i feel your feverish need for some communication

i am touch with spirits good and bad

gin and rummy

none of us can lead each others life

my life is so fucking weird and so fucking fucked up

held together with a chord progression and a cool bass riff or something

the real me has come on tonight

you have no idea who you are dealing with

who does anyway?

hollywood night spot honey

i play a gig with jeffrey cain and gregory kuehn and some cat leslie

i already like leslie cos thats my dads name right

i have devolved towards that simplicity

the gig is a blinder

the 3 musicians with no rehearsals nail down a wild gig

i mean this was beyond my wildest rehearsals baby

these cats fucking took this stuff and they played with it man

listen to me and my yanqui cliches my dude

but thats what happens

if ya hang around long enough you get pals like kuehn and cain and co

and ya give these cats like a bare framework they can ornament it

or whatever it is

beautiful wonderful divine stuff

and rumours of some film

this was a remarkable gig

maybe seventy people there max

no stage no nothing

we conjured up some stuff thats all you can say

me on bass

me on guitar

sometimes me reading the words with my fucking glasses on like a fool

i hear robin danars beautiful mix

even from where i am

my voice

its raw after 21 gigs with the church

i got the swagger and sway of nailing every fucking gig but so what

the church is a machine

tim powles obliterates the drum kit

peter and haugie fucking rock

they fucking rocked every night

after 21 gigs of one kind or another we nailed it

i was confident for 2 hours a day

as the spirit came down into my tired head

the spirit of the gin

the spirit of my beloved weed

the spirit of the sold out crowd waiting for ya behind the curtains

but some other spirit too

oh yes oh my you know its true

and the night in hollywood with caino and gang was a true little blinder

thats what musicians can do when theyre excellent musicians but under-rehearsed

the edginess fucking kicked it along

leslie was back there banging and strumming along

the piano and guitar

and i listen to that voice

i’m listening to my own voice coz i am lagged and drunk and frazzled and arrogant

in my head i am fucking alex chilton and jim morrison only im from australia so what?

i dont fucking care if theres 70 people there

the gig was advertised the day before

the place is small dark and red

im playing these borrowed and beautiful instruments

i’m listening to my voice

i’m listening to the 1000 things it can do and imply

its old and husky buts its oh so suddenly velvety smooth

the stupid voice impresses even me

oh what a kind man he must be to have a voice like that i stupidly think

as it plumbs some quiet lyric which is suddenly so unbearable poignant

for a moment i am an oracle and to each person in the room a different message

briefly we all glimpse something we wanted to see

even me with my eyes shut listening to my authenticity and my affectations

my airs and graces

it no longer matters

i stumble around of course and lunge about it but it always mercifully works out

i have an old face but my body is suppler than you think it can be

of course that is only due to yoga which allows me to bop and rock

how fantastically ridiculous and charming and gauche to try to combine all this stuff

i cant make up my tiny mind if my voice is good or bad and i argue with myself onstage as i go on singing

i swim in hotel pools as blue as the sky

i eat fries and hemp milk shakes

i get a vitamin b shot in the ass from a black chick at a clinic in la

yes i definitely recommend that

i travel through night and day in a bus

i an am alien and confused just woken up somewhere

i go down to the station and im an overnight sensation

i have tomato soup for lunch in new york

no chicken stock smiles the lovely strange latina waitress

it doesnt matter what i write its all just words

i laid down my fucking credentials in wilderness debentures

some nights i guess i just hit it once in a rare while

with a little help from my friends

let me roll it to ya

 

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