The Time Being | Steve Kilbey

rain of terra

wind whipped droplets tiara crested

hawklike hailstoned in a hidden house

carousing with some bird

i knock at the bass drum as if a heartbeat

small voices escape from it like sighs and whispers

in the backwoods symphony of autumn that falls

my wandy stick emanating mana oh my tremble feather

tree topping hills in 1950s rain

i look out from my branch deep in the may emporium

in my white and ruffled room like tabby ochre

kitty claude all nailed damasked and frozen inner sky

i under land the plain

half human fuller gain

black dove on white sky

my arrows arcs towards it on the fly

i apprehend your pain as waves thru a devices membrane

in the bolero readings of my spanish uke

fluking a wail

i sing of summergone days

vitesse

i dreamt i was a tiny man acorn born

under gods bluest sky i lie in gilded lily light

harnessed to the clouds i drift over asia minor proudly

or burrow beneath the firm and fruitful soil

narrowly daisy framed in seed and nut

i am that little sprite a flightless wingless thing

inklings of egret

i read the mind of a bird

see from its eye

high above the rolling steps to the sea

dive falcon falling stalling in thin air over just over there

i am that selfish elf that dwells in winter in warm room

dug beneath the tomb of a saint

i am that earthy spirit in the black graped wine of another china

i pine for the fir cracked by cruel axe

a naiad bride who lays on her side in my rivery bed

twin daughters in gold i am told they cannot be seen except by the very young

or by the very old

identical voices untrammelled  in youth

one is life

one is truth

warming sun come down when they are around

hawthorn hag and brambled blackberry

a little factory producing sweet flower

bees humming languidly i am free to attend on thee

in my dream i was finning it with a childs story fish

i rode a great carp

and my harp was fashioned from india and ceylon

and even beyond

dale and dell all tell the same tale

mannikin errant

i cant even remember my name

vibraphoney

i have transferred into the abstract

where fear is tempered by this storm outside

the rattling doors the rolling deepest groans

the rain is incessantly persistent

the gardens underwater like sunken cities

old dark blood throbs in my main vein in my tree

i am the pots and pans of evergreen water

i am the silvered bits of star glimmered in puddled mirrors

i am the fury of age undermined by a terrible rust

the wind shrieks tormenting idiots grovel

their huts and villages vanquished yes i am blown away

my mercy all used up when midnight sank my canoe

the blinded flash of bats in camera off line in slimy bark

the tautened twisted spidered threads as the orb hangs dead

nothing frightens me in my hurricanes or typhoon

lashed by whips of the spur studded drops

my steed carries me into allegro nights

where emptiness transfusions as chasm

oh my nasty procedure

now i am saw

now i am herd

now i am glistened to on ferrari quartz crystal thingies

now i am returned unto my old lucky-pants bed

snugly ugly in the down of morning yet to come

i will awake unintimidated by badly dreamt people

who hound me all through my falling night

until the horizon crackles like a dim spark

and my palms lay hammered flat by rat and love

mutton n killer

the story so-far

in early 2000s

hedonistic drug addled twin spitting singer never meets

up with quiet reserved musician a few good years his junior

instead they create first album virtually by post long distance

!st album is a very promising electro-ambient affair

with some slightly rocky moments and some spiritualistic stirrings

second album is more poppy tho

although it contained some good songs in of themselves

it was a slight misstep perhaps

sometimes it feels too smart for its own damn good

but still a devilishly fine record and make no mistake…

then came the 3rd record

and here we kinda hit some whole new level

suddenly we are looking at a big picture here

god and love and life and death and all that

the music has totally grown

there is a seriousness and gravitas like um.. pink floyd or something i guess

we didnt see that coming at the beginning did we..?

but that third album is pretty damn good

and even the british press give it 4 star good reviews

yeah its a brilliant record alright

and i cannot bring myself to write that this new album is better than that one

but i can affirm that it is as at least as good

and that it contains a few bona fide classic songs that will tug on your brain strings

and make your heart think again

martin has come into his own even more as an instrumentalist

some of his playing definitely conjures up earlier church songs you never heard before

both on guitar on bass there are churchy moments absolutely

he has enlisted a primary school choir who chime in unexpectedly

his own daughter hollie makes an impressive vocal debut on a few numbers

mirroring miranda kilbeys vocal debut on the first album

she also appears in a video

looking like a miniature baby kim gordon

snarling out the words

and tossing a blonde fringe around menacingly

3 0r 4 or maybe 5 of these songs are very special songs

it makes me wonder how we wrote em

an anonymous gun-for-hire guitarist

has on a track called this merciful blur 

conjured an alterna dave gilmour

who plays his lovely fluid solo and flurries

ands then leaves quietly not to be heard of again

females join in and duet and underscore my voice

my voice is sometimes vocoded

hopefully having a slightly retro sci-fi feel that our martin loves so much

auto-tune is used to be obvious and in this kind of music it sounds bizarre

there are loads of different drums

real drums machine drums whatever or all mixed up

the album owes debts to floyd bowie krautrock and stuff like that

yet we have now incorporated and transcended all influences

the album sounds mostly like us

it sounds like the last album

the words are obviously my usual patina of preoccupations

a lot of it sophisticated sophistry and subtle subtexts

it again deals with all that stuff i do

you know what i mean

god sex drug mind paradox memory longing etc etc

its all there in every single line

c’mon kennedy and i are good at this sort of stuff by now

and the album again has the deluxe lush mix of s.polinski

which means it sounds pretty much like a million dollars

more and more i am seeing it as an extension of that last albums big feeling

the last song once gets me everytime

and is probably one of the prettiest and romantic songs i ever did

but its weird too

sometimes when the odd child here or there chimes in along with my lyrics

it is a most disconcerting thing

in the mouths of children the words take on new and strange meanings…

sometimes i can tell if its me singing with myself in falsetto

or martins subtle backing vox

or sometimes a machine

some singing is interrupted by spoken word passages

and this stuff is hilariously pretentious and simultaneously gloriously bent

its got it all on there

i listened to it twice today

i have to say it really is a rather riveting listen

it was a good record to march along to

it was a good record to delve into or just take in superficially

melody and attention to small detail

we should get a doctorate each for being so fucking clever

because this aint rock for dummies

but lo it doth rock indeed in a few places

and martins guitar moves into harder spaces

and the bass pushes along just like i probably would have done it

if it had actually been me

you see the music martin writes reminds me very much of something

that i might have come across myself if i was doing the music

so i instantly can see what the singing must be

its incredible that 2 such different sorts of geezers

could intersect at this point

and create this single minded thing

you see (and this goes for everyone)

we may seem different

but

inside we are the same

now isnt that a nifty way to end this blatant little blurb?!

misery guts

you wanna sleep a little longer man

yeah i only been asleep 12 hours

the more i sleep the tireder i get

i see my family they are beautiful souls

in gardens of blinding flowers

in canteens at the end of the road

i hurled the book aside i cannot read it any longer

a thirsty elemental for destruction is trying to jump on my ship

a bad spell is upon me is it

removed slowly by our greatest oceans healing minerals

my plot has been lost among seaside graves

from my great distance

i see it all rush together

i see it all fall apart

oh too late to have sussed

decisions stack up outside my half-assed mind

some huge fucking fine falls out of the post

or i cant drive my stupid fucking car

my left hand goggle leaks in the pool no matter what i do

i break into tears at the drop of almost any hat

a genteel sad madness in the wee flat hours

a loneliness that one million crowds cannot appease

i cannot remember one song i ever even wrote not a note

still i walk along energetically trying to burn off my demons

at the pool i hurt my foot and i strangely enjoy the stinging pain

i peer through the veil for you and i see sleep

in your lovely story with all its happy endings

the autumn holiday is nearly over

i get ready for another type of hesitation

but i cant decide…

nobody home

in 1974 i was probably the worst singer in the worst band in the world

i mean the players could all play and were pretty good in their own way

but the band itself was a horrible mish mash of my stupid derivative ideas

i hated the fucking band and i’m not surprised that most other people did too

i take full responsibility for the ham fisted boogie glam dribble that emanated from us

i wrote all the “songs” so i cannot shift any blame elsewhere

i refuse to

it was my paucity of imagination

it was my lack of any originality whatsoever

and all the players “chops” werent altering the fact that we were simply awful

so no i didnt pop fully formed into this universe

with snaky basslines and ambiguous lyrics

in fact about the only thing i had going for me was my voracious reading of pop mags

thats right

i read them from cover to stupid cover every last word every last tiny blurred photo

i, the worst singer in the worst band, studied all this meaningless ephemera like a hawk

i had fallen out by now with my one true friend paul culnane

he was the only other person i knew in canberra in 1974

who could read between the lines of the rock journalists of the time

guys like dave di martino (who i was interviewed by at SXSW this very year)

guys like nick kent and lester bangs and sometimes patti smith herself

they all wrote in these various rags and i collected and read them all

that fact right there somehow made me different from all the other 2 bit bass guitarists

and teenage songwriters and would be rock stars…

kent and di martino and all the rest were always writing about this bunch of bands

and some of the bands they wrote about intrigued me no end

even though i had not heard one fucking note

or heard one fucking word

i knew that this music i would love

not because some  critic told me to

but because of some ideal i began to imagine

an ideal of the perfect guitar band

that would somehow conjure up

all i ever wanted to see which was invisible to me 

i had read a lot about a band called Big Star

although their records were not possible to find

at least not for me

they were in fact so obscure as to have flown under even my friend pauls radar

who was such a big raspberries and badfinger fan… i mean an absolute expert

still Big Star had somehow not piqued his interest when i “split” up with him

though obviously later on he must have discovered them i suppose

anyway sometime in early 1974 my band came to sydney to , ahem, fulfil one weeks engagement

and , ahem, produce a demonstration  recording in a fully equipped studio in syd-a-knee

readers of my fabulously amusing memoirs can keep reading on as a little adjunct

because here again we run into a show-band called Chalice believe it or not

after having escaped the dills in Saga who wanted to ham it up with routines

i had formed my own dissolute pack of glam gunslingers

and our first fucking gig in the big smoke guv’nor is opening

for the king of all the show bands that ever was

at least in australia

Chalice!!!!

although everyone of em seemed to be English

which seemed to mean that they sung in tune more properly and stuff

than their laconic colonial cousins perhaps

so every night the lucky punters at Chequers nightclub on goulburn st

(oh enthusiastic ones make a pilgrimage there now ; it still exists

maybe its a fucking hand-job parlour now or something i think)

you went down some stairs and there was Baby Grande and then starring Chalice

of course the much younger boys in BG stood around watching Chalice each night

the big tough looking blond singer with a northern accent

he could have been a frightening rugby player coming at ya

the other guys

all with long immaculately blowdried hair dos

like bridesmaids at a wedding would have

the whole band in their identical tailored suits

on a level of perfectly rendered cover versions

with some cheeky humour and very professional playing

they were the reigning show band group par excellence 

on the nick kent and lester bangs level it was pure merde

none of this has anything to do with anything really

there were 2 bands doing some kind of rock n roll

one a hamfisted glam boogie band

the other a bunch of conservative pros

this was not the stuff i was reading about

gee baby grande stayed at the Squire Inn now defunct in bondi junction

i got a shag cut and i fell in love with the hairdresser who was suddenly my girlfriend

i mean i was 20 and she was probably 17

there was a swimming pool and everyfink

Peter Koppes was there in the band

he was 19 and had a t shirt that said FUCK only it was written like the ford logo

i’m sure we was living it up…why wouldn’t you?

one day i’m wandering along in oxford st bondi junction before it was closed off

they turned it into a mall thingy but once it was street all the way

i wandered up a dark cool stairway up into some ultra cool record shop

and after looking through the records for a while i found it

i had forgotten i was even looking for it

i had given up hope of ever finding it but there it was

a record by Big Star

it was called Radio City

it was their second record

when i got back to canberra

i discovered that i adored radio city much more than i could have ever thought

much much much more

i still cannot understand how they got it to sound that way

how the fuck were they conjuring up these feelings ?

superficially one could compare Big Star to the raspberries and badfinger

it was total anglophile 1965/66 rock

like a perpetual mash up of all the best bits of Help and the Who

oh but Big Star had so far transcended the other 2 as good as they were

and as much as i like them to this very day

but Big Star, this alex chilton guy

it started at this basic beatle aesthetic

and there

where the beatles had all but abandoned this sound

and were really never to ever come back to it

and there where the raspberries and badfinger imagined songs

just like the beatles might have done but never did

at this very point this guy in memphis tennessee

i didnt even fucking know where that was on a map or what it meant or anything

no more than the raspberries coming from cleveland

now i can dig that kind of information

then memphis cleveland birmingham liverpool

what the fuck did i know ?

syd-a-knee was the most exotic thing i had ever known

anyway at this starting point where the others leave off

big star took this idea even beyond where the beatles (had been bothered) taking it

anyway out of the sky into my lap

has dropped something so unbearably exquisite

to say radio city is a beautiful record

is an overwhelming understatement

enough has been written of it elsewhere

my accolades will add nothing and not help alex chilton one jot

his ideas were so incredible sophisticated and subtle

i found it hard to even try and rip off his style

because i didnt know how he was writing and producing this stuff

i am still in the middle of reading his excellent bio

by holly george-warren

(hey holly feel free to use any quotes on yer next print)

the book is full of people i know or knew

people like karin berg who was an interesting part of alexs life

she signed us and guided us thru warner brothers

the book is harrowing as you watch this guy you loved

because he made one of the best records ever

its harrowing to watch him hit the skids and lose his way

i guess he achieved some redemption

because i already looked at all the pictures

and there he is at some gigs just before the end of his life at 59

and he looks relatively normal and at peace with himself

but i look at those photos and i cant decide if thats good or bad

i havent even mentioned big stars next record called sister lovers

i cant right now

im tired of typing and this computer

when i finish the book i will return with some more of my conclusions

i suppose

or maybe i never will

thats the alex way of doing things i guess

i ponder rosa

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

home april 1 fools and tools day

baton rouged

well thats basically that

the tour is over except for SXSW

which isn’t really a gig at all

i am sitting here on the bus in baton rouge

on one side is a fancy hotel

and on the other is a forest or something

the weather is warm and overcast

the weather implies many things to me

warm southern romantic weather or violent weather

around me in this place i pick up on activity

somewhere something is definitely happening

but where i am is warm quiet and uneventful

i am the dim receiver

impressions of other lives wash over me

things that don’t concern me and never will

it is a typical place at the end of a tour

the empty parking lot

the garbage at the edges of the woods

i drink down some spare tincture left on the bus

i wander to a mall and i get a massage from a chinese girl

i enter some other blissful universe that i never want to end

i meet wonderful people in my dreams and wander the skies

when i snap out of it i realise ian has had a massage there  too

and he was also transported elsewhere by the experience

yeah the tour is almost over except for these austin dates

one minute its all before ya

next minute its all in the past

all that noise and heat and sweat and light

all those people

all those mornings with all those coffees

at the end i astonished myself with the energy i could muster

i guess thats thanks to yoga and swimming

i am able to channel some source of mojo

which kicks my ass along all night as i play n sing for 2 hours

its getting darker outside now in baton rouge

and i think off so many other tours

so many other people and many of them now are gone

the times are gone

many of the places are gone

i am still out there treading the boards

but every thing else is changed

rocknroll rocknroll rocknroll

the weird ghosts and the memories

all these times all these tours all these events

but nothing waits out there for me tonight

that is a comfort and a shame

i am out of the game

although very much still a player of song

going from town to town

down the blackened tourbus corridor like a submarine

as we shoot through the greenish snow in the wee wee small hours

as we pick up and lose friends

as we cover great spaces asleep in the jarring blankness of the bunk

the shows are predictably a blur

new york atlanta wherever you like

i bestrode the stage and i gave it my all

so there is nothing more to say about those shows

they speak for themselves no doubt

or not at all

its 707 in Baton Rouge

we leave this car park in 8 hours

i love you all

i guess some yoga must be next

distant tyranny

washington and philly

we slew em

good crowds and great reaction

people saying we never sounded better

a guy whose seen us 150 times says we are at our best now

some little idiot puts up a video of ian fluffing a bit of reptile

and all the naysayers jump in

the same old little crowd

you know its possible to like the church as we are now

and to like MWP and whatever he does next

the 2 are not mutually exclusive

but the bitches gotta bitch…

ok well it was this way or nothing

i think our rave reviews and sell out shows have justified my decision

to carry on with ian

he’s doing a fucking incredible job

if you have a fucking beef with that

come backstage and tell me why that is

if you got the guts

I’m sorry you thought the band was over without MWP

but you were wrong

he is an incredible musician but we are an incredible band even without him

i have not spoken to him since he left with not a word

i respect his decision to leave

i love this man and i wish him the success he deserves

a rockin’ guitarist and a fountain of knowledge about music

you do not have to choose between us

you could have liked us both

but when you tell me i can’t continue with my band

that peter and i founded at least 6 months before we even met MWP

music and feeling peter and i have been working together since we were teens

i aint gonna walk away from this because someone else didn’t wanna do it anymore

that was his right

that was his prerogative

but if you believed he was the engine of the church’s music

you got it wrong

he was a quarter of it and now he’s gone we got a new quarter

personally we all dig our new quarter

we like him

we like his playing

we are actually very happy he is in our band

he is now one of us

man you gotta keep moving on

more songs

more tours

and more players if players drop out

i been speaking backstage with doctors and lawyers

and space aeronautical engineers

i been speaking with teenage kids and housewives

I’ve been speaking with many of our US constituents

and they have re-affirmed my confidence in this, my life’s work

my whole life leads up to everyone of these shows

and if you see us you will be amazed by what we put into this

because its everything we have

we love what we do

we love our audiences who believe in us

its an incredible loop

their love and their belief fills my old body every night i go onstage

i feel like i’m 14

better actually

i never had so much energy at 14

i am channelling their appreciation straight into my heart

where it pumps the rocknroll enzyme all over me

and the pain n doubt n tiredness n age

are totally nullified

with my bass guitar my wand my staff my trusty trident

for 2 hours i am oblivious to everything outside the room

yes like a vampire i suck the audiences energy

and i turn it back into music

without them i am just an old stupid geezer with a guitar

(come and see our shambolic soundchecks and rehearsals)

but once the people are in the room

the magic thing happens

oh bring it on i am addicted!

maybe its narcissism i wouldn’t doubt it

it definitely started there

last night a guy tells me

i am like an opera singer in my mannerisms

yes yes

exactly

a totally fucked up opera singer

and i sing my operas about this strange life we all having

at the back of every song is love

just like john lennon used to say

love love love

my job simultaneously humbles me and elevates me

its confusing

i am confused

i make mistakes

i forget the words and notes

i do and i say silly things

but i love my audience

i love our music

it has been an honour to spend 35 fucking years with y’all

i’m serious

no irony here now

thank you all

ps still on my mad alex chilton thing

cannot stop thinking about him

and listening to his records

sk boston 11 march 15

a new bus in a new town

Chicago Cleveland Cincinnati

we swim thru these cities

playing our music

nudging the songs on in to the future

whats it like, kilbo ?

asks a voice in an other room

you fucking lil superstar

you over the top over the hill

over the moon

thrum thrum thrum

deadpan them droll lyrics

wiggle your old hippy hips

oh moses you knows the power and the glory

tonite its always tonite

oh you lock in you lock in you locking in

a black poet on the street raps a poem to me

i give him a fiver

he says i just wanna eat something man

his poem is strange and hypnotic

everyone on this street knows my name

then

a woman jumps up on stage tackling me and wont let me go

i hold up my arms to indicate i’m not holding the ball

one of the road crew gets her off eventually

she’s saying something in my ear over the din of the music

i’m aware of how wet and sweaty i am as we come apart

in cleveland 3 attractive women are getting it on down the front

touching each other and stuff

giggling and that kind of thing

a lot of people in the cleveland audience making out and all that

people smoking weed at various gigs in the crowd

oh a hotel room too with a soft bed

starbucks coffee in a mall somewhere

people stare at us with our outlandish accents

we listen to 3 big star albums in a row

i read my alex chilton book

i walk in a bar and the box tops are playing

i look at snowy america go by

i go onstage and i rock n roll

i shout out this stuff i sing

blam bang wallop yeah crash

USA tour ok alright!

next?