was one of a number of factors which prompted me to get out of England in the first place in the attempt to go and broaden my mind a bit, and hopefully talk to some nice and interesting people. That's not really happened as much as I'd liked, and Q.F.S. I feel as bored, irritated, hacked off and alienated as I did in England. For all you Red Dwarf fans out there, and remember the Timeslides episode, I feel like Dave Lister does at the beginning. Perhaps I should get some bubble wrap, paint it red and write Tension Sheet on it.

Maybe I've been in St. Kilda too long. It's a bit like a whistlestop tour of social contrasts and problems - in a five minute walk you can see happy families on the beach, destitution, prostitution, the screaming insane, discarded syringes, 20-somethings getting smashed in the meat markets, trendy 30-somethings in the cafes and a great many people just trying to mind their own business. Good for people watching, but I'm beginning to ask just what it is I'm doing there, and I'm scratching my head trying to think of anything genuinely groundbreaking or constructive that I've done in the last two months. I don't think there really is anything - perhaps it's all been a big waste of time. Or maybe it's good to add a bit of perspective, and to remember just what a fortunate position I'm in. It would be a bit one dimensional if there was nothing to get annoyed about, and I went on this trip to find out a bit more about how the world is ("full of arseholes" perhaps).

Anyway, the best thing about life is being able to laugh, so here's some stuff that at least made me grin :


"FOOTBAAAALL !"

I'm not usually one for sporting events, as I find most sport utterly boring. However ... I do like drinking and shouting in public, and AFL (Aussie rules football) seems to be a game that is sufficiently fast paced and frenetic to hold my attention. We went off to the Melbourne / St. Kilda game at the MCG, part of the four week finals series. That's Graydon and Leanne on the left, two of our housemates.











The pitch is roughly the shape and size of a cricket pitch (AFL being a game that came about as a way for cricket players to stay in shape over the winter). It's very different to British football, in fact being totally unrelated. The game takes place over four quarters, ostensibly twenty minutes a piece but with stoppages usually closer to thirty. It's a long game alright, but very popular - attendance was around 60,000 for this game (venue capacity being 100,000).








Watch out, son ! A nifty catch by a St. K player could end in trouble very soon ...

I like this game because it's very fast paced, there doesn't seem to be a lot of unnecessary and complex rules, and there's a lot of, well, scuffles. Naively, Graydon asked me to provide a rolling commentary on the video he shot. The game is now played by five teams simultaneously, on ponies, with 39 players a side.










Party on, dude ! Inter-quarter entertainment came in the form of a load of beers and meat pies. And some kids going bonkers two rows in front, making crude banners and driving their parents up the wall.











Shit ! That was a goal ! St. K belt one in. As the ball has gone through the middle two posts, that counts for six points - get it between one of the middle posts and outermost ones and that counts as a 'side' - one point. The Saints put up a sterling effort for the greater part of the game, but let it slip in the final quarter when The Demons barged their way to victory. Final score was St. Kilda 72 (10 goals, 12 sides), with Melbourne winning at 90 (13, 12).









A flock of birds flew over the stadium at half time. It was so beautiful etc. etc.















The only gig I've been to since The Minority was at Hi Fi in the CBD. We were there primarily to see The Midnight Juggernauts, on the advice of Dave and Jodie. First on was Talk Show Boy, one of the most original and entertaining acts we've seen so far. It was a simple enough setup - Adrian plugs in his iPod, starts the backing tracks of his own creation and then runs around all over the venue screaming into his mic. He also cracked the following joke : "People who are able to make music that don't" - that certainly hit home :(




Unfortunately, the rest of the gig wasn't so interesting - in fact we left in the middle of the Valentinos set. It was the usual sort of stylised 'indie'-rock, very Strokes / BRMC influenced. They should have been called something like "Thatcher's Crotch", their music was that conservative.



Actually, there was some other live music to be had. I heard the sound of a drumkit as I walked up Swanston St. last week. With nothing better to do I followed the sound up to the State Library. And saw this ... Melbourne's finest law enforcers playing at being rock stars. I sidled up to one of their colleagues and demanded to know just what in Blue Blazes was going on. It turns out it was some of sort of PR event to show the public the friendlier side of the force. So I stuck around to see them go through a covers set including Forever Young by Alphaville (enjoying another go as part of the soundtrack to Napoleon Dynamite), and AC/DC's It's A Long Way To The Top If You Wanna Rock n Roll. They got some random members of the public to help out on that one - never one to resist making a berk of myself in public, I obviously helped them out.




Hands up ! It looked like everyone in town turned up and started dancing - much like an end scene from several shit 80s movies (Caddyshack, I'm looking at you). The kids in the audience obviously thought all of this was great.














I don't care what anyone says, this is a good look. Cops in kilts and aviator shades with bagpipes. They even went so far as to have a riff-off with the guitarist on an AC/DC song.

















The cynical view to take would be "Why are they mucking around with guitars instead of going prowling for villains ?". Charitably, I gave 'em the benefit of the doubt, and assumed that the officers involved would have been on their days off anyway. As a PR stunt, it seemed to work very well - the whole of the area around Latrobe and Swanston Sts. seemed abuzz with people relaxing and enjoying themselves.













Romance is not dead in St. Kilda ! You can't go anywhere without seeing someone declaring their undying passion for someone else in a patch of semi-dry concrete. Or even consummating a chance encounter with a short-term beau, no rare sight on Inkerman. They went one further the other day - by writing it in the sky. Oddly enough our mate Chris in Edinburgh had sent us a load of CDs through the post, and I noticed this not long after picking them up. Splendid !






Yahh ! Your computer's rubbish - it don't run Doom or nuffink ! Actually this is CSIRAC, the only first generation computer still in existence. Currently parked up at Melbourne Museum, this photo really does not do justice to the scale of the machinery on display. A system that takes up almost an entire room, back when people had to properly think about the programs they entered (on punch cards, natch). Trying to find a fault on one of these bastards must have absoloutely sucked. However, some things have always been the same - I was not in the least fooled by pictures of saucy 50s women winking and pointing at the valves. In almost exactly the same way you get some token model (usually wearing thick rimmed glasses for "authentic geekiness") on every advert from small scale web hosting to mainframe vendors. No doubt designed to appeal to the Beavis And Butthead element of every delusional nerd. Listen, I've been in IT long enough to know that this is just not the case. I have never, ever been interrupted in my inspections of the rows of "blinken lichten" by some strumpet with a penchant for discussing superconductivity. Pity.







Cockroach Kitchen ! Part of the natural science part of Melbourne Museum. Yes, these are live cockroaches - they were scurrying about and clicking angrily at each other to wash the frying pan. It has become abundantly clear that I need my own museum to fill up with rad stuff, oddities and curios.













Complete with three flying ducks. This particular detail had me crying with laughter, though it never did become clear why the canteen carnival existed in the first place.










I'd have liked to have a photo of a possum somewhere, but those things are batshit insane and I'm basically scared of them. I tried to take a photo, the sound that came out of it's mouth was not of this world :(