The Time Being | Steve Kilbey

frost report

finally getting around to it

the video of jack frosts tiny USA tour in 1991

here we are playing and quipping

quipping and playing

lots of mucking about

strumming and picking guitars

we take on the press the record company the audience and each other

grant is by turns sardonic sarcastic sentimental

his smile is so heartbreakingly lovely

we were doing a promo tour of the USA

a few live gigs a few radio shows

some of the stuff has been lost down the tubes forever

this then is the creme of what remained

we only knew about 10 songs

you’ll hear a few of the same songs a few times in different circumstances

i left almost all the live footage intact.

the film over all is no where near as jumpy as “buzzes and fades”

the sound quality is ok

i have not tampered with anything

this is a live home bootleg

theres lots of talk about drugs and sniggering at ourselves

its kinda sad to see it 23 years on now but its instructional

i was on the verge of a huge heroin habit about to consume my life

at this stage i was dabbling but grant had been dabbling for ages

we keep mentioning drugs with a truly monotonous regularity

although little comes our way beyond the odd joint

we seem quite besotted by each other too and our perceived “clevernesses”

we are existing in our own little bubble

and when we get back to sydney eventually that bubble will burst

here i am looking so stylish and confident and cool

on the eve of my descent into heroin mess i was definitely stylish

grant was so fucking funny

and so condescending to some of the “idiots” we encounter

grant and i thought we were the bees knees in being the hippest guys alive

and we had teamed up

i was about to have twins E and M

and grant had split up with his girlfriend whom he adored

we turned up in LA and we watched the then brand new Doors movie with val kilmer

afterwards grant just wanted to do something so bad…!

people underestimate the rock n roll side of grant

it co existed there with all the thomas hardy stuff believe me

its sad and strange watching this

he was the best friend i ever had until drugs tore us apart

grant never descended into full on addiction and he went back to brisbane

and he stopped or de escalated to the occasional dabble again

but he and i fell out permanently when i didnt stay at his place in brisbane one time

instead i had elected to stay at a drug dealing friends place

i had made my choice

and grant and i only saw each other one more time before his death

i wish i had spent more time with him when he was still here

blah blah blah

luckily this film remains to remember those days

anyway its done now except for some boring tweaks here and there

a postcard from bygone times

available soon i expect

another yellow period

the famous face of her fabulous frame

the games are announced in the marvellous spring

now its summer outside my tiny windows

summer eve can you believe such a thing?

the ointment of night is spread cross the sea

some joint still broadcasting from the 1950

some heartbreaking song broken on the wind

lonesome old music adrift in the night

in the night of great wonders approacheth the shops

the salty air corroding the chrome of the rich

i ditch my clothes on a heap on the floor

from out of the black i am coaxing a face

the night is a painting with its white and  its pink

the bats swoop low over roofs of the trippers

the wandering clouds are battered in heaven

i work as the ghosts play all their tricks on me

the lights go on and off things fall to the ground

i am not impressed by the whisperings near my head

the ocean however has purified the air

mosquitos still feed off me freely but they fly away fucked

my blood congeals in their bellies like darkening treacle

my heart beat is very very slow years pass between its subtle pulses

the summer night is full of girls who fall out of the bars

the babble of the drunken patrons is intensified by tonight

the looming holiday has elevated them with false bonhomie

their sunburnt faces utter a million meaningless words

outside on the street i am gone

dont look for me

i am in a tower of trees where a sometime pleasant breeze blows

i am sitting here banging it all out i never stop

i am charged with energy i have sucked from the great white stars

i am lucid on the dream run home where i score again again in zone

the mackerels in shoals flash from the green moonlit rocks

in an ice cream shop i add caramel to raspberry blocks

the night in eden down by the docks

summer but shorter and shortening day

unheard of sound begins to play

the realest world we have

hello and welcome

i have a lot of stuff still on the boil

songs from the real world is now out and its pretty good

maybe not quite as good consistently as a real kil/ken record but close

it does contain a few standout tracks however

which would not be outta place on the real deal

tracks like naomi and maya

and “my one”

a lovely power ballad for david and ginas wedding

i dont believe anyone has ever done a record like this before

i’d be interested to see what you thought of our commissions

although martin and i are both artists and dream up our own stuff prolifically

we both enjoy being artisans and using our experience to write specific songs as directed

this has always been one of the functions of art : to do what somebody else asks you to do

like mikey angelo painting the sistine chapel and stuff like that

you pay us to write you a song

martin and i take your request and we actualise your wish

some of our songs moved their new owners to (good) tears

here you can hear us plying our trade with love and care and flair (but not flares)

we have songs about children whove lost a parent

we have songs about lakes eternities and theology

we have songs about cafes and wives and daughters and friends

and even one brand newey just for the hell of it

martin had a track he’d kinda forgotten about

and i insisted he dig it up and lemme do something on it

its the last track. i kinda dig it

its like a dylan track off street legal or something

good on us! who else is doing tracks that sound like street legal ?

(thats a dylan album for the philly steins out there)

so look naturally i recommend it

and it was actually me who nagged MK to release it

so happy am i with most of it

i wanted you all to hear it…

next up i am playing my last shows of the year on my own

one in canberra at smiths bookshop

this will be a return where i have my voice intact

and my guitar strung prop’ly

i will trying some new material and plenty of old

i will be reading the funny bits from my book

there are some funny bits in my book that people enjoy hearing

the bits about me on tour told in a schizo kinda way

tales of the zigger jacket etc

(what the fuck is a zigger jacket anyway? )

there will be rambling misty eyed reminiscing about the AC fucking T

and how its dullness fostered my scintillating genius

that every current canberran ninny is just dying to hear ha ha

so there i am me and me book and me guild 12 in smiths book shop

itll be all yer christmas wishes come true if youre an atheist

bah humbug and have a merry whatsit canberra cos i’m a coming sunday night baby

15 dec riding in my gold falcon sleigh with bells on

then the 17th up in troppo brizzie

i will be appearing at lefties old time music hall

once a joint of salubrious notoriety now a lovely old gig

bringing back misty memories of seeing vanessa the undresser there in 1857

during the gold record rush

jesus old vanessa’d be getting on these days ……(sigh!)

anyway there are rumours of a few guests coming along to help out

so fingers crossed that will come to pass

please come to lefties all you Qlders

i’ll have merch n everyfing for late chrispy presents… perhaps for an enemy

its gonna be a great gig i promise you that and thats a promise i may keep

tickets are selling pretty good to that so make sure i dont miss out

(on selling more)

gee this advertising malarky is a cinch for me isnt it?

meanwhile ive been doing Rock Wiz all round the place

hobnobbing with old guard of Doc Neeson and Mark Gable

or hanging with the new kids like Nick from Deep Sea Arcade

or Izzi from the Preatures

you can be sure i am my usual grumpy boring tired self

Docs tales of being on a troop carrier plane in the middle east

and of heat seeking missiles locking on

and the pilots aerial acrobatics to throw it off

should have but did not calm my shakey nerves as we came into adelaide

however i very much appreciated him and Mr Gable being my wingmen

when i needed to have a desperate wee wee during a traffic jam in melbourne

they were taking the  attention from me you see and were creating a diversion

mark also took some pictures of me i believe (unbelievably enuff!!)

go to seeskpeesontrees.com and price on application i understand

meanwhile i work on bits n pieces

and listening to new church album so far which is undeniably good

ha ha

love on each n every one of you

sk

unbeknownst

in the deep arctic hole in my heart

where a lake of ache lies

the drowning city of sham

under waves of pity and scorn

when i heard them sing my song

the music travelled back in time towards me

from a future i will never know

the blindsided visionary backstage then

the alpha and epsilon

the flash of a flint the gasp of a crowd

the burning sea laps at the dirty sand

the thunder above us to say god will never love us

we still chant and supplant the suppliant rhyme

in time and both spaces we come face to faces

i am jonah on this aeroplane throw me off!

i plummet through the clouds but i still scoff

look i strap on my axe my fender stradivarius cumulo nimbus

but my blistered eyes cant see the redline coming

in rockpools by the sea see me sitting there strumming

god i cry for everyone i weep for rome

my tears would wash london clean back home

my scalding crocodile tears for my twins as they sing away out there

my skinny twins every day is a new beginning let the twinning begin

in some frozen city those pretty kitties dream their pop

i reach out in the dark recess of past i lived too fast

i guess the smack caught up with me at last

i shoot money up my arm howcome my brain is empty of the ready

i took a hit in the pit of my stomach rendered me unsteady

its hot in my room some wild zephyr doth fucking blow

whats a pansy like me doing in this tropical ruin i’ll never know

i wrote some chords but they were swords unto my ear

throw me off this craft i’m falling after all

plunger i tear through the sky like a stone

clutching wildly at vapours and mists we all fall alone

ive forgotten the words and i’m out on stage

the music from yesteryears back pages unleashed from its cage

man its like a shock wave as it travels back at me at the mic

and suddenly the phrases light up my limpet soul mighty quick

and on each side my identical daughters like mirrors to the slaughter

and the pilots voice comes on crooning i didnt know he could sing

you gotta let me off this plane really now i understand everything

and the pilot sings

why dont you why dont you why dont you

fall away

with me…?

view finder

in this house where nothing is mine only gods

a gracious spirit has passed by bringing us some sweet music

holy harmony of long gone jericho maybe ripped from horn

i remember the hanging gardens of nineveh i dreamed in my tomb

yes there were angels but they were terrible to look upon

with great wings beating cobalt void

voices calling heavens language into the ether

but i have wandered from both my oath and path

in brothel and opium den god still see through men

down every wire the liar is trapped again

the muse i sought was not so easily bought

the discontent of winter gave way to summers blazing bloom

in a courtyard in israel where the camera flare

and music comes like the most perfect distance approaching all whirling strangest strings

flinging things from its centre the music enters from above

covering the plains and planes of men with the strains of gods own song

oh if you can bear to hear it oh mortal man

every drum in every world and worlds we cannot even apprehend my friend

beating out the heart of gods name in blood like flame

suddenly i am eventually reduced to moaning my poem in the dirt of this earth

i crawl and trawl through my desert bible moses madman mayhem

let my people go

i let my people go to the city of sin and sodom down by the transparent sea

there was a bitch of a devil and she was waiting for me

i am an angel too she spat into a darkening storm that hovered high

as she pull out my eyes so i could see she was as blind as me

this nightmare world is gone come morning somewhere i care about

but the question of evil is not leaving so easy just to please thee

god intervene in this dream i sure as silent scream

god in a field in the bright land beyond death

your cross is grown over now in flowers of light

so absorbed in eternal perfection and wondering aloud

each word is a song some world will one day sing

each world slips created into time and is at once complete

oh everything is already there

nothing begins nothing ends

the music composed once lasts in the air forever

it is the very weather it is the birds and it is the fish

its the howling nether beasts who may not exist

oh fox mind siren who sings from her cove

and crazy maenad ripped orpheus for love

music is dripping from gods fingers child i guarantee it

if i couldnt be his singer why would i be it?

i play the blues down in the swamp the monsters come and see it

i arctic harp in the frosted halls and walls under the blackest vault

the women lie close to me to keep their bodies warm they say

but when the darkness comes some hands under my shirt begin to play

through this ice roof i feel his eyes although no surprise

in this wintered cloak we entered underground through a burnt oak

the mulled wine with its almonds and raisins was warm

soon a swarm of shadows had gently enfolded me in sleep

and after that

there were no memories i was allowed to keep